An AI consultant for small businesses that actually builds the thing
You've been told to "use AI." What nobody's shown you is where it pays in your business - and most of the people offering to help are prompt engineers with a Zapier account and a slide deck.
Forge is different in one important way: we don't stop at the advice. We find the hours your team loses to manual work, we build the tools that give those hours back, and we look after them for you. You get working systems your people actually use, not a roadmap on a shelf.
We built ten of these for our own agency first. Now we do it for people businesses - agencies, accountants, lawyers, consultants, recruiters - like yours.
We built our first tools for the Fame team - a 6-year-old people business with 100+ clients. They now give those hours back every week.
Read the Fame story →Where AI actually pays in a small business
It's rarely the flashy stuff. In a people business, AI earns its keep on the repetitive work between your apps that eats your team's week:
First drafts
Client reports, proposals, show notes, meeting summaries, drafted from your data and reviewed by a person
Document and transcript processing
Call recordings, intake forms and PDFs turned into structured records in the tools you already use
App-to-app sync
Your CRM, accounting software and practice tool finally agreeing with each other, without anyone rekeying
Triage and routing
Incoming requests sorted, tagged and sent to the right person
Client-facing updates
Status pages and portals that answer "any update?" before it's asked
The rule we build by: AI drafts, people decide. Every tool puts a human in the loop where judgement matters. That's not a limitation; it's why your team will trust it.
How it works
- 01
Scope
2 weeksAn ops audit: we interview your team, map the apps you use and find where the hours go. Then we choose what to build - a roadmap with the three builds that recover the most, and what each costs. If you go ahead, the audit fee is credited to your first month.
- 02
Build
2-6 weeksWe build and test the first tool - shaped to how your firm works, connected to your apps. You approve it before it counts.
- 03
Roll out
We train your team and manage the change so people actually use it - not just log in once.
- 04
Improve
MonthlyWe watch usage, fix what breaks and keep improving it. Usage tracking shows you who on your team is actually using it.
What it costs
| Ops audit | $2,500 / £2,000 · two weeks · credited to your first month |
| Run · starter | $2,000 / £1,600 a month · one team, one painful workflow: first tool built and live, then one build at a time, small changes in 5 working days, monthly hours-back report |
| Run · growth | $3,500 / £2,800 a month · 10-30 people: two builds running at once, small changes in 2 working days, weekly check-in with a named lead, live hours-saved dashboard |
| Run · embedded | $7,500 / £6,000 a month · 30+ people: continuous backlog in two-week sprints, same or next-day turnaround on small changes, we sit in your Slack and task tool, weekly planning and a quarterly roadmap |
Your first build, training and change management are included in every monthly plan · 3-month minimum on run plans · AI usage billed at cost · it runs on your own accounts, so you own it - you pay those tool costs directly
Why not an AI automation agency?
Most "AI agencies" sell you a stack of zaps and a chatbot, invoice the setup, and disappear - leaving your ops lead to find out which automation broke at 1am. We're engineers who own the outcome: we build it properly, we run it, and we stay. And we're people-first by design - we build to make your team more powerful, not to replace anyone, which is also why your team will actually use what we build.
We did this for ourselves first
We run Fame, a podcast agency. We built ten internal tools to run it - status pages, a client portal, a team homebase, intake forms, a review tool - and our people got their hours back for clients. Forge is how we do that for you.
Questions, answered plainly
What does an AI consultant for a small business actually do?
A good one finds where AI genuinely saves your team time, builds the tools, and makes sure the team uses them. A bad one hands you a report. We do the first kind: audit, build, then look after it.
How much does AI consulting cost for a small business?
Our two-week ops audit is $2,500 (£2,000) and is credited to your first month. Run plans are $2,000-7,500 a month depending on how much we build and run for you. All prices are published above - no quote required to see them.
Do we need to be technical?
No. We need an owner or ops lead who can tell us how the firm works. We do all the building, and we keep looking after it.
What's the difference between an AI consultant and an AI automation agency?
Automation agencies mostly assemble off-the-shelf zaps and move on. We're engineers who build custom tools, connect them to your apps, and look after them for you on a monthly plan - with a person in the loop wherever judgement matters.
What happens after the build?
That's the run plan: we monitor it, fix anything that breaks, and keep improving it as your needs change. You tell us in plain language; we build; you approve.