For experienced people going fractional in AI · the seat is open now
Right now the door is wide open. There's no degree for this, no required certification and no five-year wall, because the work is too new for any of that. Companies need it now, and they'll pay a part‑time leader to run it for them.
The First Client Kit is the whole path, written down: who is worth a call, the first call that sells a paid assessment, the assessment itself, what to charge, and how to run the work after the yes. It's built from real fractional work, starting with a first seat quoted at $12,000 a month.
What's included
The receipts
In a single year, the share of organizations with a Chief AI Officer nearly tripled. The biggest companies hired theirs. Every other company needs the same leadership, can't find it, and can't justify a full-time salary for it. That is the seat you fill, part‑time, while it's wide open.
Up from 26% a year earlier. AI is now a top-level leadership job.
IBM Institute for Business Value, CEO study, May 2026: 2,000 CEOs in 33 countries.
Demand is running far ahead of the people who can do the work, and 44% of executives name a lack of in-house AI skill as a major obstacle.
Bain & Company, March 2025. The 1.3 million is a forecast to 2027.
These are your future clients. They already use AI, they struggle with it, and in 2024 two thirds of them said they need outside help.
RSM Middle Market AI Survey 2025 (966 companies) and its 2024 edition.
What most companies are doing
What you bring them
They're not hard sells. They're waiting for clarity. Give them clarity, show them you're confident in the right solutions, and they're ready to say yes right now.
Why it works
If you're good with AI, people already ask you about it. You help. They say thanks. Nothing lands in your bank account. Meanwhile somebody else gets hired to do the same work, for money.
That isn't a skills gap. It's a clarity gap: who is worth your time, what you'd do for them, and what it costs. Close it, and the selling turns out to be the easy part, because the client does most of the talking.
On the first call, you ask questions and let them talk. On the assessment calls, you explain what the call is for, ask a couple of questions, and let them talk again. They walk you through their business in their own words. They like you, because they feel understood.
Then one thing decides the outcome: can you say, for each problem they named, “I can do that, like this”? When you can, they feel your confidence and they sense the clarity behind it. That is the first domino.
From there, your report shows them what AI can do for their business and what each change is worth, and the close mostly takes care of itself. Done right, you tell them your rate, and they say: “Okay, good. When do we start?”
Clarity breeds confidence. Confidence is contagious.
What's inside
Nine playbooks you follow in order, from the first message to a client who pays you every month.
What a fractional AI officer does for a business, why companies need one now, and how to use the kit.
For each problem a business has, write one line: “I can do that, like this.” Research prompts for your AI cover the lines you can't write yet.
How big a business needs to be, five signs it's organized enough to keep up with you, and six messages for your DMs that end with a call booked.
The questions to ask, how to share the price range without calling it a price, and the one question that tells you whether to offer the assessment at all: who on their team will join the calls.
Two weeks, step by step: the interviews, how to break each task into its steps, and a check of every tool they use to see which ones are ready for AI. It ends in a report with 8 to 12 ways AI can save or make the business money, ranked by the dollars.
Walk the owner through the report, agree what gets built first (one build a month, at your monthly rate), and handle “I'll think about it.” If they start within 30 days, the assessment fee comes off the work.
Why one build costs your monthly rate, why the whole list comes at 10% off, where your floor sits, and the rule that protects your rate: never discount it, shrink the scope instead.
Setting up the client, the weekly report, the monthly memo, and the client owning its own accounts. Then ongoing repair and a monthly advisory plan, so a finished list keeps paying.
How to add the second and third without the first one slipping, and what changes once you're past three.
Bonus · included
The intake form, the six messages, the call sheet, every email from the call recap to the monthly memo, research prompts and checklists, grouped by step. Copy any of them in one click.
Bonus · included
Real prices for fractional AI work by company size: the assessment, the monthly rate, the whole-list plan, repair and advisory. A two-page PDF to keep beside you.
