Buyer questions, answered.
Every common buyer question across pricing, process, AI, SaaS, SDVOSB, and the technology stack. Grouped by topic. If your question is not here, ask in the audit.
What we do.
What does That AI Guy actually do for a small business?
That AI Guy builds four things. Custom AI integrations including chatbots, retrieval augmented generation, and workflow automation. Custom software including internal tools, automations, and APIs. SaaS products from MVP through scale. Hand coded websites with full stack engine optimization across SEO, AEO, AIO, and GEO.
How is this different from a development agency?
That AI Guy is one engineer. Traditional shops bundle account managers, project managers, designers, developers, and a markup on all of them. The same engineer who scopes the work is the engineer who ships it. The same engineer answers the maintenance email a year later. Read full vs agency comparison.
What is MEGAMIND and how does it improve my project?
MEGAMIND is a federated neural network running on Apple Silicon nodes. It is a research property that informs how we build AI integrations for clients. Most client work uses Anthropic Claude or OpenAI GPT for production inference; MEGAMIND is for research and for clients who need fully on premises inference. Read about MEGAMIND.
Pricing.
How much does a custom AI build cost?
AI integrations start at $1,997 Professional tier. Full SaaS products with AI start at $4,997 for an MVP. Standalone chatbots can be added to existing sites at quote.
What does a website cost?
Six tiers from $597 Starter to $2,997 Enterprise. Most small business builds land at Standard $997 or Professional $1,497. See all pricing.
What about ongoing costs?
Three monthly retainers from $250 Essential hosting to $500 Growth Engine. Existing build clients get the $397 Full Visibility Stack complimentary for the first 12 months on Standard tier and above.
Are prices negotiable?
Tier pricing is fixed. Scope inside a tier is negotiable. Custom scopes outside the published tiers are quoted per project.
Process.
What does the free audit include?
30 minute discovery call plus a written audit delivered within 48 hours. Audit covers technical SEO, schema, AEO, accessibility, performance, security headers, and the AI surface where applicable. Findings are prioritized; critical and high findings include recommended fixes.
How long does an AI integration take to ship?
Custom chatbots in 2 to 3 weeks. RAG knowledge bases 3 to 5 weeks. Workflow automation 3 to 5 weeks. Voice agents 4 to 6 weeks. Full SaaS MVP 6 to 12 weeks.
What is the 5 phase process?
Discover, Derive, Design and Demo, Build, Deploy. Read the full process.
AI, data, ownership.
Will my site rank in ChatGPT, Perplexity, Claude, and Google AI Overviews?
Yes when paired with the engine optimization stack. Every site ships with answer capsules, FAQPage and speakable schema, llms.txt, brand.json, and entity triangulation through Wikidata where applicable. Read Tier 3.
Do I own the code, the model, and the data after launch?
Yes, fully. Code lives in a Git repository you own. Your data never leaves your environment unless you opt in to public cloud LLM APIs.
What about HIPAA, SOC2, and other compliance?
HIPAA where required: BAA available with infrastructure partner. SOC2 friendly architecture for clients heading toward audit. NIST 800 53 alignment for federal contracting. We do not claim certifications we do not hold.
Can the AI hallucinate?
Properly architected RAG does not invent answers. It cites the source it drew from. We test for hallucination explicitly and tune the system prompt to defer when the answer is not in the indexed content.
SDVOSB and federal contracting.
What is SDVOSB?
Service Disabled Veteran Owned Small Business is a federal designation enabling SDVOSB set aside contracts through SAM.gov. That AI Guy is SDVOSB certified, SAM.gov registered, and eligible to act as prime contractor on SDVOSB set aside acquisitions.
Do you take projects outside Missouri and Arkansas?
Yes. That AI Guy ships nationwide. Projects have shipped to clients in 18 plus US states. The studio is based in Cassville, Missouri.
Do you take federal subcontracts?
Yes. We work as prime on SDVOSB set asides and as sub on larger federal contracts. CAGE and DUNS available on request.
Can That AI Guy take over an abandoned project?
Yes. The first step is a free written audit. The second is a fixed price quote.