AI automation that answers your customers while you are asleep.
Most enquiries in South Africa arrive after hours, on WhatsApp, from somebody messaging three suppliers at once. Whoever replies first usually wins the job, and at eleven at night nobody replies. AI automation closes that gap permanently: your business answers in seconds, qualifies the enquiry, and hands you only the ones worth calling back.
AI automation from R4,500 setup and R899 a month, fixed in writing before a line of configuration is written.
Assistant online
Most AI automation is rented. Ours is not.
The AI automation industry has quietly rebuilt the worst habit of the web industry: a proprietary platform you cannot leave, holding data you cannot export, priced per conversation so your bill rises exactly as the thing starts working. Ask any supplier the four questions below before you commit to anything.
| The question to ask | Typical platform answer | Dube AI |
|---|---|---|
| Who owns the conversation history | The platform | You, exportable in full |
| Who owns the trained configuration | The platform | You, handed over on request |
| What happens if you leave | It stops, data gone | You take the lot |
| Is the WhatsApp number yours | Frequently theirs | Registered to your business |
| Does the bill rise with volume | Per conversation | Flat monthly, messages included |
| Minimum contract term | 12 to 24 months | 30 days notice |
| Can another supplier take it over | No | Yes, standard tooling |
What you actually own after an AI automation build
- The WhatsApp number, registered to your business in your own Meta Business account rather than ours.
- Every conversation, exportable as structured data, because those transcripts are the most honest customer research your business will ever have.
- The trained configuration, meaning your prices, rules, escalation triggers and tone, in a form another competent supplier could pick up.
- The captured leads, which are personal information you are accountable for under POPIA, so they need to sit somewhere you control.
- The right to walk, on thirty days notice, with all of the above. We keep clients by moving their numbers rather than by paperwork.
What AI automation can do for your business today
AI automation is not a future promise. Every item below is running on South African businesses right now, on ordinary budgets, using infrastructure that already exists. Nothing here requires a research project.
Answer every enquiry instantly
On your website, WhatsApp, Facebook and Instagram at the same time. Trained on your services, your prices and your service areas, so the answers are yours rather than generic.
Qualify before you get involved
Budget, location, timing and requirement captured in the conversation. You pick up the phone already knowing whether it is worth your morning.
Book straight into your diary
The assistant offers genuinely available slots, takes the booking and sends the confirmation. No back and forth about times, no double bookings.
Send quotes automatically
Standard jobs get a priced quote inside the conversation. Complex ones arrive as a structured summary so writing the quote takes two minutes instead of twenty.
Chase the follow ups you forget
Quotes nobody answered, jobs due for service, invoices past terms. Polite, scheduled, in your voice, and it happens whether or not anyone remembers.
Speak your customers' language
English, isiZulu, Afrikaans, Sesotho, isiXhosa and the rest. Customers write how they speak and AI automation answers in the same language.
Hand over cleanly to a person
The moment a conversation needs a human it routes to you with the full history attached. Nobody has to ask the customer to repeat themselves.
Take orders and payments
For stocked products the assistant confirms availability, holds stock and sends a payment link. The order arrives complete rather than as a message you decode.
Tell you what people keep asking
Every conversation is a data point. Monthly summaries show the questions coming up most, which usually points straight at a service you should be selling harder.
AI automation from enquiry to booked job, with you involved only at the end.
Live sites we built, running in this page
Most agencies show you a screenshot. These are the actual live websites, loading inside this page, from our own group of companies. Open them and check where they rank. That is a harder claim to fake than a portfolio image.
Intelligence Protection Services
National security brand. Hub and spoke architecture across VIP protection, guarding and investigations, with ranked location pages across ten cities and schema injected sitewide.
TLD Private Investigators
Regional investigations brand competing across Gauteng, Limpopo and KwaZulu-Natal. The same system on a very different budget, led by Google Business Profile rather than paid traffic.
More builds, including a WooCommerce store, are on the portfolio. We will also open Search Console live on a call rather than sending you a screenshot of one.
Four ways we build AI automation for your business
Start with one. Most businesses buying AI automation begin with the website assistant or WhatsApp, watch it work for a month, then add the rest once they trust the numbers.
AI chatbots for your website
An assistant on your site that answers questions, gives real prices, qualifies the enquiry and pushes the lead to your phone. Works on any website, not only ones we built.
