Field notes
What we install, told without filter.
Case notes, behind the scenes and concrete answers to SME problems. Alexandre writes it, in the first person, not a communications team.
Website
"Trusted tradesperson for 20 years": the sentence that makes you invisible to an AI
An electrician writes "a trusted, attentive tradesperson for 20 years." His fourteen competitors write exactly the same thing. Here's the one minute test that spots these sentences on your site, and what to replace them with.
Practical AI
Choosing an AI provider without getting fleeced: the 3 questions that make me uncomfortable too
A website delivered in 24 hours for €200 "thanks to AI": whether it's a scam or plain ignorance, run either way. Three questions to ask before signing, and why someone who talks to you frankly about breakdowns is worth more than someone with nothing but promises.
Website
Facing AI, a small business moves faster than a large group. A campsite snack bar's website proves it
A campsite snack bar open three months a year wanted a website, a menu and a logo. A large group would never have taken the project on. This owner decided in one phone call, and everything was online three weeks later. The advantage of small businesses isn't the budget.
Practical AI
DIY or hire someone: where the line with AI really falls
Much of what AI does, you should do alone, without paying anyone. Here is the exact line beyond which a provider becomes genuinely useful, and the day I charged for an analysis to conclude "you do not need anyone".
Practical AI
We do not automate to take over jobs. We automate because we cannot find anyone.
In two years of assignments, no owner-manager has ever asked me to take over someone's job. All of them told me they could not find anyone. Here is why the debate about AI destroying jobs completely misses the reality of a tradesperson.
Website
An electrician, a wealth manager and a bakery: why their logos have nothing in common
An electrician has to reassure, a wealth manager has to inspire solidity, a bakery has to make you hungry. Three logos side by side, nothing in common. What AI speeds up, and the work of meaning it does not take over.
Practical AI
AI phone answering, outsourced reception or hiring: the real prices compared (2026)
An outsourced phone answering service starts at €19/month, an AI at €49, and my own offer costs €1,900 then €190/month. Here are the real public prices of the three families of options, taken from their published price lists, and the cases where I'll tell you honestly not to call me.
Automation
Unpaid invoices: the automatic follow-up sequence that gets the money in
Your unpaid invoices aren't chased because chasing them has no date. Here's the three-message sequence I install for my clients, what the law already owes you without your having to ask, and what changes once it runs on its own.
Practical AI
What AI still can't do in 2026 (and what I spend my meetings explaining)
I install it for a living, and I spend half my meetings explaining where AI has no business being. Three things it still can't do in 2026: know when it's wrong, read a human being, carry the responsibility.
Website
Getting recommended by ChatGPT as a local small business: what actually works
Your customers are starting to ask AI who to call, and it only gives two or three names. Here's how these systems choose who to cite, the five moves that genuinely count for a local small business, and what's just hot air.
Practical AI
The quote goes out the same evening as the appointment, not three days later
A kitchen fitter was losing sales because his quotes went out three days after the visit. An AI assistant now prepares the summary and a draft proposal while he's driving home. Here's what that changes, and why he checks everything.
Sales
€1 in ads bringing back €20: what clearance retail taught me about profitability
On a clearance site, one euro of advertising brought back twenty. The secret wasn't in the advertising itself, but in what stood behind it. Here's what makes a campaign profitable, and the campaign we had to cut.
Practical AI
How much does AI really cost a small business? From €25 a month to a bespoke build
From a €25-a-month subscription to a bespoke project, three budgets with nothing in common. And the cost nobody puts a figure on: the time it takes to learn, plus the risk of automating a process that already limps. The rough numbers, honestly.
Sales
The day €4 out of every €10 started coming from trade customers
An online fine-food shop did not notice that restaurants were buying from it in bulk, at consumer prices. By opening a genuine trade area, nearly €4 out of every €10 of turnover ended up coming from trade customers. Here is how, and the launch stumble.
Case notes
What really happens between the first call and delivery
A practice calls me: "I want to automate my booking and get more clients." Here, step by step, is what happens between that phone call and the day the tool goes live. Without the sales varnish.
Data
Saturday nights on a spreadsheet chasing €1,200 that wouldn't add up
A restaurant owner spent one Saturday a month getting his till, his bank and his invoices to add up. Here's how we got that down to a few minutes, and the €1,200 discrepancy we eventually explained.
Practical AI
A day in the life of an SME owner-manager in 2026: when AI helps, and when it has no business being there
Where AI genuinely fits into an owner-manager's day, not in ten years, today. Four moments where it saves time, three where bringing it out would be a mistake. An ordinary day, no futurology.
Data
While you sleep, a system checks your competitors' prices
A competitor cuts their prices, you find out three weeks later, once the sales are already lost. Here's what a pricing watch that checks prices every morning changes, and the trap of false alerts.
Website
In three months, nearly 6 visitors in 10 were arriving through Google (and fewer through ads)
An estate agency was paying for every visitor to its website. Within three months, nearly 6 in 10 arrived through Google, for free. Here's how, and why you shouldn't panic in the first three weeks.
Automation
How many hours are you really losing? Count before you spend a euro
An owner-manager wanted to "put AI everywhere". We got him to count first: 14 hours a week were going on repetitive tasks. Here's the method for measuring it yourself, and the case where counting told us not to automate anything.
Practical AI
Will AI take over my job? The real answer comes down to one question
Will AI take over my job? It is the wrong question. The right one is how much of your work can a machine redo identically without you? Accountant, medical receptionist, plumber, three opposite answers.
Automation
Two hours of paperwork every evening: what automation changed for this plumber
A plumber with two staff was spending two hours every evening on his quotes and follow-ups. We automated what could be automated, kept the rest by hand, and here's what it really changes in a working day.
Website
Redoing your website without vanishing from Google: the alert that caught the mistake in time
Redoing your website can make you vanish from Google within a week. Here's how to keep your rankings during the switch, and the automatic alert that caught forgotten pages that same evening.
Practical AI
AI phone reception, one month in: what changes (and what it doesn't do)
A garage owner misses one call in three, hands inside an engine. Here's what an AI phone reception system changes after a month, the day it slipped up, and the limit we set for it.
Practical AI
Chatbot, assistant, agent, automation: four words sold to you as the same thing (wrongly)
Assistant, chatbot, automation, agent: four words used as synonyms, wrongly. The confusion costs money, people buy the complicated option when the simple one would have done. The clear distinction, with two systems I've installed.
Automation
4,000 product pages to write: what genuinely gets automated, and the trap that tanks Google
An online spare parts shop with a huge catalogue and pages copied from the supplier: invisible on Google. Here is what gets automated in the writing, and the exact spot where you must not leave the machine on its own.
Practical AI
What level can AI really help your business at? The 3 levels, no overselling
Three levels, from free to bespoke. For each one, what it costs in effort, what it delivers, and the trap everyone falls into. With an example: the system that sorts my decisions while I sleep.