--- title: The free prototype: what it asks of you, and what you keep description: Free usually means there’s a catch. Here is what ours costs you, in time and in information, and what stays with you whether or not we work together. url: https://www.streamlight.ai/blog/free-prototype/ updated: 2026-10-22 --- # The free prototype: what it asks of you, and what you keep Free usually means there’s a catch. Here is exactly what ours costs you, in time and in information, and what stays with you whether or not we work together. 14 Oct 2026 6 min read By [Csaba Madar](https://www.streamlight.ai/about/#f-h) · Founder The short answer Half an hour on a call, a few minutes with our agent and three to five real examples. In return, within days: a brief of how one process runs today, a clickable prototype of it, and a proposal with a fixed price and your return. You keep all of it, whatever you decide. On this page 1. [01 What it is, and what it isn’t](https://www.streamlight.ai/blog/free-prototype/#s1) 2. [02 What it asks of you](https://www.streamlight.ai/blog/free-prototype/#s2) 3. [03 What you get, and keep](https://www.streamlight.ai/blog/free-prototype/#s3) 4. [04 Why it’s free](https://www.streamlight.ai/blog/free-prototype/#s4) 5. [05 If you go ahead](https://www.streamlight.ai/blog/free-prototype/#s5) Share See it [An example proposal A home-services firm’s page, from booking to the price. Open ›](https://www.streamlight.ai/client-tamberlin/?s=6&via=agent) ## 01 What it is, and what it isn’t The free prototype is **a clickable model of one process in your business**, built around the tools you already use. You can click through a day of it: how a request comes in, what happens on its own, where a person decides, and what you’d see each morning. It isn’t the system. Nothing in it is connected to your accounts, and nothing reaches your customers. That’s deliberate: it’s there so you can see how the work would run, and so we can both see whether we’ve covered everything, before anyone builds or pays for anything. **Where it stops** A prototype shows the process. It doesn’t prove the numbers; the first month of the real build does, and we measure it. ## 02 What it asks of you About an hour in total, spread over a week: - **A 30-minute call.** Where your week goes, which process is worth fixing first, and the last time it happened, step by step. - **Five minutes with our agent,** before or after you book, so the call skips the basics. - **Three to five real examples:** an enquiry, a quote, an invoice, a call. Anonymise anything you like. - **Half an hour with the prototype,** to click through it and tell us what’s wrong. Access to your tools, if we need it, is by invitation as a read-only user, never by password, and you can remove us at any time. ## 03 What you get, and keep From the call to your decision. Nothing is signed until the last step, and only if you want to. - **Within a day:** a brief of what we heard, for you to correct. - **Within two to four days:** the clickable prototype, and a map of the process with the hours and money on each part. - **With it:** a proposal of where to start, a plan, a fixed price and your return, worked out on your own numbers. The brief, the map and the proposal are yours to keep, whatever you decide. The prototype stays open at its link for 30 days after the proposal, so you can show it to whoever decides with you. Plenty of owners take the map and fix the process themselves. That’s a fine outcome. If your own numbers don’t show it paying for itself within a year, we won’t propose it. ## 04 Why it’s free Three honest reasons. It’s how we find out whether there is something worth building, and we would rather show you than pitch you. It costs us a day or two, not weeks, because most processes are made of parts we’ve built before. And a business that has clicked through its own process makes a better decision, faster, either way. The catch, if there is one: you’ll know exactly what it would take, and what it’s worth. Some people find that harder to ignore than a sales call. ## 05 If you go ahead Go ahead within those 30 days and the build starts from your prototype, so nothing you saw is thrown away and the first build starts ahead. The prototype stays free either way. - **Two to six weeks** for a first build, on a fixed price agreed before we start. - **From $5,000** for a first build, paid on milestones, nothing before the first. - **Yours:** the code, the data and the accounts are in your name. - **The first 30 days of fixes are free.** After that, care from $600 a month if you want it, or run it yourself. ### Common questions Is there a catch? You give us an hour and some real examples. If the numbers work, we’ll propose a build; if they don’t, we’ll say so, and you keep the brief, the map and the proposal either way. Do I need to prepare anything? No. Think of the last time the process happened; that’s all the preparation it needs. The agent asks the basics before the call. Who sees our data? Only the people working on your prototype. Your examples can be anonymised, are deletable by you, and are deleted at the end unless you ask us to keep them. What if the prototype shows it isn’t worth it? Then we’ve saved you a build. We say so in the proposal, and suggest what we’d do instead, which is sometimes nothing. ### Sources 1. [How we work, phase by phase](https://www.streamlight.ai/#ap-h) 2. [The return calculator, and what moves the price](https://www.streamlight.ai/#ca-h) 3. [An example proposal](https://www.streamlight.ai/client-tamberlin/?s=6&via=agent) Ask about your business Our agent has read this note. Ask it whether the free prototype makes sense for you. [Would this work for a business like mine?](https://www.streamlight.ai/#agent) [Which process would you start with?](https://www.streamlight.ai/#agent) [Something else…](https://www.streamlight.ai/#agent) ## Keep reading [Costs and ownership 12 min How much does an AI agent cost? Rent, build or custom: which one fits your businessWhen to rent, build your own or have one built, what each costs from published prices, a one-minute check on your own process, and what we charge.Read](https://www.streamlight.ai/blog/ai-agent-cost/) [Playbooks 11 min AI agents for business: 7 jobs that pay for themselves, and 5 to skipSome jobs pay back an AI build within months, and others never do. See which is which, and where to start.Read](https://www.streamlight.ai/blog/ai-agents-for-business/) [Working with us 10 min 12 questions to ask an AI automation agency before you signWith our own answers, including the unflattering ones.Soon](https://www.streamlight.ai/blog/#soon) ## Let’s figure it out together. 30-minute strategy call, with no strings. You keep everything we find, whatever you decide. [Book a call](https://www.streamlight.ai/book/) [Chat with our agent](https://www.streamlight.ai/#agent)