Is Artificial Intelligence (AI) withstanding the hype for small business owners? NextRecent research into AI tools adoption for small and medium-sized businesses shows that many people are dialing back.
Independent operators rely on AI tools to be more efficient and are optimistic about their impact. However, since it was last investigated in 2024, it appears that AI has stopped incorporating it into business operations. And cost and complexity seem to be a barrier to keeping them out.
We then surveyed 1,500 SME owners in April 2025 to ask about AI use and implementation plans.
42% of small and medium-sized businesses reported using AI in 2024, but a 2025 survey found that it had dropped significantly to just 28%. Why are you interested?
Some small business owners, like Danilo Coviello, the founding partner of translation agency Espresso Translation, regularly use AI, but are worried about adding business risk. “I use behind the scenes AI to streamline preparation, clean terms and test briefs, but not exchange translators or project managers. AI is when tone shifts, legal nuances, or vague phrases can be at the expense of the client.
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The enthusiasm for adopting AI seems to have cooled down. Last year, 27% planned to increase business use. When asked in 2025, only 23% of people “definitely consider” the addition of AI.
This year, only 19% (1 in 5 business owners) have been added. 58% say they have no plans to use AI at all for their business.
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It seems that AI adoption is down completely, but those using it are finding business value. Research data shows that small and medium-sized businesses primarily use AI for content creation and marketing, customer service and product suggestions. SMEs also use this technology to help streamline calendar and scheduling tasks, accounting and payroll.
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“The key to leveraging AI in marketing in 2025, says Brendan Egan, founder and CEO of expert marketing and AI expert Brendan Egan. AI marketing tools help small businesses create personalized content and promotions. And SME owners are: According to a survey by Next, 11% of respondents use AI for marketing and content, making it the top use case.
Small business owners need to understand AI limitations and how to use it well. Egan said: “AI can write content, but doing so can harm your site's Google rankings. AI can create emails for customers, but many companies are caught sending out things they don't want because they wrote them.”
And there's no shortage of tools to help you work. Jasper and Copy.ai can help you automate copy creation. Canva and Midjourney can also assist with images and graphics.
“We're now advised small businesses not to use AI to help them with marketing and not to do that for them,” Egan says. “For example, if you're blogging for SEO purposes to increase traffic to your site, it's easy and fast to write content by asking AI to come up with an outline and some facts.
Next's survey found that 9% of small business owners use AI for customer service using tools such as AI assistant chatbots. These smartbots can free up time to focus on more complex customer interactions, and also help with cross-selling and upselling opportunities.
Find an AI-powered chatbot platform that allows you to build customized chatbots without coding skills.
In a survey by Next, 8% of business owners use AI to recommend products, helping small businesses increase sales and increase customer loyalty.
Shopify's AI-powered recommendations and platforms like Amazon analyze customer purchase history and browsing patterns to suggest relevant products.
Virtual assistants like Siri, Alexa, Google Assistant aren't just personal tasks. They are useful in business as well.
In the following survey, 8% of business owners use AI to manage their schedules and appointments, set reminders, respond to quick queries, and control smart devices at work.
AI Accounting and Payroll Calculators can facilitate financial management tasks, reduce errors, and save time. According to the following survey, 7% of small business owners already use these tools to run their businesses.
Popular platforms like QuickBooks, Xero, Gusto, and Freshbook use AI technology to automate recurring financial tasks such as processing invoices, tracking expenses, and managing payroll.
AI-powered data tools such as IBM Watson and Google's Looker Studio help businesses understand complex data, such as weaknesses, opportunities, product pricing, and forecasting. These tools use machine learning to find patterns, create clear visual reports, and make more informed business decisions.
AI Documentation Tools can increase efficiency by extracting data from invoices, receipts, purchase orders, and more to reduce errors from manual data entry. Also, if your business documents suddenly turn digital, it's easy to save, sort and search.
Coviello, the owner of the translation company, uses AI to “generate internal documents more quickly, edit the templates specified for clients, and check the translation briefs.”
However, AI in these tasks can pose responsibility. “We once translated supplier contracts from German and AI, and AI completely misread the embedded acronym. Human translators flagged it in two minutes, double checking it with the client, and the AI moved.
“Business owners generally fall into two buckets when it comes to AI integration,” says Egan of Simple SEO Group. “People who use it too much or never use it. In our experience there is very little business that uses AI properly.”
The following survey data reveals that small business owners have mixed feelings about the impact of AI. Some owners (12%) believe that AI can increase revenue and operational efficiency (12%), but are skeptical of its value. People who think that AI will not affect their business in any way (9%), they think that it is a threat to their business (9%), or they think that it will reduce profits (7%).
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Some obstacles that hinder AI adoption include:
Implementation cost
AI often helps reduce costs, but the price of adopting AI remains a hurdle for small and medium-sized businesses. The Bipartisan Policy Center reports that 55% of SME owners identify costs as a reason they do not use AI.
Lack of education
A 2025 survey by Service Direct found that 62% of small businesses cited lack of understanding of AI benefits as a barrier to adoption. Many small business owners consider artificial intelligence tools to be too complicated or only target large businesses.
Data Management Challenges
Data helps AI make more accurate predictions. However, collecting, organizing and analyzing data can be challenging for small businesses. A Hyperscience and Harris poll found that half of organizations do not use AI to process documents or improve workflows.
This story was produced by Next Reviews and distribution Stacker.
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