How much does it cost to automate a business with AI?
At Zerolagia a standard automation costs between 490 € and 1,490 € to set up, plus a monthly maintenance fee of 39 € to 129 €, with no lock-in and VAT not included. Custom projects — a multilingual website, an online shop, a full CRM — are quoted separately and start at 2,400 €. Every piece has its price published in the automations catalogue, with a video of it working, before you talk to anyone.
That is the cost of building it. What almost nobody tells you is the second half of the invoice: what you pay third parties every month to keep it running. The agency does not charge that — Meta does, the AI model provider does, and the server does. It is separate, and it is worth knowing before you sign.
What do you pay once, and what do you pay every month?
| Item | When you pay | Who charges it |
|---|---|---|
| Setup (building the flow, connecting it to your systems, testing it) | Once | The agency |
| Maintenance (keeping it working when a provider changes something) | Monthly | The agency |
| WhatsApp template messages | Per message delivered | Meta |
| The AI model that reads and writes the messages | Per usage | The model provider |
| The server the automation lives on | Monthly | The hosting provider |
| Licences for software you already use (diary, till, accountant) | As you already paid them | Each provider |
Which parts does the agency not charge for?
WhatsApp. Since 1 July 2025 Meta charges per template message delivered, not per conversation. Non-template messages sent inside an open customer service window are free, utility templates inside that window are free too, and service conversations have been free since 1 November 2024. Marketing templates are always charged, and the rate depends on the country calling code of the person receiving them. It is all in the WhatsApp Business Platform pricing documentation, which is the source that counts. In plain terms: answering someone who writes to you is free or nearly free; writing to them first to sell is not. If your automation is about answering enquiries, this cost is small. If it is about campaigns, it is the one that dominates.
There is an earlier step that is also paid separately: moving from the free WhatsApp Business app to the API. When that is genuinely needed, and when it is not, is broken down in WhatsApp Business API vs the free app.
The AI model. Billed per usage, and usage depends on how much text goes in and out. An assistant answering with your whole catalogue in front of it consumes more than one that just sorts an email into two buckets. In a small business handling chat and WhatsApp enquiries it is usually the smallest of the three monthly costs — but it is the only one that grows when things go well: more customers, more conversations, more usage.
The engine and the server. We build on n8n, which has a Community edition with no licence cost if you host it yourself; its managed cloud version is paid per plan, as set out on its pricing page. The alternative is subscription tools billed per operation, which start cheaper and get more expensive with volume: the compared numbers are in n8n vs Make vs Zapier.
Why a fixed price instead of hourly?
Because an automation is not bought by the hour: it is bought working. An hourly quote passes the risk of the job getting complicated on to the client, and the client has no way of knowing whether ten hours were reasonable or three. With a fixed price, that risk stays with whoever builds it.
And that is why you should distrust "from". A "from 300 €" that ends at 1,500 € is not a price, it is bait. If a quote does not say what is included, what is not, and what happens if it has to be rebuilt, it is not a fixed quote no matter what figure it carries.
What makes an automation project more expensive?
- Messy data. This is cause number one. If the same product is in the catalogue three times written three ways, or the diary lives in a notebook, the job is not automating — it is tidying first.
- Software with no way in. An old system with no API forces workarounds. It can be done, but it costs more and it is more fragile.
- Processes nobody has written down. If every person on the team does the same thing differently, someone has to decide which way is the right one before it can be programmed.
- Wanting everything on day one. Five automations at once cost more than five in a row, and none of them gets used properly.
The order we recommend, and why, is in what to automate first in a small business.
What is the cheapest way to start?
Cheaper than most people think, if you start with one piece. The first thing that usually pays off is answering enquiries: an assistant that replies on your website and on WhatsApp at any hour and logs everyone who asks. For a clinic we publish it with a name and a price — 990 € to set up and 79 € a month — and the mechanics are the same in a restaurant, a shop or a law firm.
Before that there is a step that costs nothing: the free check of your website. It analyses your site and your Google listing, gives you a score out of 100 and tells you what to fix first. No signup, no sales call. If it turns out what you need is not an automation but a better website, it will say so.
And the cost of not automating?
This is where almost everyone invents a number. We are not going to: we do not know how much your business loses by not answering at ten at night, because that depends on your sector, your margin and how many people write to you. What can be measured, in your specific case, is how many enquiries arrive outside opening hours and how many go unanswered. Those two numbers come out of your own WhatsApp and your own website, and with them the decision stops being a hunch.
The only outcome figure we publish belongs to a named client: at Dartel Solutions, the shop assistant handled 60 conversations in 61 days — measured on 27 August 2026. It is not a huge number; it is a real, checkable one, and it is work that used to be lost outside opening hours.
Is there anything else to budget for before signing?
Yes, one thing that appears on no quote: if the automation handles personal data — and WhatsApp customer service does — it falls inside your data protection obligations. The Spanish data protection authority published an introductory guide on bringing AI-based processing into line with the GDPR — it is from February 2020 and its cover is still marked "under review", so treat it as a starting point rather than the last word — and it deserves a read before anything is connected to your customer database. It is not a cost, but it is work, and whoever builds your system should know what you are talking about.
Frequently asked questions
What is the cheapest automation you offer?
Standard automations in the catalogue start at 490 € to set up plus their monthly maintenance fee. The website check is free and commits you to nothing.
Is there a minimum term or lock-in?
No lock-in. The monthly maintenance fee runs from 39 € to 129 € depending on the automation, and you can stop paying whenever you want: what stops is the maintenance, not your access to what was built.
Does the price include what WhatsApp charges?
No. Meta bills template messages delivered separately, at a rate that depends on the recipient country. Replying inside an open customer service window is not charged; sending a marketing template first is.
How much does the AI model cost per month?
It depends on usage: how many conversations and how much text. In a small business handling chat and WhatsApp enquiries it is usually the smallest of the monthly costs, and the only one that grows as business improves.
Why a fixed price rather than hourly?
Because hourly billing puts the risk of the job getting complicated on the client, and the client has no way of judging whether those hours were reasonable. With a fixed price that risk stays with whoever builds it.
How long does it take to pay for itself?
We do not publish a payback period, because it depends on your margin and on how many enquiries currently go unanswered. What can be measured before deciding is how many arrive outside opening hours and how many are lost.
Zerolagia automates business processes with AI, with the price of every piece published. Free website check here.
Talk to us: info@zerolagia.com · +34 612 48 50 87 (WhatsApp).
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