Builts AI

BACKGROUND

Please describe your company and position.

I am the Director of Thompson Career College, London

Describe what your company does in a single sentence.

Thompson Career College (TCC), London Campus is a career-focused institution offering short-format online certificate programs in Early Childhood Assistant, Pharmacy Assistant and French, with new cohorts launching every month.

OPPORTUNITY / CHALLENGE

What specific goals or objectives did you hire Builts AI to accomplish?

• Increase enrollments without adding staff.
• Cut our inquiry response time from 1-2 business days to near-instant, so we stop losing prospective students to faster-responding competitors.
• Automate repetitive student support queries.

SOLUTION

How did you find Builts AI?

Referral

Why did you select Builts AI over others?

• Pricing fit our budget
• Good value for cost
• Referred to me

Describe the scope of work in detail. Please include a summary of key deliverables.

Builts AI built two end-to-end automation systems for our admissions and student services operations.

System 1: Speed-to-Lead Automation: This system handles every prospective student inquiry that comes in across our channels (ads, social, web forms). Key deliverables:

• Instant response engine that sends a personalized program brochure within 60 seconds of any inquiry, matched to the program the prospect asked about
• Automated booking link delivery so prospects can self-schedule an admissions call without phone tag
• Multi-touch nurture sequence for leads who don't book immediately, timed against upcoming cohort start dates
• Automated reminders to reduce no-shows on booked admissions calls
• After-hours and weekend coverage so the 40%+ of inquiries that come in outside business hours get the same instant response

System 2: Student Support Automation

This system handles inbound queries from current students across email, phone, and web. Key deliverables:

• AI agent trained on TCC's full knowledge base (program details, policies, deadlines, procedures)
• Integration with our student database for personalized responses on tuition status, portal access, course schedules, and account details
• Multi-channel coverage (email, phone, web) with consistent answers across all touchpoints
• Smart escalation logic that routes only complex issues to human staff, with full conversation context attached
• Resolves roughly 80% of student queries automatically

RESULTS & FEEDBACK

What were the measurable outcomes from the project that demonstrate progress or success?

The results showed up fast and were easy to measure against our pre-automation baseline.

Response and conversion metrics:

• First response time dropped from 1-2 business days to under 60 seconds
• 3x increase in admissions calls booked
• 34% increase in enrollment rate
• After-hours and weekend inquiries (40%+ of total volume) now get the same instant response as business-hours leads, instead of waiting until Monday

Operational efficiency:

• 80% of student support queries now resolved automatically without human involvement
• 25+ hours per week reclaimed by our student services team, redirected to academic advising, career support, and proactive outreach to at-risk students
• No additional admissions or support staff hired despite increased inquiry volume and conversion

Visibility and decision-making:

• We now have data we never had before: when inquiry volume spikes, which programs generate the most interest, and exactly where leads drop off in the funnel
• Enrollment and marketing decisions are now made on real numbers instead of gut feel

The combined effect is that we're converting more inquiries into enrolled students, our staff is doing higher-value work, and we have visibility into our funnel that lets us keep improving.

Describe their project management. Did they deliver items on time? How did they respond to your needs?

Project management was clean and low-friction from start to finish.

On-time delivery: They hit every milestone on the timeline they originally quoted. The discovery and audit phase wrapped when promised, the build phases stayed on schedule, and go-live happened on the date we agreed to. No surprise delays, no scope creep that pushed dates back.

Responsiveness: Communication was direct — we worked with their founder and a small implementation team, with no account manager middle layer slowing things down. When we flagged questions or needed adjustments, we typically got a response same-day. When we asked for mid-build changes (a few tweaks to how the nurture sequence handled cohort deadlines, and adjustments to the support escalation logic), they handled it without scope drama or change-order theatrics.

Proactive communication: They kept us informed without overwhelming us. Regular check-ins during the build, clear updates on what was being worked on, and honest flags when something on our end (like knowledge base content) was holding up their progress.

Post-launch support: Once both systems went live, they didn't disappear. They've stayed engaged on refinements, monitoring performance, and helping us extend the systems as we add new programs and use cases.

Honestly, the only pacing issue during the project was on our end — we were sometimes slow getting them the knowledge base content and approvals they needed. Their team was consistently ahead of ours.

What was your primary form of communication with Builts AI?

• Virtual Meeting
• Email or Messaging App

What did you find most impressive or unique about this company?

They understood our business before pitching anything: Most automation vendors we'd talked to led with their tech stack and tried to retrofit it onto our problem. Builts AI did the opposite. Their initial audit identified operational issues we hadn't even articulated to ourselves — like the fact that 40%+ of our inquiries were coming in after hours and silently dying over the weekend. 
They got the cohort dynamic immediately and understood why response speed matters more for a four-month career program than it would for a traditional college. That context shaped everything they built.

The systems actually work as operational infrastructure, not chatbot theatre.: I'd seen plenty of "AI automation" pitches before this engagement, and most of them were dressed-up chatbots that would've created more work than they saved. What Builts AI delivered runs quietly in the background and produces measurable outcomes — instant responses, booked calls, resolved support tickets — without my team having to babysit it. The 80% auto-resolution rate on student queries isn't a marketing number; it's what we actually see in our dashboard every week.

If I had to name a third thing: they're builders, not consultants. They scoped the work, built it, launched it, and stayed engaged for refinements. No endless strategy decks, no handoffs to a different implementation team. That made the whole engagement feel less like a vendor relationship and more like having an embedded operations team.

Are there any areas for improvement or something Builts AI could have done differently?

Honestly, very little on their side. The one area I'd point to is that early on, the pace of the build was ahead of our internal pace. They were ready for knowledge base content, approvals, and access to our systems faster than we were able to deliver them. 
That's on us, not them — but if I were doing it again, I'd appreciate a more structured prep checklist upfront so we knew exactly what they'd need from us and when. They could probably formalize that intake process for clients who are less prepared on the operations side.

Beyond that, nothing meaningful. No missed deadlines, no communication issues, no surprise costs. The systems do what they said they would do.