Hey. Hope you had a great week! Let's take a look at a couple of AI updates that could actually make a difference for your business.

If you've used Constant Contact over the years, you've probably thought of it as an email marketing platform.

That's changing.

The company recently announced that it's expanding beyond email by weaving AI throughout its platform. Instead of simply sending newsletters, the goal is to help business owners create campaigns, generate content, and manage marketing across multiple channels with AI built into the process.

This isn't happening only with Constant Contact.

Over the past few months we've talked about Gusto adding AI to payroll, Claude working inside Slack, Microsoft's new AI tools, and Google's continued AI integrations.

There's a clear pattern emerging. Instead of asking businesses to learn yet another AI tool, software companies are bringing AI into the products many of us already use every day.

In this case, AI is solving the “blank screen problem”. You know the one where you don’t know how to begin. It’s a perfect use of AI to help small business owners get more done quickly.

Even if you don’t use Constant Contact, this is a good reminder that as tools evolve, you’ll want to learn how to take advantage of the AI features already included in your existing platforms. This will be more valuable then searching for a new AI app.

One article I read this week looked at Google AI Overviews and the impact of AI “hallucinations”. The author cited research suggesting that roughly one in ten AI Overview responses contains an error. That may not sound like much, but when millions of people rely on those summaries without checking the source, those mistakes can spread quickly.

What’s interesting is many people assume AI "hallucinations" are simply bugs that will eventually disappear. They're not.

Large language models generate responses by predicting the most likely words based on patterns they've learned. They don't actually verify facts before giving you an answer. That’s why AI sounds completely confident while being wrong.

That doesn't mean AI isn't useful. It means it's important to use it for the right kinds of work.

Google AI Overview is useful for:

But always click through and verify information involving:

Google AI Overview is a great way to get the gist of a topic and quickly understand the basics. But when the information could affect your business, take a minute to click through and verify the source.

These two stories really point to the same trend.

AI is becoming easier to use because software companies are building it into the tools businesses already rely on every day.

At the same time, AI still needs your judgment, experience, and context.

That's it for this week. Hopefully this gives you a clearer picture of how AI is changing the way small businesses operate and a few ideas about where these tools can make the biggest impact.

As always, my goal is to help you understand what matters without getting lost in the hype.

Yours in success,
Kathleen

P.S. Forward this to one business-owner friend who’s still “figuring out AI.” You’ll look like the smart one. 😊