The future of business services
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Yo! Been talking to a lot of folk recently about the future of service-based work in the age of AI and what we can all do to futureproof ourselves against the coming (it’s already here really) AI-pocalypse. The problem we’re seeing right now…It’s damn tough right now. A combo of AI and the current economic climate have made it very hard to sell services. First off, people are just less willing to spend money. I’ve had 2 hot clients who were on the verge of signing just ghost me within the last month alone. And I’ve had even more over the last 3-6 months who give one of the increasingly common responses when you send the quote….
… all of which mean no thanks. And I know I’m not the only one who’s seeing this. It’s partly because everyone is tightening their belts right now. And partly because AI can do A LOT of the things mediocre consultants/freelancers/services were offering in the past for a fraction of the cost. The additional problem making lead gen harderThanks to AI, it’s easier than ever for anyone to stand out. Everyone can look like an expert and “flood the zone” with social posts. In fact, if you go to LinkedIn now - a site that was historically great for business stuff - it’s full of AI-created AI engagement slop that reads like a sad boomer’s Facebook page. It’s genuinely awful, and it drowns out the real value. the old methods of…
… are gone in my opinion. You need a different approach right now. And it’s a combo of 3 things. The new approach to succeed in 2026 and beyondEssentially, you need to be AI first and demonstrate actual expertise. Sounds simple, and a lot of people are talking about this, but most people are doing it dead wrong in my opinion. There are a lot of people talking about AI. they’re doing videos, posts, and shares about things like… … The new feature in Claude All of them don’t really offer any real value or expertise beyond surface-level knowledge. So what should you do? 1. Become AI NativeI’m not talking about using a Custom GPt to write a single email. I’m talking about actually getting AI to do complex things that would be beyond you and your expertise. Think of things you might outsource to someone else in the past. You should now be using AI to do those things. If you can build full AI systems that solve genuine pains, you’re ahead of 995 of the competition out there. 2. Use AI to get real resultsDon’t just talk about how amazing AI is or what it’s helped you do. 99% of people talk about AI in terms of time saved, or something like the number of blog posts published. Which is cool. But they’re vanity metrics. Instead, use AI to generate actual revenue. I don’t care if you published 3000+ pages of slop that are at the bottom of Google. I’d rather ou publish 10 AI pieces that bring in 10 leads per month where 3 of them turn into clients. Actual results from the systems are what you should be focusing on. Any idiot can have Claude publish a tonne of stuff. Few seem to be able to actually, meaningfully, replace existing systems for cheaper cost with better outcomes. Work on doing that. Drop all of the things that are “fun” or “cool”, and focus on those which drive revenue. 3. Look at your pricing and biz structureI think we’re gonna see a lot of the traditional service business model collapse. Most of the successful agencies I’ve worked with tend to start in the same way. The founder has a cool system/approach that gets good results. They grow as a service provider until they can no longer handle more clients. Then they hire someone. Teach that person their system and double their client load with the new hire taking on that second loads of clients. Rinse and repeat. As time goes by, the founder steps back from the day-to-day and the strategies develop, but they’re all still based on the founder’s thinking and original approach. As agencies grew, so did pricing. You had to cover the overheads of…
And so, while revenue grew, margins often shrank or hit a ceiling. Moving forward, I think this is gonna change. Someone who’s AI-forward can dominate a market. They can essentially teach the agents to action the system they develop, effectively replacing that first hire and enabling them to work with 2-5X the number of clients on their own. Here’s the thing though. They’re not gonna be able to charge the same kind of prices as the old agency. As belts tighten and everyone becomes more familiar with AI, those prices are gonna have to drop. The good news is, because the overheads are cheaper, you’ll likely keep more of your cash from thsoe engagements. I actually think this is the biggest opportunity for service providers right now. As the clients become more cost-sensitive, you can come in at 50% of the competition, produce the same quality of work in a faster timeline. And for you, you can work with 2-5X the number of clients. Which means more cash in your pocket at the end of the day. There’s gonna be a bunch of young, AI native people coming up who are gonna eat the lunch of the bigger, established agencies because they can solve the same problems faster for cheaper. Show me a business that doesn’t want quick results at a lower price. In short, NOW is the time to be working on your AI abilities and building your systems into AI-based approaches. if you’re not, the next 2-5 years are gonna be rough. If you want help building AI systems and knowing what to do, join us in GM+ where I’m doing a lot of this and sharing everything. Speak soon, Pete "AI-Pocalypse" boyle |