Context: Run a small business (agency). With everything that's been going on, it feels like I'm missing out on a lot of stuff that COULD help my business, but was really time consuming to actually try. I set aside a couple of hours each day to go through everything systematically to figure out what I can actually use to help my business. Wanted to share what I found, hope it helps someone. **Chatbots:** Tested ChatGPT, Claude, Grok, Gemini Verdict: Truly helpful. Probably the most value you can get for $20 a month. ChatGPT is still king for all-roundedness and the sheer number of tools made avail. Max is worth it if youre doing anything more research heavy (was worth it for me) **AI Productivity Tools:** Tested Fyxer AI (AI email manager), Motion AI (AI employees), Yoink AI (AI writer working across all apps), Gamma AI (AI slides), Beautiful AI (AI slides). Basically the stuff that has been making its way around social media the past few weeks. Verdict: This was a real mixed bag. Motion AI / Fyxer AI felt overly complicated for me, and didn't see the value. I think it might have been skill issue though. Yoink AI was good, helped save a bunch of time esp after setting voice. Probably only worth it if you spend a lot of time across apps writing though. Gamma AI was good, would recommend for anyone doing client-heavy work. Beautiful AI flopped There are some stuff here which seems helpful, but doesnt work. Others seem dumb but help a lot **Workflow Automation.** Tested n8n, make, Zapier Verdict: These are powerful for sure, but learning curve is steep. Need to put in fair amounts of effort. N8n seemed the most flexible/powerful of the bunch, but make probably has an easier learning curve if you're just starting out. I automated some stuff around email responses, but still wouldn't let AI send anything client-work related out without my review **End Verdict:** Is AI helpful? Yes probably. Not the world shattering technology that the AI grifters make it out to be (yet at least), but also not the as useless as critics say if you spend time figuring out how to use it. Hope we can, as a community, figure out better ways to cut through the hype and what is truly useful.