The AI Guy Podcast

EP50: The 86-15 Gap: Goldman's $500M Confession That Small Business Is the AI Economy.

On October 22, 2026, Goldman Sachs published the third annual AI survey of its 10,000 Small Businesses program - 2,473 owners, fielded by Babson College - and committed $500 million to a new Small Business AI Institute built with Anthropic, Google, Meta and OpenAI. The headline is both impressive and quietly alarming: 86% of respondents now use AI in their business, up from 56% in 2024 and 77% in 2025. But only 15% say AI is fully integrated into their core operations, and three out of four AI-using owners spend less than $100 a month. Most small businesses are not AI-poor; they are AI-shallow - pointing a general chatbot at everything instead of pointing the right tool at the few jobs that make money.

Marcus and Jules walk a 4-step SMB playbook: (1) pick the one job that makes you money, not the one that is fun; (2) point one tool at that job instead of one chatbot at everything; (3) take the free training on the table right now, including Google's "Grow with Google" AI certificate and three months of Google AI Pro at no cost; (4) set the human gate before it touches money, then measure one workflow for two weeks.

Includes: the parallel SMB playbook article (ai.advalorem.io/reports) and the Discord CTA.

Voices and content are AI-generated.

EP49: The AI Balance Gap (Insperity 4-Step Workforce & AI Playbook).

On October 29, 2026, Insperity published "The AI Balance Gap," a study with Lighthouse Research & Advisory of more than 1,800 SMB leaders and workers. The headline: 75% of SMB leaders are already using or experimenting with AI, but only about four in ten feel prepared for the people side of that change. Companies that invest in their people as intentionally as they invest in technology reported roughly 2x stronger outcomes across trust, work management, the experience of change, leadership involvement, and people investment.

Marcus and Jules walk a 4-step SMB playbook: (1) use AI to augment your people, not replace them; (2) keep human accountability on every AI decision that touches a customer or money; (3) reallocate the AI-created capacity into the work that grows the business; (4) align your AI strategy with your workforce strategy, so employees can see the two plans live side by side.

Includes: the parallel SMB playbook article (ai.advalorem.io/reports) and the Discord CTA for a free 1-on-1 with Val.

Voices and content are AI-generated.

EP48: The $12,000 AI Back Office (Oracle + OpenAI 4-Step SMB Playbook).

On October 27, 2026, at Oracle AI World, Oracle and OpenAI announced the Oracle AI SMB Bundle: a free-to-start package that gives eligible US small businesses $12,000 in annual Oracle Cloud credits (renewable for up to three years), bundled with ChatGPT Business, Oracle AI Workspace, Codex, Oracle App Composer, and NetSuite QuickStart for invoicing and cash flow.

Marcus and Jules walk a 4-step SMB playbook: (1) confirm you actually qualify; (2) pick your one cash-flow pain and point NetSuite QuickStart at it; (3) wire in the assistant with a human gate on anything that touches money or customer data; (4) build the one tool you'd otherwise outsource on the credits.

Includes: the parallel SMB playbook article (ai.advalorem.io/reports) and the Discord CTA for a free 1-on-1 with Val.

Voices and content are AI-generated.

EP47: Corvo AI and the Local Marketing Shift (Yext 4-Step SMB Playbook).

On October 23, 2026, Yext expanded its agentic marketing platform and launched an early version of Corvo AI: a local marketing agent that monitors business listings, reviews, hours, and address details, then helps keep them clean.

Marcus and Jules walk a 4-step SMB playbook: (1) audit your core local data; (2) connect the tools your customers actually use; (3) automate low-risk fixes; (4) keep a human checkpoint on anything customer-facing.

Includes: the parallel SMB playbook article (ai.advalorem.io/reports) and the Discord CTA for a free 1-on-1 with Val.

Voices and content are AI-generated.

EP46: Google Gave Every Small Business a Brand Brain and a Cash-Flow Mirror (4-Step Gemini Playbook).

On October 20, 2026, Google launched dedicated tools inside Gemini for small business owners: a new business landing page, a Styles feature that learns your brand (colors, fonts, tone) and keeps every visual consistent, finance skills that surface revenue, top expense, and cash-flow trends, and deeper connections to the apps you already use.

A 4-step weekend SMB playbook: (1) feed Styles your brand DNA once; (2) turn on the finance skills for one honest number; (3) connect the two money apps, not all of them; (4) keep a human approval gate on anything that sends or spends.

Includes: the parallel SMB playbook article (ai.advalorem.io/reports) and the Discord CTA for a free 1-on-1 with Val.

Voices and content are AI-generated.

EP45: OpenAI Open-Sourced the Harness That Runs Codex — Now It's a 3-Step API.

On September 10, 2026, OpenAI introduced the Agents API in public beta, powered by the open-source Codex harness. The engine that coordinates model calls, tools, and context is now both a public API and a codebase you can actually read. No extra platform fee in beta — you pay for the tokens and tools the agent uses, not rent.

A weekend-ready 3-step SMB playbook: (1) call the harness, not a wrapper — point the Agents API at one clear task; (2) read the open source — inspect how it routes model calls, handles tools, and manages context; (3) keep a human approval gate — decide what the agent may read, write, or spend, and route anything that moves money or sends messages behind your approval.

Includes: the parallel SMB playbook article (ai.advalorem.io/reports) and the Discord CTA for a free 1-on-1 with Val.

Voices and content are AI-generated.

EP44: Fifteen Tools, One AI — Meta Muse Ends the Human Router (4-Step SMB Playbook).

