Connect Your AI to Your Business Tools · Lesson 4 of 8

Lesson 4: Connect a business app and run three real tasks

25 minutes. One app, three tasks, one read-only start.

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Email and calendar were the warm-up. This is where it starts saving real time: connecting the tool where your business actually keeps its numbers, customers or orders.

Pick one of the three tools you circled in Lesson 1. If you're not sure, pick the one that holds information you look up most often. For many small businesses that's the accounting system or the CRM.

These vendors publish their own official connector. Each one's own help page is listed in this course's sources.

| Tool | What it's for | Works in | What it can change | |---|---|---|---| | QuickBooks Online (Intuit) | Accounting, invoices | Claude, ChatGPT | Can create, update, send and delete invoices. US only. Needs a QuickBooks Online subscription. | | HubSpot | CRM, leads, deals | Claude, ChatGPT, Copilot | Can view, create and update records. Its Claude connector can't delete. Needs a paid Claude plan. | | Shopify | Online store | Claude, ChatGPT | Can change prices, apply discounts, add products. Shopify says you're responsible for changes the AI makes. | | Stripe | Payments | Claude, ChatGPT | Can read and write. Refunds and payouts need a person to approve through a link. | | Square | Point of sale, bookings | Claude, Copilot | Orders, catalog, inventory, bookings. Square labels it beta. | | Canva | Design | Claude, ChatGPT, Copilot | Create, edit, resize and export designs. | | Slack | Team chat | Claude, ChatGPT | Can send and schedule messages. A Slack admin approves it. | | Asana | Projects, tasks | Claude, ChatGPT, Copilot | Create and assign tasks and projects. | | Notion | Notes, wikis | Claude, ChatGPT, Copilot | Read and write, with your existing Notion permissions. | | Zapier | Links to the many apps you've connected in Zapier | Claude, ChatGPT, Copilot Studio | Whatever actions you turn on in Zapier. Each successful call uses two Zapier tasks from your plan. |

A few notes on that table:

• "Works in" means the vendor's own documents, or Microsoft's Copilot connector gallery, name that assistant. Other combinations may exist. Search the directory in your assistant to be sure.
• Notice the right-hand column. Almost every one of these can change things, not just read. That's why your worksheet from Lesson 2 matters here.
• Zapier is a special case. If your tool isn't in any directory but is in Zapier, Zapier's connector can reach it. It costs Zapier tasks, so watch your usage for the first week.

In Claude

• Go to Customize, then Connectors, and select Discover. (In a chat, you can also select the + in the message box, then Connectors.)
• Search for your tool by name. Look for the vendor's own listing. Claude marks reviewed ones as verified, but Anthropic's own docs note that verification "isn't a security audit."
• Read the listing. It shows what the connector can read and what it can write.
• Select Connect and sign in to the tool. Use the limited account from your worksheet, not the owner account, if your tool lets you.
• Back on the connector's page in Claude, open Tool permissions. For anything in your "Never on its own" column, choose Blocked. For anything that changes data, choose Needs approval. Leave reading tools on Always allow only if you're comfortable with that.

On Claude Team or Enterprise, if you see Request instead of Connect, your Owner hasn't added it yet. Send them your worksheet.

In ChatGPT

• Open Settings, then Plugins, or go to the plugin directory at chatgpt.com/plugins. (OpenAI moved apps into the plugin directory in July 2026. If you see "Apps" instead, you're looking at the same thing.)
• Search for your tool and select it. If it's bundled in a plugin, select Install plugin, then Connect.
• Sign in to the tool with the limited account from your worksheet.
• Check the app's permission setting (look in the app's preferences in the plugin directory). Choose the setting where ChatGPT reads without asking but asks before making changes, called "Allow read actions" at the time of writing.

On ChatGPT Business, Enterprise or Edu, your admin controls which apps are allowed and whether they can take actions, under Workspace settings, then Apps. If your app isn't there, ask them.

In Microsoft 365 Copilot

In Copilot, business apps arrive as Copilot connectors, and the first step belongs to your admin.

• Your admin turns on the connector in the Microsoft 365 admin center (look under Copilot connectors). Microsoft's own gallery, checked October 7, 2026, included HubSpot, Xero, Zoho Books, Square, Gusto, Asana, monday.com, Notion, Canva, Box and others. Microsoft-built ones of the live-lookup kind are on by default; ones built by partners need admin approval.
• You then sign in with your own account for that tool: in Copilot Chat, select the ... menu, then Settings, then Sources, find the tool, and Connect.
• Microsoft began rolling out write actions (create, update, delete) for these connectors in early October 2026. Each one asks you first, with choices like "Allow once," "Allow for conversation" or "Always allow." Use "Allow once."

QuickBooks, Shopify and Stripe were not in the Microsoft-built lists I checked. If your tool isn't there, ask your admin or IT partner about the Agent Store (vendor-made agents your admin can allow) or Copilot Studio (where they can add a vendor's MCP server to a custom agent; HubSpot and Zapier both document this). Those are admin or IT-partner jobs, not do-it-yourself steps.

Run these in order. Each one goes a little further.

Task 1: Look something up (read)

Ask a question you'd normally answer by logging in and clicking around. Examples:

• QuickBooks: "List every unpaid invoice more than 30 days past due. Show customer, amount and days overdue, oldest first."
• HubSpot: "Which deals in our pipeline haven't had any activity in the last two weeks?"
• Shopify or Square: "What were our top five products by units sold last month?"
• Stripe: "How many failed payments did we have this week, and from which customers?"
• Asana: "What tasks are overdue across all my projects?"

Then check one answer by hand. Open the tool yourself and confirm at least one number. This is how you learn to trust it (or learn where not to).

Task 2: Pull two tools together (read)

Ask a question that needs both this app and your email or calendar from Lesson 3. For example:

• "For each overdue invoice, find the last email I exchanged with that customer and tell me when it was."
• "For my meetings this week, pull up each company's deal stage in HubSpot."

This is the thing copy-and-paste could never do quickly.

Task 3: Draft, don't do (write, with approval)

Ask for one change, and stop at the approval prompt.

• "Draft a friendly reminder email for the oldest overdue invoice. Don't send it."
• "Create a follow-up task for the stalest deal, due Friday, assigned to me."
• "Draft (don't publish) a 10% discount for our slowest-moving product."

When the approval prompt appears, read it before you click. It tells you exactly what the AI is about to do and with what details. If it's right, allow it once. If anything is off, deny it and say why.

• The connector shows as connected in your assistant's settings.
• Task 1 gave an answer, and you confirmed at least one number by hand.
• Task 3 showed you an approval prompt before anything changed, and the change (if you allowed it) shows up in the tool itself.
• Update your worksheet: write down which tools the connector has, and what you set each to.

If the AI said it couldn't find anything, check two things first: is the connector turned on for this conversation, and does the account you connected with actually have access to that data?

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Next: some tools don't just send back text. They show up with their own screen.

→ Lesson 5: Apps inside the chat

Previous: Lesson 3: Connect your email, calendar and files · Next: Lesson 5: Apps inside the chat