AI, particularly GenAI, offers huge benefits to South African small businesses.
This is according to Winston Ritson, AI consultant at MTN Business, who explained that GenAI is no longer just for larger enterprises.
“GenAI has matured into a SaaS-type service, where companies can simply purchase a month-to-month subscription or benefit from AI-powered tools as part of a broader tech suite,” said Ritson.
He said that while one often hears of ambitious and large-scale use cases for AI, its biggest value to small businesses lies in handling repetitive and rudimentary tasks.
Ritson provided several examples where AI can help:
- Scanning unread emails to find customer complaints.
- Generating an ordered task list for the day ahead.
- Drafting a basic legal document.
- Turning a summary into a formal email.
“Lots of the best AI use cases for small businesses will involve a standard set of prompts you can run daily,” said Ritson.
Microsoft Copilot
When choosing the right AI tools for your small business, consider what is available within your preferred productivity suite.
Microsoft Copilot is a standout example, as it is native to Windows 11, Microsoft 365, and Microsoft Teams – important software for small businesses.
Not only does this make it easier to start using AI, but it also ensures that your AI tools are inherently integrated into the rest of your ICT ecosystem.
Another major advantage of Microsoft Copilot is the anonymized training data it has from millions of small businesses across the world.
“Through this data, Copilot has learned how small businesses typically need to run to be productive, and where businesses can save energy by deploying AI tools and agents,” said Ritson.
Ritson highlighted the power of Copilot’s AI agents within Microsoft Teams, as an example, explaining how these can be created for specific repetitive tasks.
This includes automatically replying to certain chats, searching Microsoft Teams for specific alerts, and much more.
MTN Business and Microsoft
MTN Business is a trusted Microsoft advisor in South Africa and can help your small business leverage Microsoft Copilot’s impressive AI capabilities.
You can take advantage of a 3-day, obligation-free readiness assessment from MTN Business, which will determine how Microsoft Copilot and Microsoft 365 can unlock value in your business.
Microsoft Copilot is also included as part of MTN Business Unboxed – a bundle of solutions focused specifically on empowering small businesses.
This bundle includes connectivity, Microsoft 365, domain registration (if needed), and more – everything you need to take your small business to the next level.
