AI consulting that starts with your numbers, not the technology.
Most businesses know AI could help and have no idea where to point it. AI consulting fixes that. We map how your business actually runs, measure where the hours go, work out where AI pays back fastest, cost each opportunity, and hand you a roadmap with the quick wins at the top and the expensive distractions removed.
AI consulting from R850 an hour, or R6,500 for the full roadmap, credited in full against your first build.
Mapping opportunities
Free AI consulting always ends in the same product
Every vendor in this market offers a free consultation. It is not consulting, it is a qualification call, and it can only ever conclude that you should buy what they sell. That is not dishonesty, it is structure. A conversation nobody pays for cannot afford to end in "do nothing".
It can recommend a competitor
Sometimes the right answer is a product somebody else sells, or an off-the-shelf subscription at R400 a month that makes a custom build pointless. Paid AI consulting can say that. A free one structurally cannot.
It can recommend nothing
A meaningful share of our AI consulting engagements conclude that the real problem is a process nobody simplified or a tool already paid for and never configured. Fixing that costs you far less than any build.
It survives us
The roadmap is written so any competent developer or agency can execute it. Plenty of clients hand it to their own IT people and never buy a build from us. That is a legitimate outcome and the fee already covered it.
Quick wins first, bigger projects sequenced behind them, distractions removed.
What AI consulting actually gives you
AI consulting should produce a working document your team can act on this month, not a slide deck about the future of technology. Nine things in the pack.
A map of how work really flows
Drawn with the people who do the job, including the shortcuts and workarounds nobody documented. Most businesses find this valuable on its own.
Hours measured, not guessed
How long each repetitive task actually takes, multiplied by your real frequency. This turns "we should automate that" into a number you can weigh against a quote.
Opportunities ranked by return
Every candidate scored on value and effort, so the quick wins are obvious and the bigger projects sit behind them rather than getting started first because they sound impressive.
A cost against every item
What each would take to build, what it would save, and roughly how long until it pays for itself. Priced honestly, including when the answer is a tool you can buy for less.
Build, buy or leave alone
Stated per item in writing. Sometimes an off-the-shelf product does the job and building anything would be waste. That sentence appears in most of our roadmaps.
The data and POPIA picture
What information you hold, where it lives, what you may use it for under POPIA, and what must be tightened before any of it touches an AI system.
A twelve month sequence
What to do this quarter, next quarter and after that, with dependencies noted so nothing gets built before the thing it relies on exists.
Something your team can execute
Written so a manager and a developer can both act on it. Hand it to us, to your own people, or to another supplier entirely. It is yours.
A working handover session
We walk your team through it, answer the questions and agree who owns what. A roadmap nobody understands is a document nobody uses.
Where AI consulting keeps finding the fastest payback
These are the areas AI consulting repeatedly identifies as quick wins in South African businesses, roughly in order of how fast they return the money.
- Answering customer enquiries out of hours
- Qualifying leads before a person gets involved
- Generating quotes from a rate card
- Following up quotes that went quiet
- Reading supplier invoices and delivery notes
- Summarising calls and meetings into actions
- Drafting standard emails and proposals
- Turning voice notes from the field into job records
- Translating messages between languages
- Compiling weekly reports from several systems
- Screening job applications against requirements
- Flagging unusual numbers in the accounts
- Writing product descriptions at volume
- Answering internal policy questions for staff
The roadmap tells you which of these apply to you, what each is worth in hours and rands, and which to build first. Several of them turn out not to need AI at all, which is covered honestly on business process automation.
How an AI consulting engagement runs
Two weeks, and about three hours of your time in total. We do the work between the sessions rather than parking your team in a workshop.
Discovery session
Ninety minutes with you and the people doing the work. What you sell, how work arrives, where it gets stuck.
Process mapping
We document the flows and measure the time each repetitive step takes, using your own volumes rather than industry averages.
Opportunity scoring
Every candidate scored on value and effort, then costed, so the sequence falls out of the numbers rather than out of opinion.
Roadmap written
Twelve months, with quick wins, dependencies, costs and expected savings. Written to be executed by anyone.
Handover session
We present it to your team, answer questions and agree owners. You keep the document regardless of what you do next.
We deliver AI consulting across Johannesburg, Sandton, Midrand, Centurion, Pretoria, Cape Town, Durban, Gqeberha, Bloemfontein and Polokwane, and remotely anywhere in the country. Regional clients in Zimbabwe, Kenya and Botswana are quoted in local currency.
What AI consulting will not do for you
Stated up front, because the gap between what this market promises and what it delivers is where most of the disappointment lives.
