Notes / Company
Your agency uses AI. What should you ask before hiring them?
Practical questions and evidence to discuss before hiring an agency that uses AI for website, marketing or operational work.
By Edu Rigonato. Published Sep 23, 2026. 11 min read.
An agency tells you it uses AI to deliver better work, faster. You still need to decide whether to trust it with your website, marketing or business operations. What would make that conversation useful?
“We use AI” leaves a lot unexplained. It might mean a designer explores early concepts with a generation tool, a writer checks a draft, or a deployed system reads customer records and takes action. Those uses create different questions about quality, information and responsibility.
Research on AI disclosure in freelance work found mismatches in how workers and clients understood acceptable use. That study involved platform-based participants, so it does not describe every agency relationship. It does give a reason to discuss the actual work instead of assuming a broad phrase means the same thing to both parties. ( Hwang and colleagues, CHI 2026 )
The questions below are a way to make those expectations concrete. They are useful before hiring and should help define what you will review later. The amount of evidence you request should reflect what the project can affect.
What result will the agency be responsible for?
Start with the job you are paying the agency to do. Ask it to explain the intended result, the deliverables, the assumptions and how you will decide whether the work meets the brief.
For a website project, “build a modern website” is a starting point for a conversation. It does not yet explain which services the site must communicate, which customer questions it should answer or how an inquiry should reach your team. A clearer brief connects those needs to pages, content, forms and checks you can review.
Ask the agency to distinguish completing the project from improving a business outcome. A working inquiry form can be tested before launch. Whether the new site produces more qualified opportunities needs a definition of “qualified,” a measurement period and attention to changes in traffic, offers and follow-up. Agreeing on that distinction helps you assess the delivery without turning every later change in revenue into a verdict on the website.
Frequently asked questions
Is it a problem if an agency uses AI?
AI use alone does not establish quality. Ask which tasks use it, what the team contributes and how the result is checked. Research on particular work settings shows that benefits vary; a useful example and a clear delivery plan tell you more about your project than a general AI claim.
Can an agency show evidence without sharing another client’s work?
Yes. Discuss a redacted example, a demonstration created for review or an explanation of the checks and decisions behind a comparable assignment. The alternative should address your actual concern. A provider should not have to expose confidential client information to demonstrate its approach.
Do I need to own every AI tool or prompt the agency uses?
Clarify what you receive and can continue using. The provider may retain reusable tools or operate a managed platform, while your agreement gives you particular deliverables, access, exports or licenses. Resolve those categories and transition arrangements explicitly; do not assume every production component transfers.
Should AI use automatically make the project cheaper?
There is no universal pricing rule. Compare the agreed work, review responsibilities, service and continuing costs. Ask what the fee covers and what changes it. Faster production may matter to the price or timeline, but it does not tell you by itself what the complete service should cost.
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