Webinar Recording & Recap: Make your Business More Efficient with AI

AI does not need to feel complicated or out of reach for small businesses. Our recent webinar, Make your Business More Efficient with AI, focused on practical ways SMEs can start using AI to save time, improve content and get better support with everyday business tasks.

Rather than trying to master everything at once, the key takeaway was to start simple, test what works and keep refining your approach.

Use your website to guide the writing style

A helpful starting point is to copy and paste content from your website into the AI tool. This gives it a better sense of your tone, writing style and the audience you are trying to reach. For businesses creating blogs, emails, social posts or promotional copy, this can help produce output that feels more aligned to the business from the start.

Do not accept the first response

One of the most useful habits when using AI is to keep refining. If the first answer is too broad, too flat or not quite right, ask it to adjust. Tweak the wording, give more direction and tell it what to improve. Better results usually come from shaping the conversation rather than expecting the perfect answer first time.

Set up personalisation in ChatGPT

Using ChatGPT personalisation can make the tool more useful over time. By setting preferences for tone, style and the kind of help you want, you can get responses that are more relevant and practical from the start. This is especially helpful for busy SMEs that want support that feels clearer and more tailored.

Give the AI a clear role

Prompts tend to work better when the AI knows what role it is stepping into. Asking it to act as a social media manager, accountant, business adviser or marketing person can lead to more focused and useful responses. This gives the tool more context and can improve the quality of the answer.

A copy-and-paste prompt to try

Readers can use or adapt the following prompt:

“If I ever give a vague prompt, respond by asking me clarifying questions before answering.”

You can also follow this with practical instructions such as: “Act as a social media manager, accountant, business adviser or marketing person and tell me…”

Ask AI to improve your prompt

Another useful step is to write your first prompt, then ask the AI to improve it before carrying out the task. This can help make your request clearer, more specific and more likely to produce a strong result. It is a simple way to get better output without needing to know prompt-writing techniques in depth.

Be careful with AI-generated images

If you create images with AI, it is worth taking time to adjust them before using them publicly. Small edits can help the image feel more natural and more in line with your brand. It is also a good idea to rename downloaded image files from AI systems, which may help reduce the chances of them being flagged as AI.

Start with the free version first

For most businesses, the best place to begin is with the free version of an AI tool. This gives you space to test how useful it is in your day-to-day work without extra cost. If you start to run out of free credits and find real value in the tool, that is the point to consider moving to a paid plan.

Explore more support

If you would like to keep building your confidence with AI and use it more effectively in your business, check out our AI Business Consultant here.

Used well, AI can become a practical support tool for SMEs – helping with writing, planning, marketing and decision-making in a way that saves time and supports better day-to-day efficiency.