Bowen AI Strategy Group is an AI consulting firm for small businesses in Pittsburgh and Washington County. This page is written for the owner deciding whether to hire one: what an engagement should look like, what it should cost, the red flags, and who should own the code at the end. Our own answer to each is here too.
A small business should expect the firm to look at its actual operations before recommending anything, to put a scope and a price in writing quickly, and to leave behind a working system the business owns. At Bowen AI Strategy Group that means a working session, a scoped number within 48 hours, and a first live system typically inside two weeks.
Most AI consulting was designed for companies with a hundred employees and a project budget. A small business has neither. What it has is an owner who already knows where the pain is, a small team that cannot absorb a six-week discovery phase, and a very short tolerance for paying for documents. A firm that serves small business well has to be built around those three facts.
So the first thing to expect is that the firm asks to see how you work before it tells you what to buy. Our version is a working session on where your hours go, where leads leak, and what you cannot see in your numbers. The second thing to expect is a short gap between that session and a written number. Ours is 48 hours. The third is that the engagement produces a system, not a recommendation. The custom projects that come out of our consult are AI sales agents on phone, SMS, and web that qualify and book, custom dashboards on your real data, workflow automation, integrations into your CRM, calendar, and phone, chatbots or knowledge bases trained on your own content, and an AI-ready website when the session shows the site is the leak.
Only a small share of Pittsburgh small businesses have ever engaged an AI consultant, according to our Pittsburgh AI consulting statistics, which puts the figure at 8 percent for businesses under 50 employees. That is partly because the engagement model most firms offer was never meant for them. The rest of this page is about what a model that is meant for them looks like. The overview of our own is on the AI consulting Pittsburgh hub.
Bowen AI Strategy Group's custom engagements start at $3,000 per month, scoped to the systems being built, with the number in writing within 48 hours of the working session. An AI-ready website, when the consult calls for one, is $1,500 plus $250 per month for care. GEO is priced separately at $1,500 for the audit and $1,500 per month.
Three things should be true about any price a small business is quoted for AI consulting. It should be written down before work starts. It should be tied to something you can point at, meaning a system with a name and a job, rather than a block of hours. And it should tell you what happens to the price if the scope changes, which for us is that a new build gets a new written number and the old one does not move.
What moves our number is the number of systems being built and connected, how many integrations each needs, and the volume it handles. A single phone agent booking into one calendar is near the floor. A dealership running three lead sources through one agent, a service-drive workflow, and a dashboard is higher. Either way you know the figure before you commit.
Our other offers are priced on their own because they are different products. GEO, meaning getting cited by ChatGPT, Gemini, and Google AI Overviews, is on the GEO services page. Ads and AI video are scoped per campaign. The repeat-revenue email engine is priced to the size of your customer list. The consult will tell you honestly if one of those is the bigger lever for your business than a custom build.
Working session on your operations first. Scope and price in writing within 48 hours second. First live system on your own tools, typically inside two weeks, third. Then a dashboard on real data shows what it did and the next build is chosen from the same list. Each step produces something you can hold, and you can stop after any of them.
Week 0
With the owner or the person who runs the day. We walk a real week: calls, forms, quotes, invoices, hand-offs. You leave with a ranked list of what AI could change and why.
Within 48 hours
The first build, what it replaces, what it measures, and what it costs. If you say no here, you keep the list.
About two weeks
Built on accounts in your name, connected to your CRM, calendar, and phone. You watch it handle real leads before we talk about anything else.
Ongoing
A dashboard on your data shows what the first system did. The next one is scoped with that information, in writing, at its own number.
Two things about this sequence are worth noticing. Nothing is built before something is written down, and nothing new is scoped before the last thing is measured. That keeps the engagement small at every step, which is what makes it survivable for a small business. If you want the strategy side of this, meaning how we decide what goes first, the AI strategy consultant page lays out the framework. If your question is about processes and hours, start with the AI automation consultant page.
The big ones: a recommendation before anyone has looked at your operations, a price that is not in writing, a strategy deliverable with no build attached, a platform the firm resells rather than one it chooses for you, and a contract where the firm keeps the code or the data. Any of those means the engagement is designed around the firm, not around you.
