3 AI Tools Every SME Should Implement Right Now (I've Tested 28 in the Last 6 Months)

There's something faintly absurd about testing 28 AI tools in six months, like taste-testing every variety of instant noodle in pursuit of the perfect sodium hit. Yet here we are, drowning in a sea of ChatGPT wannabes and "revolutionary" platforms that promise to transform your business but mostly transform your inbox into a graveyard of forgotten logins.

The good news? Three of them actually work. They won't be your marquee signings that single-handedly win you games, no, these are those solid midfielders that show up game after game, delivering the consistency every company needs.

Read.ai for Meetings

We discovered this after our third consecutive meeting where nobody could remember who'd promised what to whom. It sits there, sphinx-like, recording and transcribing with pure dedication, then produces summaries that read like they were written by someone who actually pays attention. The action items feature has saved us from approximately 47 passive-aggressive "per my last email" exchanges.

Perplexity for Research

Meanwhile, Perplexity handles research with the efficiency of a librarian who's had three espressos. Unlike conventional search engines that bury you under an avalanche of SEO-optimized drivel, it actually cites sources and admits when it doesn't know something. We've used it for everything from market analysis to settling disputes about whether tomatoes are technically berries (they are).

Gamma.app for Presentations

Finally, Gamma.app for presentations. It possesses that rarest of qualities: it makes you look more competent than you actually are. Feed it a few bullet points about quarterly projections and it transforms them into slides that suggest you've been moonlighting at McKinsey. We love flipping through the many different styles you can pick and choose from.

These aren't magic bullets. They won't fix your cash flow or make your customers less demanding. But in the grinding daily marathon of running a small business, they're the equivalent of decent running shoes — you could manage without them, but why would you want to?