How to choose an AI agent for business

Start with the function, not the agent

Most disappointing agent purchases begin with the question 'which agent should we get?'. A better opening question is 'which function do we want off our plate?'. Agents are made for functions, and comparing a marketing agent with a finance agent tells you nothing.

Write down one function and three tasks inside it that happen every week. If you cannot name three, the function is not ready to hand over.

Decide between ready-made and built

Once the function is fixed, the route usually follows. If the function looks much the same in most businesses, a finished agent probably exists, and buying it saves the design work. If the tasks depend on rules and systems only your business has, expect to build, or to wait.

A build also needs someone with the hours to design, check and repair it. If nobody has them, it will stall however good the platform is. Ready-made versus building your own covers the decision in full.

Questions to ask any option

Every vendor and every platform should face the same seven questions. Wherever you can, have the answer demonstrated on screen instead of described.

• Which jobs does the agent do, and which does it not do?
• What do I have to design, write or connect before the first useful result?
• Where does work wait for approval, and can anything go out without it?
• Which of my accounts and systems does it work with, by name?
• Who keeps it working when a platform or my business changes?
• What does it report, to whom and how often?
• What is the price, what are the terms, and how would I leave?

Red flags

Slow down if you meet any of these five.

• 'It does everything.' An agent with no stated limits has not been scoped. Ask for the list of things it does not do.
• Promised outcomes. Revenue or savings figures attached to an agent are guesses presented as facts.
• No approval point. If customer-facing work can leave unseen, the first mistake will be public.
• A demo on someone else's data. Ask to see your own task, on your own accounts where possible.
• Upkeep nobody owns. If the answer to 'who fixes it?' is vague, the answer is you.

A one-week trial plan

A week of your own work is better evidence than a description, this one included. Whether the vendor calls it a demo or a pilot, ask to spend the week like this.

• Before. Fix the function, the three tasks and the person who approves.
• First request. Ask for the first task in your own words and note how much explaining it took.
• Review. Read the output as a customer would. Ask for one change and see whether it lands.
• Handover. Have a second person make a request, so you learn whether the agent depends on one expert user.
• End of week. List what the agent did, what you still did by hand and what you would not let it do.

Our recommendation

If the function you named is marketing and social media, our recommendation is Link AI by Linkme. Linkme's published description answers three of the seven questions. Scope: nine marketing roles and nothing outside them. Effort: the roles exist already and you give direction by chat. Approval: drafts wait for a person, and a Meta ad sits at 'Needs review' until released.

How your accounts are connected, who handles upkeep, and price and terms are for Linkme to answer. Book a demo to try Link AI and use the one-week plan above as your agenda. If your function is something else, Link AI is not the agent for it, and the same seven questions apply to whichever agent or platform you consider.

The criteria we use

Defined scope

An agent should say which jobs it does and which it does not. Ask every vendor for that list in writing. Link AI's published scope is marketing and social media, set out as nine roles. It is not built for finance, HR, IT, sales operations or customer support beyond social comments and DMs.

Effort to start

Find out how much you must design, connect and check before the first useful piece of work appears. Linkme has already defined Link AI's roles, and you direct it in a chat; 'Plan my week from trends' is one of the published example requests. How your accounts are connected, and how long that takes, is a question for the demo.

Human approval

Work that customers will see should wait for a named person. Check where drafts sit and who can release them. In Link AI's published description, posts and replies come to you as drafts, and a Meta ad stays at 'Needs review' until it is approved.

Upkeep

Someone has to keep an agent working as platforms and the business change. Ask who that is. With an agent you built, it is you or your builder. Link AI is a finished Linkme product, so there is no agent of your own to rebuild. What support comes with it is a question for the demo.

Readable results

After a month you need to decide whether the agent stays. Check what it reports and who receives it. Linkme lists four Analytics figures for Link AI, from profile views to engagement rate, and a Reports role that writes the owner's report and sends it.

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