On September 29, 2026, Meta expanded its Muse personal AI agent to small business (Muse for Small Business). It connects to 15 third-party tools — Asana, Box, Canva, Dropbox, Figma, Granola, HighLevel, Intuit QuickBooks, Klaviyo, Lovable, Notion, Shopify, Slack, Stripe, and Zoom — plus your Instagram professional account, Facebook Page, and Meta ad accounts. You set a goal (“find ten new customers this month”) and Muse maps the steps across those tools. Pricing follows the existing Muse app: Free (usage limit, ~100M tokens/week), Power $20/month (~500M/week), Maximum $100/month (~3B/week); available in the US and Canada. Meta’s guardrail: “Nothing publishes, sends, or spends without your approval.”

In this episode, Marcus and Jules walk the 4-step, free-to-start SMB playbook: (1) start free and connect the three money tools (QuickBooks, Stripe, Shopify + your ad account); (2) give it a goal, not a task; (3) keep the approval guardrail on; (4) measure the router hours you saved. Tools: Meta Muse for Small Business, Intuit QuickBooks, Stripe, Shopify, Meta ads, Klaviyo, Canva.

Includes: the parallel SMB playbook article (ai.advalorem.io/reports), the 3 AdValorem implementation packages, and the Discord CTA for a free 1-on-1 with Val.

Voices and content are AI-generated.

EP43: Google Just Put One Cart in Front of 60 Billion Products — and It’s Coming for Your Store.

On October 15, 2026, Google began rolling out Universal Cart in the US across Search and Gemini. It is a persistent, cross-retailer AI cart built on 60+ billion continually refreshed product listings: it organizes products, tracks price and inventory, applies promo codes, and supports checkout via Google Pay or hand-off to the merchant’s own cart. The protocol underneath is UCP — the Universal Commerce Protocol. Same week, Wix Symphony connected to Stripe Link, letting SMB AI agents request owner-approved payments for inventory, bills, and fees with a 10-minute approval window.

In this episode, Marcus and Jules walk the 5-step, no-enterprise-contract SMB playbook: (1) audit the product feed; (2) turn on the UCP handoff; (3) add an agent-payment guardrail with human approval; (4) measure the agent channel like a new sales rep; (5) choose an SMB-priced stack. Tools: Google Merchant Center, Shopify Catalog/UCP enrollment, Stripe Link, Meta Muse for Small Business, Wix Symphony.

Includes: the parallel SMB playbook article (ai.advalorem.io/reports), the 3 AdValorem implementation packages, and the Discord CTA for a free 1-on-1 with Val.

Voices and content are AI-generated.

EP42: 75M Payments at 32 Cents Each — the x402 Agent Economy and AWS AgentCore Payments.

Last month, x402 (the open standard for machine-to-machine HTTP payments) moved 75 million transactions worth $24M between 94,000 buyers and 22,000 sellers, at ~32 cents each. On Oct 13, 2026, Amazon Bedrock AgentCore Payments went generally available, built with Coinbase and Stripe: AI agents now pay for APIs, data, and model inference one request at a time over x402, with spending limits enforced at the infrastructure layer (not the model). Incarna's agents pay BlockRun's inference router per-request — a 3-day integration (vs 2-3 months building it yourself).

In this episode, Marcus and Jules walk the 4-step, zero-enterprise-contract SMB playbook: (1) pick your side of the 32-cent rail — buyer that spends AI budget, or seller exposing a paid endpoint; (2) make your most valuable output agent-payable via x402 (USDC on Base); (3) put a hard spending cap on the buyer side via AgentCore Payments + Coinbase; (4) measure the agent channel like a new sales rep. Tools: Weave, Sully, Slang.ai, CureMD, Voksha, Coinbase, Stripe, x402 open standard.

Includes: the parallel SMB playbook article (ai.advalorem.io/reports), the 3 AdValorem implementation packages, and the Discord CTA for a free 1-on-1 with Val.

Voices and content are AI-generated.

EP41: 20+ Payment & Retail Giants Back Google's Universal Commerce Protocol (UCP) — the Agentic Checkout Channel.

Google's Universal Commerce Protocol (UCP) is entering U.S. merchant accounts through the Merchant Center UCP Integration Hub (Oct 6-9, 2026; NRF Big Show Oct 9, Sundar Pichai). Gemini + AI Mode in Google Search can now discover your products, build the cart, and complete checkout on Google via Google Wallet / Google Pay — with PayPal next. It is co-developed with Shopify, Etsy, Wayfair, Target, and Walmart, and endorsed by 20+ partners (Visa, Mastercard, Amex, Stripe, PayPal, Best Buy, Macy's, Home Depot, Zalando, Flipkart). Open-source Apache 2.0, AP2-compatible. U.S. first; Canada + Australia next.

In this episode, Marcus and Jules walk the 4-step zero-code retail/e-commerce SMB playbook: (1) build an agent-ready structured product feed in Merchant Center (titles, SKUs, prices, stock, shipping, returns), (2) onboard through the UCP Integration Hub and pass the built-in test suite, (3) enable friction-free Google Wallet (Google Pay) checkout — ship fast, honor the feed price, keep items in stock — and (4) measure the new 'agent traffic' channel separately and defend margin.

Includes: the parallel SMB playbook article (ai.advalorem.io/reports), the 3 AdValorem implementation packages, and the Discord CTA for a free 1-on-1 with Val.

Voices and content are AI-generated.