The AI era is now a reality no one can escape. They are capable of doing almost everything that we humans do with software. Big companies making huge deals with AI software companies were expected. However, the way AI is impacting small businesses as well might not have been on anyone’s list earlier. 

AI technology has revolutionised the entire market, even the creativity field as well. So when it comes to small businesses, the question is not about using these tools to grow but to survive. 

Only businesses that will be using these AI tools will survive in the marketplace. Rest all will be replaced by their smart competitors. 

Do you want to refuse the change like many others out there or want to dive into the limitless possibilities of AI? If you choose the 1st one, I will guide you to leave this article right now. If you also want to dive in, read the article completely. 

In this article, we’re going to show you the 10 ways you can boost your business efficiency with AI. 

1. Content Generation: 

The revolution of AI started with Chatgpt which is a text-to-text software tool. Later all of a sudden, we got bombarded with content-creating applications. Chatgpt, Google Bard helps with writing content whereas Midjourney, Dall-E helps with generating engaging images from texts. 

It is estimated that 1/3rd of the content creation community has already started to use AI for their content. Obviously, the numbers are going to rise only. 

The AI tools are the next-gen search engine which shares the data & information. With a few changes, you can use them. This saves 30-50% of their time. 

AI like ‘mid-journey’ can create what the brain can imagine. All you need is just to give words to your ideas. 

2. Marketing: 

Marketing is a sector where AI has proved its worth to the last single penny. This is a combination of data, predictions, understanding trends & patterns, customised strategies, and customer experience. 

Where marketers use their teams to scrap the data to use the best ideas for marketing, AI can help companies do the same with much less effort. 

Here are a few ways how AI helps in marketing. 

– AI tools have the ability to search, organise, categorise, and analyse thousands of data from previous marketing campaigns & competitors’ insights. 

– AI can help with understanding customer behaviour better. By looking at the data, the AI can help categorise your audience on different bases such as country or language. This will further help in creating strategies according to the divisions and gain more leads.

3. Sales: 

Not only the leads but you can also optimise your sales force as well. The AI tech is able to do all kinds of analytic jobs which usually take more than 60% of the time of sales executives. This means they actually invest only 30% of their time into actual sales. Moreover, AI can do these things as well for you. 

– AI can forecast the incoming trends by looking at the data. This will also help you improve customer interactions, and patterns, prioritise leads, and identify the next steps with the customers. 

– Using AI technology, keeping a lead scoreboard is easier than ever. 

– With tools such as Chatgpt & Google Bard, you can personalise emails and other outreach messages, generating the best response rates. 

4. Customer Service: 

Companies want to serve their customers 24×7. But is it possible? Yes but only when you have a strong team, actively working for both shifts. The more you support your customers, the more they will come to you and do mouth-marketing for your product/service. 

Expert customer support professionals believe that AI is going to be very helpful in their job. It will save their time & respond faster to queries. 

– AI-powered Chatbots will take the text support and share personalised B2B & B2C answers and recommendations. They can be the ground-zero support for them. 

– Self-service or knowledge base is taking a high ride nowadays. Features like FAQs & more knowledge bases like PDFs, and dedicated web pages encourage customers to solve their queries on their own. 

– AI will help you with the best customer insights such as login data, social media posts, reviews, surveys, and more. 

5. Human Resource: 

Leveraging AI for the HR department will reduce the operations work heavily. There are several ways a company can implement AI for managing a team, signing in new team members, checking the performance, cost-cutting, promotion & appraisals, and selecting new employees for the company. 

– AI tools will help in writing content for different job descriptions, interview questions, outreach emails, and offer letters. 

– Applicant tracking system will track whether an applicant is suitable for the position or not. 

– Companies can use AI Chatbots to engage with candidates. These Chatbots can help them land suitable job roles according to their skills & interests. 

– Centralising the data with the help of AI will be easier. A single tool can be customised to look after payrolls, benefits, attendance, learning, performance, talent reviews, retention, and skills. 

6. Cybersecurity: 

The tech world is at its peak today, making the world more transparent, connected, and available to all. But no one can forget the threat it is making to privacy & cyber-attacks on each one of us. 

Well, better if we embrace the technology by understanding its potential and using it for our benefit. IBM surveys say that 64% of cybersecurity executives have already started implementing AI for enhanced security implementation. 

Before you use AI tools for security, make sure you take consultation with IT security professionals so no data should be leaked at any cost. 

–          AI can analyse data and patterns of a red flag and identify them before they cause significant damage.  

–          AI-enabled security will monitor all potential threats and evolve with time and environment. 

–          The AI tools analyse spam emails, unknown traffic, and messages. This will take the red flags into consideration and pose them against the bad bots. 

7. Legal Departments: 

Corporate lawyers deal with a lot of data & go through heavy processes which in turn take a lot of their time in documentation and research. Implementing AI means everything will move faster with fast research, real-time analysis, and documentation. 

–          AI tools will heavily reduce the time taken in documentation, research, and analysis of the key insights.  

–          Double cross-checking the contract to find errors and unfavourable terms. 

–          The AI tech can generate initial standard documents for clients. 

–          AI can cope with business compliance around the globe and help you reduce penalties. 

8. Accounting: 

Accounting is all about the calculation of several factors. Here is the thing, AI can help you save a lot of time by setting all things on automation. Data entry, managing payrolls, approving appraisals, expenditures etc. 

–          AI can automate manual accounting tasks. This includes data collection, data entry, categorization, and invoicing. Time to free up some time for the accounting employees. 

–          Machine learning will help you create an error-free payroll system. 

–          Effectively prepare financial statements for tax auditing and reduce time & resources for the same.

9. Finance: 

The finance department always deals with data, automation, and cloud solutions. Using AI for a company’s finance will automate processes and provide large data sets, improve decision-making, prevent scams, and maintain compliance. 

–          AI can speedily check large amounts of data and uncover insights that are useful for companies. This will improve the decision-making with precise data. 

–          Fraud in finance is a common act. Thanks to AI technology, you can now identify the errors that are commonly overlooked, and suspicious behaviour, and evaluate financial transactions. 

–          AI tools can help companies predict future trends by analysing the data, economic indicators, and metrics. 

Conclusion: 

Getting into AI is the only way small businesses are going to survive in the coming years. It is true that AI technology is still in its first phase, companies have already started utilising it for their operations and this article shows HOW. 

If you’re a small business owner, better to declare today as your day 1 of AI training and prepare to dive deep into the new revolutionary world formula. 

Implement AI in all the above-mentioned departments of your company and enjoy saving time and improving growth. All the best.