Optional at checkout · $67 (retail $197)
Before the first call, it reads the owner's intake form, your messages and their website, and hands you the problems they likely have, a line drafted for each, and the questions to ask. After the call, drop in the recording. Every problem the owner named comes back with how it's usually solved and your “I can do that, like this” line, plus the assessment proposal and the recap email, drafted from the call. You check them, and you send them the same day.
The math
Here is one example from the rate card: a $1M company where your assessment finds 10 ways AI can save or make it money.
An example, not a promise of income.
Who made it
Chris Kahler is a fractional Chief AI Officer. He builds AI into the daily work of real businesses, and the kit comes from his own sales calls, assessments and builds. These are his numbers.
a month, his first fractional seat. It closed on the spot.
of his assessment-led sales calls closed.
from one engagement: $12,000 a month over 120 days.
users of his open-source AI tools.
You won't see a client named here. Client names stay private, and the kit shows you how to protect yours the same way.
Is this you?
You've run AI projects, automations or operations for an employer. You know you could do it for several businesses at once. What you don't have is the way to price it, sell it and run it as your own.
The conversations end in free advice and “let's grab coffee sometime.” The kit turns the next one into a booked call, and that call into a paid assessment.
Quoting $10,000 a month feels wild, so you'd quote $2,000 and resent it. The rate card and the calculator give you the numbers, set by the size of the business, and the reasons they hold.
This isn't about ads or funnels. It starts at the first real conversation and runs all the way to a client who pays you every month, and then to the second and third.
Honesty first
Keep your $97 if any of these is you.
Still here? Then this was built for you.
FAQ
No. It's written playbooks and the templates you use with real clients. You read a step, then you do it. The optional Confidence Engine does part of the work for you.
No. You need to be the person people already come to about AI: someone who uses AI to build automations and AI systems, at work or for yourself. The kit doesn't teach the building. It teaches you to turn what you can already do into a paid practice: who to work with, what to charge, and how to run the work.
No. Most of the talking comes from the client. You ask good questions, listen, and say what you'd do. The kit gives you the questions and the words for the parts that matter, like sharing the price range.
From real fractional work, not a survey. They're the prices on the First Client rate card, set by the size of the business you serve. You can run your own numbers before you buy.
An optional add-on at checkout: $67 instead of its $197 retail price. It works both sides of your first call with an owner. Before the call, it turns their intake form and your messages into a prep sheet: the problems they likely have, a line drafted for each, and the questions to ask. After the call, you drop in the recording, and every problem the owner named comes back with your “I can do that, like this” line, plus the assessment proposal and the recap email, drafted from the call. You check them, then you send them.
Nobody can promise you a date. It depends on your network, your skills and the work you put in. The kit makes sure that when the conversations happen, you know what to do with them.
Because the price shouldn't be the reason you wait. The value is in having the steps in order and the templates ready when a client is in front of you. Your first paid assessment, at $1,500, pays for the kit more than fifteen times over.
If the kit isn't worth it to you, email within 60 days of buying and get every dollar back, including anything you added to that order. No forms, no hoops. Each order has its own 60 days: anything you buy later gets its own 60 days from the day you buy it. How refunds work.
Yes. $97, one time. No subscription.
No risk to you
If the kit isn't worth it to you, get every dollar back.
Email within 60 days of buying and the full order is refunded: the kit and anything you added to it. No forms, no hoops. Anything you buy later has its own 60 days. How refunds work.
After checkout
Your access details arrive by email as soon as the order completes. Everything is open on day one.
Put one real business you'd want as a client into the rate calculator. Know what that client is worth before your first conversation.
Write your first “I can do that, like this” lines for the problems you already know how to solve. That's the first domino.
Send the first of the six messages to someone who already runs a business past $500,000 a year. Book the first call when it fits.
Everything in one place
Clarity · confidence · your first client
The companies around you are deciding who runs their AI right now. Be the one they call. The playbooks, the templates and the prices, for $97.