AI Gatekeepers and Community: The New AI Agent Reality 🖥️
By Polly Barnfield, OBE, CEO of Maybe*
AI Platforms as Gatekeepers to Your Customers
A profound shift is occurring. Platforms like OpenAI and Perplexity aren't just powerful AI tools—they're becoming the primary gatekeepers between your business and your customers.
When consumers ask ChatGPT to "find the best insurance provider" or tell Perplexity to "book my holiday," these AI agents don't simply provide information. They're increasingly making decisions and executing transactions on behalf of users. With developments like Perplexity's universal checkout system, these platforms can compare options, make selections, and complete purchases—potentially reducing your carefully built brand to just another option in an AI's decision matrix.
The uncomfortable truth? Nearly every organisation in the UK just gained a formidable new competitor. The question isn't whether AI will transform your customer relationships—it's whether you'll be positioned to thrive in this new reality.
Beyond Efficiency and Accuracy: The Rise of Resonance
At Maybe*, we understand that business needs have traditionally operated on two axes: efficiency ("how easily can I get this done?") and accuracy ("how well is this actually solved?"). But in an AI-saturated marketplace where artificial intelligence can generate competent solutions for almost any task, accuracy alone is no longer a sufficient differentiator.
What now separates successful organisations is resonance—how deeply your solution connects with your audience's identities, values, and aspirations. This isn't theoretical; we've seen it play out across sectors:
Birmingham City Council: Community-Driven Support
When Birmingham City Council, the UK's largest local authority, wanted to enhance digital support for local businesses, it needed more than an efficient AI system. It also needed one that resonated with its diverse community of entrepreneurs.
By partnering with Maybe*, they implemented AI-powered, multilingual business support that connected with the unique needs of over 300 local businesses. The result wasn't just improved technical metrics—it was a solution that resonated with the identity and aspirations of independent entrepreneurs in the city's visitor economy.
AJF Financial Group: From Transactions to Relationships
Financial services firms face particular challenges in an AI-first world. When AJF Financial Group needed to transform its lead generation approach, it wasn't just looking for efficiency—it needed a system that maintained the human connection essential to its brand.
Using Maybe*'s AI-driven technology, they transformed how they identified and engaged with prospects, handling 20,000 leads with intelligence while preserving the relationship-focused approach that defined their brand. The system didn't just work better—it resonated with their identity as trusted advisors.
From Product-Market Fit to Market-Product Fit
This shift represents a fundamental inversion of traditional business thinking:
Pre-AI World: Companies built products and searched for their market
Post-AI World: Success comes from having a community that demands its own unique product
For the UK Government High Street Task Force, this meant moving beyond generic urban revitalisation strategies. By leveraging Maybe*'s AI-driven insights, they developed approaches that emerged directly from the needs of specific communities, driving high-street revitalisation strategies that directly supported local business success.
Similarly, when Growth Society needed to transform e-commerce data analysis, they didn't just implement a more efficient system. They deployed Maybe* to create analyses that reflected the specific values and priorities of the UK's fastest-growing e-commerce brands, reducing manual work by 30% while delivering insights that resonated with their clients' business cultures.
Building for Belonging in an AI-First World
The sustainable competitive advantage in this new paradigm isn't efficiency or accuracy—AI has largely commoditised both. Instead, it's about creating resonance and belonging through technology that reflects your community's needs and values.
Maybe* delivers this through several key approaches:
No-Code Community Empowerment
Our no-code platform enables your team to build AI agents that reflect your organisation's unique character and values. This isn't just about accessibility—it's about ensuring the technology serves your community's specific needs rather than forcing your community to adapt to generic AI.
Multi-Agent Architecture: Technology That Adapts to Your Culture
Our sophisticated multi-agent system includes a Master Orchestration Agent coordinating overall activity, domain-specific agents handling specialised tasks, and security and oversight systems maintaining compliance. This architecture means the technology adapts to your organisational culture, not the other way around.
Universal Connectivity: Integrating Community Knowledge
Maybe* connects seamlessly with your existing systems, integrating the knowledge and relationships you've built over the years. For Prospecting on Demand, this meant reducing response times to just 90 seconds while maintaining their distinctive approach to client relationships.
Implementation: Becoming AI-First Without Losing Your Identity
While many organisations fear adopting AI means sacrificing their unique identity, Maybe* proves the opposite. Our implementation approach, typically measured in weeks rather than months, focuses on enhancing rather than replacing what makes your organisation distinctive:
Birmingham City Council maintained their commitment to diverse, local businesses while modernising their support services
AJF Financial preserved their relationship-focused approach while revolutionising their sales process
Growth Society enhanced its consultative expertise while dramatically improving analytical capabilities
Positioning Your Organisation for the AI-First Future
In a world where AI gatekeepers increasingly mediate customer relationships, your organisation's ability to build community and resonance becomes your primary competitive advantage. Maybe* provides the technology platform that enables you to do this while delivering tangible business results:
Public sector organisations can enhance service delivery while strengthening community connections
Financial services firms can handle complex client relationships at scale without losing the personal touch
E-commerce companies can uncover insights that reflect their specific market's needs and values
From AI Disruption to Community Leadership
While most organisations struggle to respond to AI's disruptive potential, our clients are already using it to strengthen their community relationships and market position.
In an AI landscape increasingly dominated by powerful gatekeepers like OpenAI and Perplexity, Maybe* stands apart by enabling organisations to maintain direct, meaningful connections with their audiences through AI that reflects their unique culture and values.
The ultimate winners in this new paradigm won't be those who build the most efficient AI systems—they'll be those who use AI to cultivate the strongest communities. Maybe* is your partner in becoming not just AI-enabled, but community-led in an AI-first world.
Get Started today to see how Maybe can help your organisation maintain its unique identity while thriving in an AI-first world.
