Signal Lab

AI Starter Kit for Small Business

Five safe, practical ways to start using AI in a small business — each with a human check on the numbers.
Treat what AI gives you as a signal, then confirm the figure at source before you act on it.

Why it matters: AI can draft, sort and summarise in seconds, but it can also be confidently wrong. The value comes from pairing a fast first draft with a person who checks it against the real record — the bank feed, the invoice, the ledger.

Practical AI Small business

Your answers stay in this browser. Export only — nothing is uploaded. Illustrative, not financial or technology advice.

Signal Lab · Toolkit

AI Starter Kit

Four steps: check you're ready, pick the uses that fit, see the time it could save, then take home a 30-day plan and your prompts.

Illustrative example until you enter your own answers. Not financial or technology advice.

  1. 1 · Readiness check
  2. 2 · Five starter uses
  3. 3 · Time it could save
  4. 4 · 30-day plan

Step 1 · Quick readiness check

Eight questions, about two minutes. Answer for how things are today, not how you'd like them to be. · Jump to score

Which of these does the business already use? (tick any — tailors the tool suggestions)

Readiness score (%)

Getting ready · 0–44%Ready to start · 45–74%Ready to scale · 75–100%

Step 2 · Five starter uses

Each one saves time on a job most small businesses already do. Tick the ones you want in your 30-day plan, and adjust the hours to suit your business.

Tool names are examples of common products that can do this kind of work — not endorsements. Check what your existing software already includes.

Step 3 · Time it could save

Uses ticked for your plan. Your estimates, not measured results.

Your own or your team's hourly cost — use what you'd pay to have the work done.

Confirming the figure takes time. Count it.

After leave and quiet periods.

UseIn planHours/weekAfter checking$/week$/year

Illustrative only. These figures are your own estimates. In practice, measured time savings are often lower than first expected — checking, rework and learning the tool all take a share. Time the task for a week before you start, then compare at the end of the 30 days before you count on the saving.

How this is calculated
  • Hours after checking = Hours/week × (1 − checking %)
  • $/week = Hours after checking × value of an hour
  • $/year = $/week × working weeks per year
  • Readiness score = sum of question weights: Yes = full weight, Partly = half, No = zero (weights shown next to each question; they add to 100)

Excludes software costs. Illustrative — not financial or technology advice.

Step 4 · Your 30-day plan

Built from the uses you ticked and your readiness answers. One owner, one log, one decision at the end.

Take it with you

Export the plan and your inputs, or copy the prompts for the uses you ticked.

Takes your current answers — stays on your device.