If you're a small business owner looking into AI automation, the first question is always the same: what's this going to cost me? The honest answer is that it depends — but unlike most consultants who hide behind "contact us for a quote," we believe in transparent pricing. Here's what AI consulting actually costs in 2026, across the industry and from us specifically.
AI Consulting Pricing at a Glance
| Service | Pricing | What You Get |
|---|---|---|
| AI Audit | Starting at $299 | Full operations assessment, opportunity matrix, ROI report |
| Implementation | Starting at $2,500 | Custom automations, integrations, and system builds |
| Maintain | Starting at $500/mo | Monitoring, bug fixes, minor adjustments |
| Grow | Starting at $2,000/mo | Optimization + new automation rollouts |
| Full Ops | Starting at $5,000/mo | Dedicated development, priority support, quarterly re-audits |
Pricing scales with your business size and complexity. The audit scopes everything precisely so you know the cost and expected ROI before committing to any build.
What Each Tier Gets You
AI Audit (Starting at $299)
This is where every engagement should start. The audit is a rapid assessment of your business operations — interviews with your team, process mapping, opportunity identification, and a prioritized roadmap with real ROI calculations. Most audits are completed in a single day.
| Business Size | Employees | Audit Cost | What's Included |
|---|---|---|---|
| Small | 1 – 15 | Starting at $299 | 3-5 interviews, process map, opportunity matrix, ROI report |
| Mid-size | 15 – 50 | $5,000 – $10,000 | 10-15 interviews, full process map, multi-department analysis, detailed roadmap |
| Larger | 50 – 100 | $10,000 – $15,000+ | 15+ interviews, cross-functional mapping, executive presentation, phased roadmap |
The audit pays for itself. Our first client's audit identified $61,600 in annual savings — the audit cost was a fraction of that. For a deeper look at what's involved, read our complete guide to AI audits.
Why some companies offer "free" audits: A free audit is usually a 30-minute call with a checklist, not a real deep dive. You get what you pay for. A real audit involves analyzing your operations, documenting your processes, and building a custom ROI model — that takes meaningful expertise.
Implementation (Starting at $2,500)
This is where the audit recommendations get built. Implementation cost depends entirely on complexity:
| Automation Type | Starting At | Timeline | Example |
|---|---|---|---|
| Simple automation | $2,500 | 1-2 weeks | AI email responder, appointment booking, report generation |
| AI agent | $3,000 | 2-4 weeks | Voice AI receptionist, sales follow-up agent, support chatbot |
| Multi-system integration | $8,000 | 4-8 weeks | CRM automation, onboarding workflow, hiring pipeline |
| Full system build | $15,000 | 8-16 weeks | Complete operations overhaul, custom CRM, multi-agent system |
Every implementation recommendation comes from the audit, which means you know the expected ROI before you spend a dollar on building.
Maintain (Starting at $500/mo)
This is where we differ from most competitors. Maintenance isn't optional with us — it's required on every engagement. Here's why: 95% of AI projects fail, and the #1 reason is that nobody maintains them after launch. AI tools break. APIs change. Workflows evolve. Without someone watching, your automation quietly stops working and everyone goes back to the old way.
Our maintenance tier covers monitoring, bug fixes, and minor adjustments. It's the insurance policy that makes the whole investment work.
Grow (Starting at $2,000/mo)
Once your initial automations are running, the Grow tier adds optimization and new automation rollouts. Think of it as a monthly strategy session plus hands-on development. We look at what's working, what can be improved, and what new opportunities have emerged — then we build them.
Full Ops (Starting at $5,000/mo)
Dedicated AI development for your business. Priority support, quarterly re-audits, and a development pipeline that treats AI as an ongoing competitive advantage — not a one-time project. This tier is for businesses that want AI baked into their operations permanently.
What Drives the Cost Up (and Down)
A few factors that affect pricing across the board:
- Number of systems involved. Automating a single tool is cheaper than connecting five tools together. The more integrations, the more complexity.
- Data quality. If your data is clean and organized, implementation is faster. If it's scattered across spreadsheets, inboxes, and sticky notes, there's cleanup work before automation can start.
- Compliance requirements. Healthcare (HIPAA), financial services, and government-adjacent businesses require additional security and compliance layers that add 20-50% to costs.
- Custom vs. off-the-shelf. Some automations use existing AI tools with light customization. Others require custom-built solutions. The audit tells you which is which.
- Team size and process complexity. More employees means more interviews during the audit and more workflows to map. Larger businesses naturally cost more to assess.
How to Think About ROI
The real question isn't "how much does it cost?" — it's "how much does it return?" Here's the formula we use in every audit:
Annual savings = (hours saved per week) × (hourly rate) × 52 weeks
ROI = annual savings ÷ implementation cost
A $5,000 automation that saves one employee 8 hours per week at $25/hour returns $10,400 per year — a 208% ROI in the first year alone. And that savings compounds every year the automation runs.
Our first client's numbers: $61,600 in annual savings from automations that cost a fraction of that to implement. That's the power of auditing first — you don't guess where the ROI is, you calculate it.
Getting Started
If you want to know what AI automation would cost for your specific business — and more importantly, what it would save — the AI audit is the first step. You'll walk away with a precise roadmap showing exactly what to build, what it costs, and what you'll get back.
Want to see the numbers for your business?
Our AI audit gives you a custom ROI breakdown — not guesswork.
Get Started