Five honest limits
- It will not fix a business with no demand. If the phone is not ringing, automation gives you a faster way to handle nothing. That is a marketing problem and belongs on SEO services.
- It will not replace management judgement. The roadmap tells you what things cost and what they save. Whether that is the right use of your capital remains yours to decide.
- It will not make bad data useful. If your records live in three spreadsheets that disagree with each other, that gets fixed first and the roadmap will say so plainly.
- It will not survive contact with no owner. A roadmap with nobody accountable for it becomes a PDF in a folder. The handover session exists to prevent exactly that.
- It will not promise a percentage. Anyone quoting you a guaranteed efficiency gain before measuring your process is guessing, and you should treat the number accordingly.
AI consulting rates, published in full
Three ways to buy, depending on whether you need an answer, a plan, or somebody alongside your team while it happens.
By the hour
For a specific question, a second opinion on a vendor proposal, or a session working through one process with your team.
AI roadmap
The full engagement: process map, time audit, ranked opportunities, costs and a twelve month plan, plus the handover session.
- Discovery and process mapping
- Time and volume audit
- Opportunities scored and costed
- Build, buy or leave stated per item
- Twelve month sequence
- Credited against your first build
Ongoing advisory
A standing monthly session while your team executes, reviewing progress, unblocking what has stalled and adjusting the plan as things change.
The roadmap fee is credited in full against your first build with us, so if you go ahead the AI consulting effectively costs nothing. Builds are priced on business process automation, AI chatbots and WhatsApp automation. Larger consultancies typically charge R25,000 upwards for a comparable engagement.
AI consulting questions we get asked
What does AI consulting cost in South Africa?
Ours is R850 an hour, R6,500 for a full roadmap, or from R3,450 a month for ongoing advisory. The roadmap fee is credited against your first build, so if you proceed with us the AI consulting is effectively free. Larger consultancies typically charge R25,000 upwards for a comparable engagement.
Why pay when every vendor offers a free consultation?
Because a free consultation is a qualification call and it can only conclude that you should buy what they sell. That is structure rather than dishonesty. Paid AI consulting can recommend a competitor's product, an off-the-shelf subscription, or doing nothing at all. That independence is the entire thing you are buying.
My business is small. Is AI consulting worth it?
Often more so, because small businesses feel wasted hours immediately. A two person operation losing fifteen hours a month to quoting gets that time back straight away. The roadmap is scaled to your size rather than being an enterprise document with the numbers changed.
Do I have to build with you afterwards?
No. The roadmap is written so any competent developer or agency can execute it, and it is yours to keep. Plenty of clients take it to their own IT people. The credit against a first build exists because we would like the work, not because you are tied to us in any way.
How much of my time does it take?
About three hours in total. Ninety minutes for discovery, some short follow-ups while we map, and an hour for the handover. We do the work between those sessions rather than parking your team in a room for two days.
What if the answer is that we do not need AI?
Then that is what the roadmap says, and it will point at the cheaper fix instead. Frequently the real problem is a process nobody simplified or a tool already paid for and never configured. Saying so is the job, and it happens more often than this industry admits.
Can you review a proposal from another vendor?
Yes, and it is a common request. An hour or two of AI consulting is usually enough to tell you whether the scope matches the price, whether the technology fits the problem, and which questions to put back to them before you sign anything.
What about POPIA and our customer data?
It is part of the roadmap. We cover what information you hold, where it is stored, what consent you have, and what needs tightening before any of it goes near an AI system. This is where most businesses have gaps, and it is considerably cheaper to find them now than after a breach.
Will this disrupt how we currently work?
The AI consulting itself does not. Nothing changes during the engagement, we are observing and measuring. When builds begin, each workflow runs alongside your manual process for two weeks before anyone switches over.
Which industries have you advised?
Service businesses, security, retail and e-commerce, professional services, logistics and construction. The process differs by industry, but the pattern rarely does: quoting, follow ups, job coordination and reporting are where the hours go almost everywhere.
How soon could we start building?
Usually within a week of the handover. The roadmap contains costed builds, so once you pick the first one there is nothing left to scope and work can start immediately rather than going back into a quoting cycle.
Do you work with businesses outside Gauteng?
Yes. AI consulting runs by video call and shared documents, so location makes no difference to the work or the price. We work across South Africa and elsewhere in sub-Saharan Africa, quoted in local currency outside the country.
The rest of what we do
AI consulting is one part of what we do. Start from website design company in South Africa for the overview.
Start with a conversation about where the hours go.
Tell us what your business does and where the week disappears. A short call is usually enough to say whether AI consulting is worth buying, and if it is not, we will tell you that instead.