- Trained on your services and pricing
- Captures name, number and requirement
- Escalates to a human when needed
- Setup R4,500, then R899 a month
WhatsApp business automation
The channel South Africans actually use. Automated replies, qualification and booking on the official WhatsApp Business API, with human takeover at any point.
- Official Business API, not a workaround
- Answers in seconds, day or night
- Books, quotes and takes orders
- Setup R4,500, then R899 a month
Business process automation
The admin that eats your week. Quotes, invoices, job cards, follow ups and reporting, wired together so they happen without anyone retyping anything.
- Quote and invoice generation
- Job cards and scheduling
- Automatic follow up sequences
- From R9,500 per workflow
AI consulting
A costed roadmap showing where AI automation pays back fastest in your specific business, so the first thing you build is the thing that earns.
- Process audit and opportunity map
- Prioritised by return, not novelty
- Build plan with real numbers
- From R6,500, credited against your build
How an AI automation deployment is actually put together
We publish this because most suppliers will not, and because you should be able to hand this page to a technical person and have them tell you whether it is sound.
Channel
The official WhatsApp Business API through the WhatsApp Cloud API, plus a website widget and the Meta social inboxes. Your number sits in your own Meta Business account. Unofficial tools that automate WhatsApp Web breach Meta's terms and get numbers banned, so we do not build on them at any price.
Knowledge
Your services, prices, service areas, terms and the answers to the questions you field daily, structured so the assistant retrieves facts rather than inventing them. This is the layer that decides whether AI automation sounds like your business or like a chatbot.
Rules and guardrails
What it may quote freely, what it must never price without you, which words trigger immediate escalation, and the subjects it declines outright. Written down, reviewed by you, and changeable in a day.
Delivery and data
Qualified leads routed to your inbox, WhatsApp, Google Sheets or CRM. Conversation data retained under POPIA limits, encrypted in transit, exportable and deletable on request. Nothing sits on a machine in our office.
What we will not do, at any budget
- Build on an unofficial WhatsApp workaround. It works until Meta bans the number, and it is your number.
- Let the assistant invent prices. If it has not been given the figure, it captures the enquiry instead of guessing.
- Store personal information we do not need, or keep it longer than the retention period we agreed with you.
- Pretend AI automation replaces judgement. It handles repetition. Complaints, negotiation and anything sensitive go to a person, deliberately.
- Charge per conversation. A pricing model that punishes you for succeeding is not aligned with you.
AI automation live in about two weeks
Every AI automation build follows the same five stages. You spend roughly two hours in total, most of it in the first conversation.
We learn your business
One session covering services, prices, service areas and the questions you answer most. This is the bulk of your involvement.
We train the assistant
Your pricing, your terms, your tone, including the things it must never say and the point at which it must fetch a human.
You test it privately
You and your team message it for a few days on a private channel and flag what sounds wrong. We adjust until it sounds like you.
We connect the channels
Website, WhatsApp Business API, Facebook and Instagram, plus wherever the qualified lead should land.
We keep improving it
Monthly, using real conversations. Questions it handled badly become training. This is what the R899 a month buys.
Businesses getting the most from AI automation
If your business looks like any of these, AI automation usually pays back fast and obviously. If it does not, we will say so rather than take the setup fee.
- You get enquiries after hours and lose them by morning
- The same eight questions come in every single day
- WhatsApp is where most of your customers reach you
- Somebody spends half their day typing quotes
- You are paying for ads but replying slowly
- You serve customers across several suburbs or provinces
- Your team is small and stretched across too much
- You lose track of quotes that were never followed up
- Weekend and public holiday enquiries go unanswered
- Customers message in more than one language
- Bookings involve four messages before a time is agreed
- You would rather grow without hiring another admin person
We deliver AI automation across Johannesburg, Sandton, Midrand, Centurion, Pretoria, Cape Town, Durban, Gqeberha, Bloemfontein and Polokwane, and remotely anywhere else in the country. Clients in Zimbabwe, Botswana, Namibia, Kenya, Zambia and Tanzania are quoted in local currency on those pages.
AI automation pricing, published in full
Fixed setup, fixed monthly, cancellable on thirty days. The monthly fee covers hosting, message costs, monitoring and the ongoing training that makes AI automation better every month. There is no per-conversation billing and no separate platform invoice to manage.
Website assistant
Then R899 a month. An assistant on your website, trained on your business, capturing and qualifying leads.
