Providing enhanced customer value is key in modern business. Potential customers are not just looking for bare bones service any more, they want all the free extras. Why wouldn’t they – everyone else is promising it. One of the burning questions on the minds of many of my customers is “How do I boost customer value with AI?”.
This post explores the balance between offering value and maintaining efficiency, particularly as AI becomes a tool for solving these challenges. We’ll dive into how AI is emerging as a practical solution to maintain and even boost value without exhausting resources.
With that said, let’s get into it – starting with the problem.
The “Free” problem begins
The marketing world is absolutely teeming with lead magnets, free classes, strategy sessions and anything else people can think of to add value. While these are great for building trust and initial engagement, they come at a minimum cost—time. Time that could be spent on billable work or refining core offerings.
Ironically, what begins as a strategy to bring customers to a business often ends up being a drain on the very resources the business is attempting to grow. Now don’t get me wrong, these activities are vital parts of your business; but the problem is that this often does not stop once the customer is onboard. In fact, many times this is only the beginning.
Maintaining Value Once Customers Are Onboard
Once a customer has engaged your service and becomes part of the family, many businesses feel the need to continue coming up with ways to provide value-add services to keep their shiny new customers engaged, loyal and keep them coming back.
Doing this without increasing costs can feel like a challenge.
Quite reasonably, new customers expect this as part of the process of proving yourself and appreciating the trust they have placed in you, while loyal customers expect this as appreciation of their ongoing loyalty. Think in terms of activities such as personalised support, reports and advice, check-ins and free product enhancements etc…
The problem here is that many of these value-adds become a necessary part of the service over time; but they don’t always remain sustainable. A business may begin offering value-adds in good faith and with the best of intentions; but eventually start wondering if it is viable to offer these extras for free. In my own experience, this generally leads to one of 3 questions:
Do I begin charging for this service – if I do, what will the response from customers look like?
A good customer might see the value and accept the added charge, but this still carries a business risk
If I cannot charge for it, do I need to stop doing it?
At the end of the day this represents either a price rise or reduction of service to the customer.
Is there a way to automate or streamline these value – adds?
Automation offers a potential solution, but it also comes with trade-offs: less automation means more time spent, while more automation can quickly increase costs.
So where is the balance?
Enter the Generic
Often as business owners, we try to find the balance in generic approaches that can lead to good outcomes without incurring significant costs. Finding the right approach however is often nearly as time consuming as bringing a core product to market.
For anyone who has ever gone down this track, the following might sound familiar:
You’re trying to offer “value-add” services—those little extras that keep customers happy and coming back. But suddenly, what started as a simple add-on has turned into a monumental task. Once again, you’re stuck doing research, figuring out what will resonate with your customers, and investing time and resources into developing a new offer.
The funny thing is, this extra service isn’t even your core product—it’s just supposed to be a freebie or a perk. You realise that creating something generic that works for a wide range of customers is almost as hard as building your original product. It’s almost like you’re building your business all over again—but this time for something that isn’t even your core product. And while generic might seem easier, it often ends up feeling just as challenging as building that first offer from scratch.
Many companies want to offer extra services but hesitate because these services don’t seem worth the time investment. They are holding on opportunities that could really make a big difference in their world!
Opportunities You’ve Held Back On
The desire to give customers personalised interactions—such as customised advice, reports, or unique content—is often strong, but time is usually the problem. This is where AI becomes a powerful tool to boost customer value, optimising these personalised processes so that businesses can deliver tailored services at scale without needing extra hands-on involvement.
For instance, I’ve worked with businesses that generate a lot of content, such as videos or articles. In these cases, they’ve leveraged AI to make their content more accessible and useful to customers. Many of these have created CustomGPTs that allows their audience to search video transcripts for specific topics and even find the exact moment in a video where that topic is discussed. This gave their customers a more efficient way to engage with the content spontaneously, while saving the business hours of manual searching or organising.
Another business I worked with in a completely different industry used AI to boost customer value by optimising the production of custom financial reports for their clients. What used to take hours of manual work compiling up-to-the-minute data and writing insights now happens in minutes. This freed up their time to focus on revenue generating tasks while still providing personalised reports that exceed client expectations.
AI’s potential isn’t limited only to content creation or reports. Businesses can apply these tools across industries to streamline nearly any personalised interaction, offering more value to their customers without the time burden.
The Impact of AI on Customer Value
When businesses start using AI, they quickly realise how much time they can save—businesses that implement the technology effectively see truly profound results. While many initially expect a modest reduction in time spent—perhaps 10-20%—the reality is that businesses often cut out 80-90% of the time spent on routine tasks. Optimising just one key process can save dozens of hours each month.
Of course, as with any powerful tool, there’s an upfront investment, whether in terms of technology, setup, or even learning how to make the most of it. However, that’s where smart training comes in. With the right guidance and support, you can quickly get your team up to speed, ensuring that the cost of implementation is minimised while the benefits are maximised.
Interestingly, research suggests that many employees are already ahead of the curve when it comes to AI experimentation, often embracing the technology before their organisations do. By empowering teams to use AI effectively—building on their enthusiasm—you can maximise the benefits and avoid the steep learning curve that organisations fear. With the right guidance, AI quickly shifts from being an investment to a long-term time-saver. This allows your business to focus on revenue generating tasks, while still being able to boost customer value through the strategic use of AI. Keep in mind that your people are likely already using the tech, so training and development has already begun!
Shifting Perspective
Once in place, AI doesn’t just save time—it frees your team to focus on higher-value tasks, directly contributing to growth and improved customer satisfaction.
The real value comes from seeing AI as more than just a time-saving tool. It’s an investment in efficiency that, when paired with the right training, can dramatically improve both the quality and scalability of your services. Getting started is the hardest part for some because the options are so broad and deep. It’s the old problem of the tyranny of choice!
AI can be a rabbit hole that can drain time and resources like no other, so it is vital to ensure that you are doing work that will produce an outcome of some sort, and will improve the way you are currently doing things.
Begin this process by understanding what it is you want to do.
Start Adding Value with AI
Begin by asking yourself 2 very important questions regarding how to deliver value to your clients using AI:
Question 1: What are the tasks or extra little bits that you do for your customers that are costing you time and money, without a direct return?
Question 2: What are the little things you WANT to do for your customers, but have held off on because you know they will not return a direct return for you?
By asking the right questions and using AI, you can streamline your operations and provide more value to your customers without raising costs. Whether it’s optimising routine tasks or offering new services you’ve always wanted to provide, AI can help you elevate customer service and boost business efficiency.
The first step to solving this problem is to start, so let’s begin!
Cheers.
Adam Walsh,
Founder – Bizualize
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