I build the systems
I write about.

Websites, automations, and AI agents for small businesses — built by someone who runs this stack every day, not someone who read about it last month. Fixed scope. Fixed price. You own everything at the end.

~/fit

Let's find out fast if this is a fit

I'd rather tell you no in ten minutes than take a project that shouldn't exist. Here's the honest filter.

Good fit

  • You're a small business doing real revenue, and something manual is eating hours every week
  • Your website is slow, dated, or quietly costing you customers
  • You want one specific thing automated well — intake, follow-up, quoting, reporting — not "AI strategy"
  • You want to own the result outright, with no platform holding it hostage
  • You can point at the process you want fixed

Not a fit

  • You want a chatbot because a competitor has one, with no job for it to do
  • You need round-the-clock support or an on-call engineer — I'm one person with a calendar
  • You're looking for the cheapest possible bid
  • The process you want automated hasn't been figured out by a human yet — automation makes a broken process broken faster
  • You want someone to hand it to and never think about it again
~/packages

Three ways to work together

Every engagement starts with a paid diagnostic, because scoping properly is the work. If you go ahead with a build, the diagnostic fee comes off the price.

The Diagnostic
Start here
$500one-time · credited toward any build

Two hours with you and your team, then a written plan: what to automate first, what to leave alone, what it's worth, and what it'll cost. Yours to keep whether or not you hire me.

  • Walkthrough of how work actually moves through your business
  • Ranked list of what's worth automating, with time-saved estimates
  • Honest note on what you should not spend money on
  • Fixed quote for anything you want built
Turnaround: about one week
The Retainer
Ongoing, optional
$750–2,000per month · cancel anytime, no notice

For businesses that want the systems maintained and extended rather than frozen. Monthly hours, a standing check-in, and someone who already knows how your setup works.

  • Monitoring, fixes, and updates when APIs or tools change underneath you
  • A block of build hours each month for the next improvement
  • Monthly written report: what ran, what broke, what it saved
  • Direct line for questions — response within one business day
No lock-in. Leave and you keep everything.
~/process

How it actually goes

No discovery-phase theater, no twelve-page proposal. Four steps.

Twenty-minute call

You describe what's eating your time. I tell you straight whether it's worth automating and roughly what that costs. Free, and often ends with "you don't need me for that."

Diagnostic

I map how work moves through your business and write the plan — what to fix first, what it's worth, what it costs. You own the document either way.

Build

Fixed scope at a fixed price, agreed before anything starts. You see working progress weekly, not a black box that emerges in a month.

Handover

Everything transfers to accounts you control — code, hosting, credentials, documentation. Thirty days of fixes included. Retainer only if you want one.

~/proof

The proof is this website

I don't have a slide deck of logos. What I have is a stack I run in production every day and write about publicly — including the parts that didn't work.

$0

What this site costs to host

Static build on a global CDN, deployed automatically on every change. Same architecture I'd build for you — fast, cheap, and nothing to patch. The full setup →

24/7

Automations running on my own hardware

A self-hosted workflow engine handling lead gen, content distribution, monitoring and agent orchestration — on a mini PC drawing about fifteen watts. How one of them is built →

20

Articles showing the actual work

Tool comparisons, build guides, and monthly reports on what I use and what I dropped. Read a few and judge the thinking before you spend anything. Start reading →

~/questions

Fair questions

Why you and not an agency?

An agency sells you a team and staffs you with whoever's free. You get me on every call and in every file. The tradeoff is real: I take a small number of projects at a time, so I'm not the right choice if you need something enormous or need it tomorrow.

Do I own what you build?

Completely. Code in your repository, hosting in your account, credentials in your name, documentation written so another developer can pick it up. No proprietary platform, no license that expires, nothing that stops working if we part ways.

What happens when the AI tooling changes again?

It will — that's most of what I write about. I build so the model is a swappable part rather than the foundation, and I'll tell you honestly when something is too new to bet your operations on. The retainer exists for exactly this, but it's optional, and plenty of builds never need one.

Can you just make us an AI chatbot?

Probably, but I'll ask what job it's doing first. Most businesses that want a chatbot actually want faster response times or fewer repetitive questions, and there's often a simpler, cheaper, more reliable way to get that. If a chatbot genuinely is the answer, I'll build it.

What don't you do?

Paid ads, SEO retainers, social media management, branding, and anything requiring 24/7 on-call coverage. I build systems. For the rest I'm happy to point you at someone better.

Start with a conversation

Twenty minutes, no pitch. Tell me what's taking too long and I'll tell you whether it's worth fixing — and roughly what fixing it costs. If it isn't, I'll say so.

Book a call →
Or email hello@theopstack.com — I answer everything.