None of these are exotic. They are the same questions you would ask a contractor before letting them near your building. Our best AI consultant in Pittsburgh page turns them into a checklist you can take into any conversation, including one with us.
With Bowen AI Strategy Group, the client owns the code and the data. The systems are built on accounts in your name, on the tools you already run, and if you stop working with us they keep running. Ask any firm this question before signing, because the answer is frequently no.
Here is why it matters more for a small business than for a large one. A large company has a legal team and a procurement process that will catch an ownership clause. A small business owner usually finds out who owns the system the day they try to leave. If the phone agent is on the firm's account, leaving means the phone stops being answered. If the dashboard runs on the firm's database, leaving means the numbers disappear. That is not a partnership, it is a hostage situation with a monthly invoice.
Our rule is that everything lives in your name from the first day. The phone number, the CRM connection, the hosting, the code repository, the data. We have access while we work together, and you can remove it the day you decide to. That makes us easier to fire, which is the point. A firm that can be fired has to keep earning the engagement, and the systems we build are meant to outlast us.
Ask for this in writing. If a firm will not put it in the agreement, that is your answer.
Car dealerships, real estate teams, and local service businesses across Pittsburgh and Washington County. What they have in common is high inbound volume, a clear value per lead, and a process that repeats, which is what makes an AI system worth building. Bowen AI Strategy Group is based at 225 William Dr, Canonsburg, PA 15317.
Lead response across sales and service, appointment confirmation, unsold-lead follow-up, and one view of where leads come from and what they close at.
Inquiry qualification, showing coordination, past-client reactivation, and a website that answers the questions buyers and sellers ask AI engines first.
The phone, dispatch, estimate follow-up, review requests, and rebooking, for the trades and the professional offices that live on inbound calls.
If your business is not one of those three but shares the traits, the working session still applies. The traits are what matter. If it does not share them, meaning every job is different or there is no inbound volume to speak of, we will say so in the session rather than scope a build that will not pay for itself.
Common Questions
A small business should expect the firm to look at its actual operations before recommending anything, to put a scope and a price in writing quickly, and to leave behind a working system the business owns. At Bowen AI Strategy Group that means a working session, a scoped number within 48 hours, and a first live system typically inside two weeks.
Bowen AI Strategy Group's custom engagements start at $3,000 per month, scoped to the systems being built, with the number in writing within 48 hours of the working session. An AI-ready website, when the consult calls for one, is $1,500 plus $250 per month for care. GEO is priced separately at $1,500 for the audit and $1,500 per month.
Working session on your operations first. Scope and price in writing within 48 hours second. First live system on your own tools, typically inside two weeks, third. Then a dashboard on real data shows what it did and the next build is chosen from the same list. Each step produces something you can hold, and you can stop after any of them.
The big ones: a recommendation before anyone has looked at your operations, a price that is not in writing, a strategy deliverable with no build attached, a platform the firm resells rather than one it chooses for you, and a contract where the firm keeps the code or the data. Any of those means the engagement is designed around the firm, not around you.
With Bowen AI Strategy Group, the client owns the code and the data. The systems are built on accounts in your name, on the tools you already run, and if you stop working with us they keep running. Ask any firm this question before signing, because the answer is frequently no.
Car dealerships, real estate teams, and local service businesses across Pittsburgh and Washington County. What they have in common is high inbound volume, a clear value per lead, and a process that repeats, which is what makes an AI system worth building. Bowen AI Strategy Group is based at 225 William Dr, Canonsburg, PA 15317.
Who Is Behind This
Tyler Bowen (MBA, Ed.D.) is the founder of Bowen AI Strategy Group, based at 225 William Dr, Canonsburg, PA 15317, serving Pittsburgh and Washington County.
Tyler runs the working session and builds what comes out of it, so the person who scopes the engagement is the person accountable for it. The firm works with car dealerships, real estate teams, and local service businesses, and every engagement ends with a system the client owns.
Reach him at 412-841-5392 or book a working session below.
One working session on your operations. A ranked list, a scoped number in writing within 48 hours, and a system you own.
225 William Dr, Canonsburg, PA 15317 | Serving Pittsburgh and Washington County