Last week, Y Combinator shared a memo about “AI Native Agencies”.
That started a few conversations with peers.
The idea is simple: agencies in the future may look more like software companies.
High margins and more leverage.
(YC says agencies can have software-like margins. I already run Inscaler with ~90% margins. 😅)
Jokes aside, AI is already changing our industry.
And honestly, I’m happy about it.
Service businesses have always struggled with how much one person can really produce in a day.
AI helps with that.
Now, let’s talk about Inscaler and how I actually use AI in my business.
I mainly use two tools:
Everything else is built into the tools I already use, like:
I use ChatGPT in a broad way.
Over time, I built a few custom agents that help me every day.
Here’s how I use them.
This agent knows almost everything about the last three years of running Inscaler.
I use it like a thinking partner.
I ask questions and test ideas.
I talk things through.
Sometimes it gets things very wrong.
Once, it almost pushed me to change my whole pricing model.
That taught me only to act when I am entirely sure, after checking myself.
Still, I find it useful.
I wrote about this a few months ago, and it’s still working well.
I trained this agent using:
Its job is simple.
Review call transcripts and give feedback using start / stop / continue framework.
When I review client calls, I always do two things:
Over time, the feedback has become very similar.
Still, I would never give feedback without listening to the call myself.
The agent works with me, not instead of me.
I never publish content written by AI from scratch.
Never.
My flow is simple:
The agent reviews tone, clarity, and structure using a long prompt.
Sometimes I keep the changes.
Sometimes it feels off, and I go back and rewrite.
I’m still testing this one.
Not entirely convinced yet.
Since launching my YouTube channel, I trained an agent using:
It helps me create clear scripts for long videos.
So far, it works well.
But it’s early, I’m still improving the prompts as I go.
Claude surprised me.
For my work style, it often feels clearer and more helpful than ChatGPT.
I mainly use it for real work tasks.
Right now, I’m using Claude to update more than 50 internal documents:
I’m adding my voice and updating old material.
Claude is helping me rebuild a large part of my Google Drive.
I do this while working, using Claude side by side.
I also use Claude when I need to:
Clients pay for my experience, not for an AI.
AI helps me work better in the background.
It saves time.
But first client conversations are always with me.
I’m not an agency that needs to scale, I'm a craftman and I run hands-on, crafted work.
That requires full attention.
AI helps me support more clients than before.
But the work is still personal.
It always starts with me.
If you run a service business and interestingly use AI, I’d love to see it.
How you are using, what’s changed and how it’s impacting your business.
Thanks for reading this far, see you all next week!
