Listen To Betty Speak With Customer 1:
Listen To Betty Speak With Customer 2:
Introduction
For Instant Water Heaters in St. Louis, the constantly ringing phone was the sound of a dilemma. Every call was a potential high-value emergency job, but it was also an interruption that pulled the team away from the work that actually pays the bills. They were losing profitable after-hours calls, frustrating potential customers with wait times, and burning out their staff. The cost of hiring a full-time receptionist was prohibitive, but the cost of inaction was even higher.
They came to My Sick Builds with a critical challenge:
How can we answer every call, qualify every lead, and dispatch jobs instantly, without hiring more people?
Our solution was Betty, a custom-built AI Voice Agent that works 24/7, never calls in sick, and handles the entire customer intake process flawlessly.
The Challenge
Before Betty, Instant Water Heaters faced a set of problems common to almost every successful service business:
- Overwhelmed Phone Lines: During peak hours, calls would go to voicemail, which is where high-urgency leads go to die.
- Lost After-Hours Opportunities: A broken water heater doesn’t care about 9-to-5 business hours. Every unanswered call after 5 PM was a high-margin job handed to a competitor.
- Inconsistent Information: Manually taking down information over the phone led to missed details, incorrect addresses, and unprepared technicians, requiring costly second trips.
- Team Burnout: The owner was spending over 20 hours a week just answering basic intake questions, pulling them away from scaling the business. The team was constantly interrupted, breaking their focus on the jobs at hand.
Our Solution:
Betty, the Perfect AI Employee
My Sick Builds designed and deployed Betty, a sophisticated AI Voice Agent tailored specifically for the plumbing industry. Betty doesn’t just answer the phone; she conducts an intelligent, empathetic conversation that gathers every necessary detail and gets the right information to the right person, instantly.
How It Works:
Automated 5-Step Workflow
We built a seamless, automated workflow that turns a customer’s urgent problem into a scheduled, high-value job for the team in minutes.
Step 1: The Call Comes In (Anytime, 24/7) A customer with a broken water heater calls. Betty answers instantly in a warm, professional voice.
Step 2: Intelligent Qualification Betty follows a 13-step, industry-specific script to gather all critical details: name, address, water heater type, problem description, and even property access info.
Step 3: Instant Data Entry The moment the call ends, all the information is automatically and perfectly organized in their Airtable CRM. No typos, no missed details.
Step 4: Immediate Technician Alert Simultaneously, an SMS notification is sent to the on-call technician with a complete summary of the job.
Step 5: The Job is Dispatched The technician has everything they need to head to the job site, often within minutes of the original call, creating an incredible customer experience.
What Makes Betty the Perfect Teammate
Betty isn’t a generic bot. We built her from the ground up to be the ultimate team member for a home service business.
She Works 24/7/365
- What it is: Answers calls after hours, on weekends, and on holidays.
- Why it matters: You capture the profitable emergency jobs that happen at 10 PM on a Friday, while your competitors are asleep.
She Speaks “Plumber”
- What it is: Understands industry terms like “tankless vs. tank,” “pilot light,” and “pressure relief valve.”
- Why it matters: She gathers the right technical details so your techs arrive prepared, saving time and a second trip.
She Provides Instant, Accurate Quotes
- What it is: We connected Betty to the client’s comprehensive knowledge base, which contains detailed pricing, model numbers, warranty info, and installation details for every water heater they offer.
- Why it matters: When a customer asks “How much for a 50-gallon Bradford White?”, Betty provides an exact, consistent price instantly. This builds trust through transparency and turns a simple intake call into a powerful sales consultation, saving the owner from having to constantly look up prices.
She Qualifies Every Lead
- What it is: Follows a smart script to separate tire-kickers from serious buyers and identifies true emergencies.
- Why it matters: Your team only spends time on pre-qualified, high-intent customers who are ready to move forward.
She Handles the Money Talk
- What it is: Clearly explains the assessment fee, gets work authorization, and even discusses payment options.
- Why it matters: It removes the awkward “money conversation” from the first call and ensures your team gets paid for their diagnostic expertise.
Hear Betty in Action: Real Customer Calls
Don’t just take our word for it. Listen to how Betty handles real-world scenarios with calm, professional intelligence.
Call 1: Navigating a High-Urgency Safety Call
Listen as Betty calmly handles a call from a stressed homeowner with a ‘danger’ notice, patiently guiding him to find technical details and gathering all dispatch information flawlessly.
Listen To Betty Speak With Customer 1:
Call 2: Adaptive Information Gathering
What if your customer is at work? Hear how Betty adapts, letting him text photos of the leak when he’s home, guaranteeing the technician is ready.
Listen To Betty Speak With Customer 2:
Under the Hood: The Technology Stack
For those interested in the technical details, here’s a look at the robust and scalable infrastructure we built to power Betty. This isn’t an off-the-shelf tool; it’s a custom-integrated system designed for performance.
Our core technology stack includes:
- Voice AI Platform: Vapi for real-time, natural-sounding conversational AI.
- Language Processing: OpenAI (ChatGPT) for industry-specific language understanding and response generation.
- Workflow Orchestration: Make.com for managing the complex flow of data from conversation to action.
- CRM & Data: Airtable for flexible and powerful customer and job management.
- Notifications & Comms: Twilio, LinqApp, and Replit for instant, reliable SMS alerts to technicians.
Conclusion
The Betty Voice Agent project proves that custom AI solutions can revolutionize a service business. By deeply understanding the plumbing industry’s challenges, we delivered more than just automation—we delivered business transformation. Instant Water Heaters can now scale their operations, enhance customer satisfaction, and give their team the freedom to focus on what they do best: serving their community.
Ready to stop missing calls and start growing your business?
Build Your AI Voice Agent