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AI Automation for Local Business

Small automations that plug a hole in how money moves through a business, sold for a setup fee and a monthly.

Money to start
$0-300
Time to a first sale
4-12 weeks
Length
13 lessons · 89 min

Written 31 August 2026 · checked 31 August 2026. Third-party fees and rules change; this course names what a cost is for rather than what a provider charges today.

What it costs before a single sale

Automation platform while you learn (Make, Zapier, n8n, Pipedream or similar)
$0 to start
Automation platform once a client is live
Billed monthly, per plan
Business phone number that can send and receive texts
Monthly line charge plus per-message charges
US carrier approval for business texting, through your provider
A setup charge plus ongoing per-message rates
Model access, for the one step that needs it
Usage-based, charged per request
A domain and an email address on it, so you are not a free webmail address
A yearly charge from the registrar
A demo built for a real business before anyone has paid you
$0 in cash, 3-6 hours of you
Learning one platform well enough to build without a tutorial open
15-40 hours, unpaid
The first client build, from yes to go-live
10-25 hours, most of it waiting on access

Checked 2026-08-31. Notice how few of these are numbers. We do not print other companies' monthly fees here on purpose: a figure typed into a lesson goes stale and then this page is lying to you. Open each provider's own pricing page on the day you sign up.

Do not start this if

This list is the reason the free part exists. Every line is a real reason to walk away, and walking away after reading it costs you nothing.

  • You want to sell AI. Almost none of this job is AI. It is understanding one business's booking tool, phone system and inbox well enough to describe their own process back to them more clearly than they can.
  • You will not maintain what you sold. Connectors get deprecated, a client swaps their booking tool without telling you, a phone number gets flagged. If you will not answer at 8am on a Tuesday, do not sell an automation.
  • You want to build software rather than glue existing tools together. This is plumbing between other people's products. The micro-SaaS course is the honest one for that.
  • You cannot make yourself walk into a business you have never been in and talk to the owner. This is sold face to face or on the phone, to people who did not ask you to call.
  • You need money this month. The order is conversation, scope, demo, build, go-live. Each step waits on someone else, and access and carrier approvals wait longest.
  • You are not old enough to open a payment processor account or agree to a provider's terms in your own name, and you have no adult who will do it with you. That is a hard blocker, not a formality.
  • Debugging annoys you. When something fires twice at 3am, that is your evening. Most of this work is finding out why step four ran and step five did not.

The course

Part 1

Is this real?

Free

What you are actually selling, which automations get bought and why, what the whole thing costs in money and hours, and a five-day test that is allowed to end in no.

  1. What you are actually sellingNobody buys AI. They buy a specific handoff that currently drops, and most of what you build has no model in it at all.6 min
  2. The five automations, and what each one touchesMissed-call text-back, reminders, review requests, lead routing and inbox triage. What each one does, the mechanism behind it, and where each one breaks.7 min
  3. What it really costsThe money, the hours, and the cost nobody prices: you now own an on-call obligation attached to four companies' APIs.7 min
  4. Five days to a yes or a noA test you can run this week for nothing, and a clear description of what a no looks like, because for a lot of people the answer here is no.6 min

Part 2

Set it up.

Operator

Narrow to one thing, choose a toolchain you can defend, build the flagship automation with its guardrails, learn to scope and demo before you build, and set a price with a floor you can explain.

  1. One automation, one kind of businessWhy narrowing on both axes at once is the only thing that makes the second build cheap, and how to choose which axes.Operator
  2. The toolchain, and who owns the accountsFour slots: the runner, the channel, the memory and the model. How to choose each, and the ownership rule that keeps this an honest business.Operator
  3. Build the missed-call text-backThe flagship build, step by step, plus the guardrails that separate a working demo from something you can point at a real customer.Operator
  4. Scope it and demo it before you build itThe order that works is conversation, scope, demo, price, build. Most people demo something generic and then discover the booking tool has no API.Operator
  5. Setup fee plus monthly, and how to find your floorTwo charges because there are two different things being sold. How to build a floor from your own costs, and why this course refuses to tell you what to charge.Operator

Part 3

Get the first customer.

Operator

Who to approach and how to qualify them before you spend an hour, exactly what to say, how the first paid build actually runs, and what you owe when it breaks.

  1. Who to ask first, and how to qualify themFour filters, five minutes of homework per business, and one observation that makes your opening line impossible to mass-send.Operator
  2. The first conversationOpeners for walking in, calling and emailing, and honest answers to the five things you will actually be asked.Operator
  3. The first paid buildClosing, taking money, getting access, going live carefully, and handling the fact that their data is a mess.Operator
  4. When it breaks, and what you oweYou own a piece of someone's operations built on four companies' APIs. What actually breaks, how to find out before they do, and how to end it properly.Operator

Parts 2 and 3 need an Operator account

Part one is yours already, with no account. The build half is on the Operator plan, $7/mo.

  • Part 2, Set it up — the accounts, the tooling, the pricing and the first thing you put in front of a buyer.
  • Part 3, Get the first customer — what to say, who to say it to, and what to do when it goes wrong.
  • Both parts in every course here, not only this one.
  • The rest of the Operator plan: the Growth-tier catalog, county-personalized playbooks, catalog search, and publishing your site at a live address.

Nothing on this page unlocks by waiting. Part one stays free for good, and it is genuinely enough to decide with.

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