How much does an AI consultant cost? Pricing models and our fixed prices

My own prices are public: a free 30-minute call, a €250 consultation with a written plan, and setups from €800, all listed on our prices page.

I will not quote you a "market average hourly rate" in this article. The figures that circulate online come from platforms and agencies that rarely show how they were measured, and I could not check any of them against a source I would trust with your budget. What I can do is explain how the pricing models work, what pushes the price up or down, and what you should have in writing before you pay anyone, including me.

How do AI consultants charge?

By the hour. You pay for time, whatever comes out of it. This suits open questions where neither side knows the size of the work yet, for example "can you look at our setup and tell us what is broken". The risk sits with you: if the consultant is slow, or explores more than you needed, the bill grows and nobody is technically at fault.

Fixed price for a defined result. You agree on what will exist at the end (a written plan, one working connection between two tools, a configured customer database) and the price for it. The risk moves to the consultant, which is why a fixed price is only possible when the scope is written down: what is included, what is not, and how you will check that it works.

Monthly retainer. A set number of hours or a set kind of support each month, for monitoring, small changes and questions after something has been launched. This makes sense once you have something running that people depend on, and almost none before that.

Share of savings or revenue. Some consultants offer it. I do not, because in a company of 10 to 100 people it is hard to agree afterwards which part of a change came from the new system and which came from a good month, and that argument tends to spoil a working relationship.

What drives the price?

The rate is the least interesting number. What drives the total is:

• How clear the problem is. "Our enquiries get lost between the website and the sales team" can be priced. "We should do something with AI" cannot, and the first paid hours go into finding out what the problem is.
• How many tools have to talk to each other. One flow between two tools is a small job. Five tools, two of them old and without a proper way to connect, is a project.
• The state of your data. Customer lists in three spreadsheets with different spellings of the same company take time to clean before anything can be automated, and that time is real work.
• Who will own it afterwards. If nobody in your team will look after the setup, you either need ongoing support or a simpler setup that does not need looking after.
• Subscriptions. Software costs come on top of the consultant's fee. In my work they stay on your accounts and you pay the vendor directly, so you can see them and cancel them without asking me. For one example of what a tool costs, see n8n pricing for a small business.

What should you get for the money?

Whatever model you choose, ask for these in writing before paying:

1. The result, described so you can check it. Not "AI strategy" but "a written plan for the enquiries area: the tasks worth starting with, the effort and risk of each, and what not to do yet".
2. Included and not included. The second list matters more than the first, because that is where extra invoices come from.
3. How you will accept the work. For a setup, a test you can run yourself: send a test enquiry, see it arrive in the customer database, see the reply go out.
4. Who pays for which software, and the expected monthly cost of each subscription.
5. What happens with your data: what goes to which AI tool, and whether a processing agreement is in place before anyone processes customer data on your behalf.

If a consultant cannot tell you what the result will look like before you start, you are buying hours, whatever the invoice says.

Is an hourly rate cheaper than a fixed price?

Sometimes, on paper. In practice a low hourly rate on an unclear task often ends up more expensive than a fixed price on a clear one, because the clear task has a finish line and the unclear one does not. I prefer to spend a short, cheap step making the task clear and then quote a fixed price, and I think that order is fairer to you than an open meter.

From our own system: how I price my work

These are my published prices, excluding VAT. The single place where they are kept up to date is our prices page, linked below.

• Free 30-minute call. We look at your situation, and afterwards you get a short written outline with up to three tasks worth starting with.
• Consultation, €250. 45 minutes on one area (sales and enquiries, customer support, systems and data, or AI in your team), then a written plan for that area within 24 hours and a project quote. The €250 is credited toward a project of €1,000 or more ordered within 30 days.
• Setups from €800, for example website enquiries going into your customer database with an automatic reply. Larger systems are quoted as a fixed price with a written scope.
• Ongoing support from €150 a month, with a minimum of three months, only once something is running.

If you want to see what a written plan looks like before paying for one, there is a sample AI roadmap for a fictional company, marked as a sample.

When is paying a consultant not worth it?

When the answer to your question is a setting in a tool you already pay for, or when nobody in the company will have time to use what gets built. I say this on the free call when it is true, and it is a perfectly good outcome of a call. There is more on this in what an AI consultant does, and when you do not need one.

Frequently asked questions

Do AI consultants charge by the hour or by the project? Both exist. Hourly suits open questions; a fixed price suits work with a written result and an acceptance check.

Are software subscriptions included in the consultant's price? Usually not, and they should be named separately. In my quotes they are listed with the expected monthly cost and paid by you, on your accounts.

Can I start small? Yes. A single setup or a one-area consultation is a normal first step, and it tells both sides whether a bigger project makes sense.

Want a price for your situation?

A free 30-minute call is the quickest way to find out what your task would cost, and whether it needs a consultant at all. Afterwards you get a short written outline with up to three tasks.

Sources

• Elivance services and prices, elivance.eu/services#prices (our own page, linked above). Prices from the Elivance service specification dated 17 October 2026; excl. VAT.

Prices checked: 18 October 2026.