Lodesa
AI & automation for small businesses

The tech expertise your business needs, without hiring a tech team.

I plug the software you already pay for into one working whole, and I build the ideas you've been sitting on. Then I keep it all running. It's like having your own technical director on call, without hiring one.

Free, no sales pitch · the plan is yours to keep · one fixed price, agreed first · not finished until it works, at no extra charge

Sound familiar?

Sentences I hear a lot.

We're paying for software that doesn't do half of what they promised.
Nothing talks to anything, so we type the same thing in three times.
I'm not technical, so I can't tell if our developer's any good.
The one person who understood how it all hung together has left.
ChatGPT gave me the idea. I've no idea if it's possible, or safe.
We're drowning in admin a computer should be doing.
I know AI could help us. I just don't know where to start.
We lose track of who's paid and who hasn't.
Every quote I send just disappears into silence.
The website looks fine, but it doesn't bring in any work.

Said one of these yourself? That's exactly the work I do.

Book the free review

The plan is yours to keep · One fixed price, agreed first · Not finished until it works, at no extra charge · No lock-in

What I do

The technical brain you'd hire if you could justify a full-time one.

I don't sell a product. I work out what's holding you back, then build, connect or fix whatever that takes. An AI assistant that drafts replies to the emails your team answers every day. Job paperwork that writes itself from a photo and a voice note. The monthly numbers assembled and explained without the spreadsheet ritual. Whatever shape the work takes, your tech ends up doing the dull parts on its own, and it's owned properly, not left half-built.

Systems that talk to each other
Assistants that answer
Slow jobs made quick
How it works

Three steps.

01

A free 30-minute review

We talk through what's bugging you. Within a couple of days you get a one-page plan: the two or three things worth fixing first, and what they'd cost. Yours to keep either way.

02

One fixed price

No open-ended bills. You know the number before we start, and what you'll get for it.

03

I keep an eye on it

Optional. Tech breaks when the tools around it change, so for a small monthly plan, an hour of my time each month, I keep it running and chip away at the next improvement.

Real results

What this looks like in practice.

New name, old trade. Instead of testimonials you'll find two client jobs and six honest composites with the numbers attached, plus nine worked examples of the fixes I quote most, from AI-drafted inbox replies to job paperwork that writes itself.

See real results
What it costs

Clear numbers, no meter running.

The first review is free. After that we work in fixed-price milestones: you agree the work and the price before anything starts, and improvements later are simply the next milestone. If you'd like me to keep an eye on things too, there's a small monthly plan.

See what it costs
The AI bit, done properly

AI made it easy to have the idea. The hard part is what comes next.

Making the idea real is where most of it falls over, and doing it yourself can leak your customers' data without you ever knowing. That's the bit I do. I take the idea, build it properly, and make sure it's safe before it goes anywhere near a customer or your books.

What I won't do

I won't sell you AI you don't need, and I won't tie you into anything you can't walk away from. If a clever tool would be too fiddly for your team to run without me, you'll hear that before I build it. And if the honest answer is that you don't need me, or that someone I trust would do your particular job better, I'll say so.

A note from me

I've spent twenty-five years fixing technology inside banks, hospitals and government departments, and Lodesa is that same engineering pointed at businesses that could never justify hiring someone like me full-time.

If you're wondering whether your problem is big enough to book a call about, it is. The small ones are usually the quickest wins. There's more about me on the About page, including the Amstrad.

Questions

The things people usually ask.

Do I need to understand any of the tech?

No. I explain things in plain English and handle the rest. You just tell me what's getting in the way.

What if I already have a developer or an IT person?

Even better. I work with whoever you've already got, as the person who makes the pieces fit together rather than a replacement for a good developer.

What happens after you've done the fix?

It's yours. I build things you can run without me. If you'd like me to keep improving it and watching over it, that's the optional monthly plan, but you're never obliged to take it.

Is my data safe?

It's the first thing I think about, not the last. Your data doesn't move anywhere it doesn't need to go, and anything AI-related gets checked for safety before it goes near a customer or your books. Every automation I build is logged, scoped to named data flows, and documented before it goes live. The short, plain-English version is on the privacy page.

What if it doesn't work?

Then I put it right. We agree up front what a fix is meant to do, and it isn't finished until it does exactly that, at no extra charge. If you later want changes, or something drifts because the tools around you have updated, that's simply the next milestone, priced the same clear way rather than sprung on you.

Can we do this without a call?

Yes. Email what's bugging you to [email protected], or WhatsApp it, and you'll get a plain written reply within one working day, priced where there's enough to price. The call exists because half an hour of talking usually beats ten emails, not because you have to.

Am I locked in?

Never. No contracts you can't leave, and no systems only I can run. If you ever walk away, everything I built goes with you.

What happens if you're unavailable?

Everything I build is documented and handed over as yours, so any competent engineer could pick it up tomorrow; nothing lives only in my head. I carry professional indemnity insurance. And if best efforts aren't enough, guaranteed response times can be agreed as an SLA on the monthly plan, priced honestly.

Are you a big agency?

No, and that's deliberate. You get one experienced person who knows your setup inside out, not a rotating cast of account managers. The person who scopes your job is the person who builds it; no handoffs.

What if my job needs someone who isn't you?

Then I'll say so. Twenty-five years in this trade means I know other engineers and small specialist firms whose work I trust, and if one of them is the better fit for your job, I'll introduce you rather than stretch to keep the work. If you want, I'll stay in your corner while they do it, keeping the technical side honest. What matters is that you end up with the right result, not that every hour goes through me.

Why "Lodesa"?

A lodestar is the star sailors steered by, the one fixed point you could always trust to point you the right way.

That's the idea: one steady source of technical direction for a business that can't justify its own tech team. I already run the technology behind two small businesses, day in and day out. Ask on the call and I'll walk you through what I built and what it saved them.

Book a free 30-minute review

The plan is yours to keep · One fixed price, agreed first · Not finished until it works, at no extra charge · No lock-in