TL;DR
- For the first time, most major AI platforms sit around the same $20/month pro tier... but they are not interchangeable.
- Pick one primary platform (ChatGPT, Claude, or Google AI Pro), then add one or two focused tools ($10–$15/month) that solve a pain point you would otherwise build yourself.
- Solo operators can usually stay under $40/month total. Five-person teams often anchor on Google Workspace + Gemini; ten-plus may need per-seat team plans.
- You are probably overpaying if you have more than two AI subscriptions and cannot name what each one does, or you are on a paid tier you barely use.
- Run Jackson's 15-minute audit: list every AI charge, then ask "If this disappeared tomorrow, what would break?" Four unused $20 plans is $960/year gone.
Jackson and I went through our own AI budget recently and canceled a few subscriptions that were cool on paper but barely used. That is the whole episode in one sentence: price converged, value did not.
Here is how to stack tools without feeding every SaaS company $20 a month for nothing.
The $20 baseline (and what each platform is actually for)
OpenAI's ChatGPT Plus is still the Swiss Army knife: strong general model, image generation, voice, built-in browsing, plugins, and Codex if you want agentic work on your local machine. Jackson recently moved his primary workflow to ChatGPT Codex after living in Claude for a while... so even inside Infacto we are not religious about one logo.
Claude Pro shines when you live in long-form writing or serious software builds. The tradeoff Jackson keeps hitting: at $20/month you can run into session limits on heavy days and wait for the reset. Fine for many owners, annoying if AI is your daily operating system.
Google AI Pro (Gemini) wins when your business already runs on Drive, Docs, and Gmail. Context from your files matters, and the plan includes a large storage bucket (2TB in the tier Jackson referenced on the show). For a five-person team sharing documents, that centralization is often worth more than a second chatbot.
Microsoft Copilot is the outlier on the list: higher headline price, and it assumes you are already paying for Microsoft 365 per seat. If you are not living in Teams, Outlook, and Word all day, you are often paying for a bundle trap... AI attached to software you do not use.
Same sticker price. Different jobs. Pick the primary that matches where work already happens.
Tool stacking: one brain, one or two specialists
The strategy we walked through on Infacto Daily:
- One primary platform: your default model for thinking, drafting, and quick questions.
- One or two one-shot tools: narrow products that do one job well enough that building it yourself is not worth it.
For the podcast we pay for Opus Clip to turn long video into short clips we review and post. I bought a year of credits for about $120 (~$10/month) because it also handles social posting for us. We could automate that pipeline in-house. We chose not to, because the time saved is obvious every week.
Your version might be product photos, SEO drafts, or QuickBooks questions... not video. The pattern is the same: would I miss this if it vanished tomorrow?
One-shot tools by category (when to pay vs when your primary AI is enough)
Jackson pulled a category map of popular single-purpose tools (content repurposing, ad/video generation, product visuals, design, websites, marketing copy/SEO, sales/CRM, support, research, automation). A few patterns worth keeping:
Content repurposing (Opus Clip, Munch, Vizard, Submagic): record the job site, the install, or the full day (Meta glasses trend) and let software find the "satisfying" moments. Dylan's brother-in-law does flooring: people love before/after footage, but setting up cameras every job is brutal. One corner iPhone + a clip tool is a marketing channel, not a hobby.
Product visuals: snap a photo, auto background and lighting... worth paying if you do that all day.
Websites and landing pages: Jackson would not pay here; a primary model plus something like Vercel is enough for many owners. Wix AI is the "just handle it" option if you want zero assembly.
Marketing copy / SEO: Claude (or your primary) may be enough. Dedicated tools often add keyword research, site integration, and Google Trends... not just a paragraph generator.
Sales / CRM / support: HubSpot AI, Fin by Intercom, voice agents for inbound calls... high leverage when support volume is real.
Research: Notion AI, Perplexity... but ChatGPT agent mode can spin up a browser and hit specific sites when you need hands-on research.
Back office: QuickBooks AI is the example from the episode. "Show me P&L for the last three months" without clicking through menus. Same story for Zapier glue when the pain is connecting systems, not chatting.
If the primary model already does 80% of the job, do not add a second $20 subscription out of FOMO.
What to spend by team size
- Solo: One primary ($20) + one specialist tool ($10–15). Target under $40/month.
- ~5 people: Google Workspace with AI Pro so Gemini works across shared files; optional second primary (Claude) for writers/coders.
- 10+: Team seats (~$20/user) so work is visible and collaborative inside the org's AI workspace.
These are guidelines from our budget conversation, not a mandate to upgrade. The point is to match seats and storage to how files actually move through the business.
Signs you are overpaying
Run these honestly:
- More than two active AI subscriptions and you cannot state the specific job each one does.
- Habit billing: you kept the first tool you tried and never reevaluated (Dylan still feels this pull toward the Anthropic ecosystem even though ChatGPT + Cursor covers the same ground).
- Low usage on a $20 plan: under ~10 sessions a week, the free tier may be enough.
- Copilot without Microsoft life: paying for Microsoft AI while avoiding Teams/Outlook/Word.
Jackson's homework: 15 minutes on your bank statement. List every AI line item. For each one: If this disappeared tomorrow, what would break? Cancel what would not. You can always resubscribe. Four forgotten $20 tools is $960/year to companies that do not need your charity.
Finding tools without the rabbit hole
If you are on the other end (no paid tools yet, just free ChatGPT or Claude), the opportunity is picking one pain point and testing deliberately... not signing up for eleven trials in a weekend.
We built the Infacto AI Tool Directory for listeners: 41 tools filtered by use case (content, design, automation, research, social), free trials flagged, favorites saved, and a ~30-minute quick start per tool so you know what you are walking into before you create an account. Access is free for Infacto Daily listeners (name + email for a secure login link in the episode description).
If you want a lighter starting map before you trial anything, the free AI tools checklist is the fast sanity pass. If you are ready to browse by category and compare trials in one place, start at the Infacto tools hub.
What to do this week
Pick your primary platform based on where work already lives (Google shop → Gemini, mobile brainstormer → ChatGPT, deep writer/coder → Claude). Name one pain point worth $10–15/month. Audit the rest.
Cool products are everywhere. Margin is in the stack you actually use.