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Automation

Business Automation & AI

Automate your workflows without per-task billing, and run AI on your own infrastructure so your data never reaches a third-party API.

Two costs that compound as your business matures

Workflow automation tools like Zapier and Make charge per task execution. Early on, when you have a handful of automations running occasionally, the cost is negligible. As your business matures and automation becomes central to how you operate: CRM sync, lead routing, invoice processing, onboarding sequences, and reporting pipelines. Task counts compound quickly. Teams running serious automation workflows regularly hit $200 to $500 per month on Zapier before they realise it.

AI API costs follow the same pattern. A team experimenting with ChatGPT or Claude API pays little. A team that has integrated AI into daily workflows (document processing, customer communication drafts, internal knowledge search, and code review. These teams can spend significant amounts monthly on token usage. And every query, every document, every piece of context sent to those APIs leaves your environment.

Workflow automation without per-task billing

We deploy a self-hosted workflow automation platform, a visual tool your team uses from a browser to build, test, and manage automations without writing code. The platform connects to most tools your business already uses: CRM systems, email platforms, spreadsheets, databases, communication tools, payment processors, and hundreds of other services via their APIs.

Workflows you have built in Zapier or Make can typically be recreated with modest adjustments. We migrate your active automations, run old and new in parallel until outputs are verified, then cut over. You stop paying per task.

For teams that want to go further, the platform supports custom code steps in JavaScript or Python for cases where pre-built integrations do not cover the requirement. Most business automation workflows, even complex ones with branching logic and error handling, can be built entirely without code.

Private AI on your infrastructure

We deploy a private AI environment that gives your team access to capable language models running on your own server. Your team uses a clean browser interface, the same general experience as ChatGPT, with models you select, on infrastructure you control. No query leaves your environment.

The environment supports multiple open-source models suited to different tasks: general writing and reasoning, code generation and review, document analysis, and structured data extraction. For teams that need AI to work with their own documents: answering questions about internal processes, searching across client files, surfacing relevant information from accumulated documentation. We configure a retrieval-augmented generation pipeline. Your documents are indexed and made queryable. The AI answers questions grounded in your actual content.

We deploy and manage Ollama as the model serving layer, Open WebUI as the team-facing interface, and AnythingLLM for document knowledge base configuration.

Who manages models and keeps automation running

Both automation and AI infrastructure require ongoing attention. New automation platform versions are released. Better AI models are released regularly. Open-source model quality has improved dramatically over the past year and the pace of improvement continues. Infrastructure needs monitoring.

Our support retainer covers all of it. We apply automation platform updates, evaluate and deploy improved models when they are meaningfully better, monitor server resources, and respond to incidents. Your team builds and runs automations. We keep the infrastructure underneath them current and stable.

What you can expect

Outcomes of this engagement

  • No per-task pricing — unlimited workflow executions at a fixed server cost
  • Migration of existing Zapier or Make workflows included
  • Private AI access with no data leaving your infrastructure
  • Document knowledge base for querying your own content
  • Visual workflow builder accessible to non-technical team members
  • Ongoing model updates and automation platform maintenance

Estimated savings

What teams typically save

Based on current public pricing for the tools business automation & ai replaces. Server costs shown are estimates — actual costs depend on your hosting provider.

20 people
Currently paying$375/mo
After migration~$25/mo
Monthly saving$350/mo
Annual saving$4,200/yr

Setup cost recovered in ~3 months of savings.

SlackIntercom
50 people
Currently paying$575/mo
After migration~$30/mo
Monthly saving$545/mo
Annual saving$6,540/yr

Setup cost recovered in ~2 months of savings.

SlackIntercom
100 people
Currently paying$1,050/mo
After migration~$40/mo
Monthly saving$1,010/mo
Annual saving$12,120/yr

Setup cost recovered in under 1 month of savings.

SlackMicrosoft TeamsIntercom

* Current costs based on public pricing as of 2026. Your actual costs may vary. Server costs are billed directly by your hosting provider — not by TrySelfHost.

TrySelfHost

Discuss Automation & AI

A strategy call covers whether this engagement makes sense for your current infrastructure and business stage. No sales pitch — a direct assessment of fit.

Common questions

Frequently asked questions

How capable are open-source AI models for real business use?

For most business tasks: writing assistance, summarisation, document analysis, code review, structured data extraction. Current open-source models are practical and capable. The gap with frontier commercial models has narrowed significantly over the past year. We recommend specific models based on your actual use cases and evaluate them before deployment.

Does the automation platform connect to the tools we already use?

Most likely yes. The platform includes pre-built integrations for most common business tools: Google Workspace, Microsoft 365, HubSpot, Salesforce, Stripe, Shopify, Airtable, Slack, and hundreds of others. For tools without a pre-built integration, connections can be built using the tool's API. We review your stack during the initial call and confirm coverage before recommending deployment.

Does the AI server need a GPU?

For interactive use by a team, yes. CPU-only inference is too slow for practical day-to-day use. A mid-range GPU server runs most open-source models at response speeds your team will find usable. GPU servers typically cost $80 to $200 per month depending on specification. That's more than a standard VPS, but usage is unlimited and the cost is fixed.

Can we integrate the AI into our own applications?

Yes. The AI infrastructure exposes a standard API that your development team can integrate into your own applications using the same interface format used by the major commercial AI providers. We document the API surface and support integration work as part of the deployment.

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