- Trained on your services and prices
- Lead capture to your inbox or phone
- Human handover built in
- Monthly retraining included
Website plus WhatsApp
Then R1,450 a month. Both channels, one assistant, one shared memory of every conversation.
- Everything in the website assistant
- Official WhatsApp Business API
- Booking and diary integration
- Conversation reporting monthly
- Priority support
Full automation build
Per workflow, quoted after the process audit. For quoting, invoicing, job cards, follow ups and reporting.
- Process mapped before anything is built
- Connects the tools you already use
- Fixed price per workflow
- Three workflows from R24,000
- Support plan from R1,450 a month
Not sure which to start with? The AI consulting roadmap costs R6,500 and is credited in full against your first build. Website builds with an assistant included are priced on website design packages, and the hosting and monitoring behind everything sits on website maintenance packages.
AI automation questions we get asked
What does AI automation cost in South Africa?
AI automation starts at R4,500 to set up a website assistant plus R899 a month. Website plus WhatsApp is R7,500 and R1,450 a month. Full process automation starts at R9,500 per workflow, or R24,000 for three. The monthly fee covers hosting, message costs, monitoring and monthly retraining, so there are no separate platform bills and no per-conversation charges.
Do I own the AI automation once it is built?
Yes, and this is the question most people forget to ask. The WhatsApp number sits in your own Meta Business account, the conversation history is exportable in full, the trained configuration is yours on request, and the captured leads live somewhere you control. On thirty days notice you take all of it. Plenty of platforms in this market cannot say the same, so ask them directly.
Will it sound like a robot?
It sounds like whatever you train it to sound like. We build AI automation on your actual language, including how you greet people and how you talk about price. During testing you and your team message it for a few days and flag anything that sounds off, and we keep adjusting until it reads like your business rather than like software.
What happens when it does not know the answer?
It says so plainly and fetches a human. The assistant is configured to hand over rather than guess, and the full conversation history goes with it so the customer never repeats themselves. You can also set triggers, such as any mention of a complaint or an emergency, that escalate immediately regardless of what else is happening.
Can AI automation work on WhatsApp?
Yes, on the official WhatsApp Business API, which is the properly licensed route rather than an unofficial workaround that risks your number being banned. It runs on the WhatsApp Cloud API, handling conversations, templates and bookings, and hands over to a person the moment it needs to. We handle the Meta business verification for you, which is the part most businesses get stuck on.
Does it work in languages other than English?
Yes. AI automation here handles all eleven official South African languages plus the mixed usage that is normal in real conversations, because customers rarely write in one language at a time. If somebody messages in isiZulu, it answers in isiZulu, and if they switch mid-sentence it follows.
Will AI automation replace my staff?
In practice it stops businesses needing to hire another admin person and frees the team they have for work that actually needs a human. The assistant handles repetition. Your people handle judgement, relationships and the complicated jobs. We would rather say that plainly than sell you a headcount saving we cannot stand behind.
How long does AI automation take to set up?
About two weeks from signing to live. Roughly one week of training and configuration, then a few days of private testing with your team before it goes onto your public channels. WhatsApp adds a few days for Meta business verification, which we handle as part of the setup fee.
Do I need a new website for this?
No. AI automation installs on any website, whether it is WordPress, Wix, Shopify or custom built, using a single snippet. If your site is very old or extremely slow we will mention it, because a slow page reduces how many people reach the assistant at all, but it is not a requirement.
Who owns the conversations and the data?
You do. Conversation history, captured leads and the trained configuration belong to your business and are exportable if you ever leave. Data handling is set up to comply with POPIA, including retention limits and consent wording where it is needed, and nothing is stored on equipment in our office.
Can it connect to the systems I already use?
Usually. AI automation connects to email, calendars, WhatsApp, most common CRMs, Google Sheets, accounting tools and anything with an API. During the audit we confirm exactly what your stack allows before quoting, rather than promising an integration and discovering the limitation in week three.
How do I know it is actually working?
Monthly reporting shows conversations handled, leads captured, average response time, questions it could not answer, and handovers to your team. That last number is the most useful, because it tells you exactly what to train next. If the numbers are not moving we will tell you rather than sending a prettier graph.
The rest of what we do
AI automation is one of four things we do. Start from website design company in South Africa for the overview of how the whole system fits together.
See AI automation answering your own customers.
Tell us what you sell and the questions you get asked most. We will build a working demo trained on your business, at no cost, and give you the link so you can message it yourself before spending anything.