One month left till the end of 2025, and business owners who want to stay ahead of the curve are already peeking into the next year, wondering how they can improve their service offering and outdo the competition. Run any Google search or check with ChatGPT, and one constant return will be the use of AI. So much so that you end up asking: should you still run your business yourself, or are you better off outsourcing it to the machines? Here’s the trick: you don’t have to choose. Here are some of the areas where you are better off doing more yourself, and other times, letting the AI take the wheel as you push for business growth in 2026. 

Technology acceleration

New technologies are introduced to the market every day faster than any one person can adapt. Before you read the instructions to get a grip on what is required, there’s a shinier, newer, more impressive model or product that requires you to understand its workings from the bottom up. If you take time out for such mundane tasks, when then do you have time to actually grow your business?

Enters AI. AI has found use in a number of industries, from the health sector, where diagnosis is faster, to autonomous vehicles in transportation, to safety, and an overall improved experience in gaming. This is particularly evident in online gambling, exemplified by top 10 online casino australia real money options with exciting, personalized offers and freebies. With the right API integrations, you can plug into the software directly and handle tedious tasks faster than ever before. These can range from real-time threat detection to simplifying identity verification so your users can discover and use your service hassle-free. It does not stop at security and cybersecurity; it extends to trend detection, from picking out newer software that is better suited to your industry for the most reward to competitor research to identify low-hanging fruit you can capitalize on in 2026.

Economic Viability

Another step is to determine whether the business you are trying to grow is economically viable in the region you are targeting. For example, if you have a meal subscription service targeting busy entrepreneurs living and working in Silicon Valley, a plan focused on healthy nutrition and performance might be easier to scale. However, if you are in Australia trying to launch a drone delivery service from scratch, it might be more difficult due to strict aviation and safety regulations.

So, as far as economic viability is concerned, you will need to do some legwork. Carry out surveys to see if the region will allow your business to thrive, and if the answer is yes, congratulations, you can then employ AI to smooth your processes, handle supply chain and energy management, while you stay focused on the day-to-day running. 

Talent and flexibility

When it comes to hiring talent, you want to go 50:50 with the AI. There are some things you would be better positioned to pick out from your experience hiring skilled labor that just data on the resume would not quite capture. Where the AI comes in is that it can help you streamline all the resumes you receive, order them by location, expertise, and academic info, and then look through the different piles that interest you and would benefit your business. 

Another area is employee training. This is one of the many things that can slow business progression. If it takes too long for your employees to get up to speed, that’s money being left on the table, angry customers who will not be returning, and very lengthy negative Yelp reviews. Lucky for you, this is where AI comes to the fore. With its ability to collect and process data, it can create a unique training regimen for different workers and schedule the training in a way that, while some are away, others are at their desks, ensuring your customers are happy and business is growing. 

Better client management

Perhaps more important than managing your employees is managing your relationships with your clients. Any business looking to grow should focus on four things when it comes to client management. These are gaining new customers, retaining old customers through strategies, upselling them by offering more value, reaching out to customers you might have lost along the way, and trying to mend the relationship. 

AI makes it easy to do all four things. While you cannot remove the importance of the human touch, AI can help paint a vivid picture of the demographics you aim to target and offer SEO suggestions that will position your business so it can be noticed. Retaining old customers is even easier with custom loyalty strategies and offers that constantly remind them they are valued by your business, offer valuable suggestions on how you can provide value to old customers, and draft email marketing strategies to reach out to former customers who no longer do business with your brand.

Rounding Up

As 2026 approaches, the real drivers of business growth will be the smart fusion of human intuition and AI efficiency. Technology can speed up processes, analyse data, and uncover opportunities, but it is human creativity, empathy, and vision that give businesses their identity. The companies that will lead the next wave of growth are those that balance automation with authenticity, using AI to enhance, not replace, their human edge.