AI tools to help small businesses improve productivity: recommendations from 11 alumni

We asked 11 small business leaders from our alumni community to share their favourite AI tools and how they use them

The rapid developments in AI mean small business leaders now have access to a wide range of services to handle repetitive tasks and speed up the time it takes to carry out activities such as conducting research, creating content, and writing emails.  

The tools help to free up time to focus on other activities, cut costs, and boost sales.  

When using AI, you should always bear in mind issues around accuracy and copyright. A human checking the outputs from the technology is vital. 

We asked 11 Help to Grow: Management Course alumni to share their favourite AI tools and explain how they use them.  

1. ChatGPT 

‘I ask ChatGPT to interview me about the key elements of my business first, so it learns the details and context before I ask it to create anything. I then prompt it to ask me questions about my offers, my ideal customer, what they’re buying, and what they want to feel when they purchase, my brand voice and everyday phrases, and what genuinely differentiates me from others. I then turned those answers into a simple reference document and uploaded it to ChatGPT, so future outputs are far more on point. It saves a huge amount of time because I’m not repeating myself or correcting the tone and context on every task.’ 

Julie Begbie, The Happy Business Co

‘ChatGPT has made my blog, content, and email writing so much quicker. I use it to give a basic idea and then elaborate on and rewrite in my own words. It has made me tackle areas of my business which I didn’t enjoy and often avoided because I was always stumped for ideas.’ 

Amanda Marshall, 3 Donkeys 

‘ChatGPT helps with my business planning, summarising and composing draft emails but most importantly it’s a fantastic tool because it has memory and can keep track of all the elements of my business. It’s been a genuinely valuable tool for helping me build my website, organise my tasks and understand what needs to be done.’ 

Jay Stansfield, The Squibbles 

2. Google Gemini 

‘Google Gemini Deep Research saves me a lot of time. It acts like an AI research agent. In a few minutes, it explores hundreds of sources and provides me with a comprehensive report allowing me to explore other meaningful tasks.’ 

Ana Clarke, Lifezone 

‘I use Google Gemini as an assistant researcher for business planning. For example, I might ask “list all the hypnotherapists you can find within a 10-mile radius of my clinic, together with their price structure and any specialisms they offer.” When I started my business, I would spend hours doing this sort of research. Gemini gives me the answer in seconds. With this help, I am better able to target my marketing material, leaving me with more time to do the thing that I really love, helping clients get through their issues with hypnotherapy.’ 

Tim Maude, Tim Maude Hypnotherapy 

3. Sintra 

‘Sintra is my practical productivity co-pilot. I rarely use the first draft it provides but it helps me turn rough ideas into structured drafts for posts, emails, and plans, which I then refine. It gets me to a strong starting point quickly and over time it’s learned about my business, brand, and tone so there are fewer edits.’ 

Lorraine Allman, Party Without Plastic 

4. Pretty Prompt 

‘We use Pretty Prompt to boost business productivity by fixing the biggest AI problem: poor inputs. You can drop in a rough, garbled idea, and it instantly turns it into a clear, professional prompt that delivers far better results. The Chrome extension embeds directly into tools like ChatGPT, making it easy to use day to day. Saving prompts in a shared library keeps our team aligned which is crucial as we scale AI across marketing and product. It also gives us the flexibility to choose the best LLM for each task and leverage the strengths of each platform.’ 

Gabriella Goddard, Brainsparker 

5. Claude Code 

‘I created an AI powered gift site which I vibe coded in a weekend. Claude Code is an amazing tool. It’s not just for developers. I use it to research social media trends and then create posts automatically for Facebook and TikTok. All my adverts have several variations with different angles and hooks. I rely on Google Gemini (Nano Banana) to do the images while Claude writes variations of the copy. I also use Gemini and Claude to scrape app stores and social media so I can find people talking about my brand. I then proactively reach out and join the conversation.’  

Simon Driscoll, Feather & Blend 

6. Gamma AI 

‘I use Gamma AI to create presentations, and it’s transformed how quickly I can prepare training materials. Instead of spending hours formatting slides in PowerPoint, I can focus on the content and messaging while Gamma handles the design. For business owners who regularly pitch, present, or train, it removes the creative bottleneck – you can go from idea to polished presentation in minutes rather than hours. 

Emma Michael, Emma Michael AI Solutions  

7. Sidekick AI 

‘The most brilliant and tangible impact of AI for me has been the Sidekick AI assistant tool within Shopify. It already has access to your analytics, which is brilliant. What used to take hours and many, many exports, spreadsheets and formulas to analyse, is now available immediately. We get to find out what the most promising markets are, if products develop worrying patterns in their returns rate, or what products sell best together (and therefore would be a great bundle), all with one prompt.’ 

James Leinhardt, Levitex 

8. Comet Browser 

‘Comet Browser has genuinely made my workday easier. It helps me pull out the key info from long pages, reply to emails faster, and stay focused by organising everything I need in one place. I’m often juggling multiple projects and tabs, and having something that thinks ahead and supports me like this has taken a lot of stress out of the day.’ 

Cheryl Laidlaw, CeCe Digital 

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