Authentia handled use-case definition, workflow design, tool selection, and development for a dental technology lead qualification pilot. The solution reached a selected group of clients in Canada and received strongly positive qualitative feedback. A broader US rollout is planned.
A sales enquiry about dental technology can involve equipment, software, workflow, and specialist knowledge. This engagement focused on the first stages of that conversation: understanding a prospect's needs and connecting them with the right follow-up.
The business problem
Buying dental technology involves detailed questions. A dental laboratory evaluating production equipment has different needs from a practice considering a new digital workflow. Prospects may want to understand compatibility, software, training, materials, or how a product fits into work they already do.
The supplier's sales process involved reviewing inbound enquiries, following up, understanding the prospect's needs, and arranging a conversation with the right person. Those steps contained useful information and human judgement, alongside repetitive coordination. The opportunity was to explore whether an AI-assisted first conversation could help a prospect make progress while preserving access to a specialist.
That gave the engagement a specific business focus: the journey between an enquiry and a qualified discovery meeting. It also created a manageable boundary for a pilot, with a clear place for the sales team to enter the conversation.
Defining a useful role for AI
The proposed assistant needed to work with the supplier's actual product context. An enquiry about equipment could lead to questions about software and workflow. A conversation about components could require a different qualification path. The design therefore accounted for the distinction between dental laboratories and practices, and for the product knowledge needed to make the initial exchange useful.
We scoped an assistant that could ask relevant qualification questions, respond using the supplied product knowledge, and help arrange a meeting. Specialist escalation remained part of the workflow when a conversation required deeper expertise. This was a commercial enquiry workflow; its purpose was to support product discovery and sales conversations.
The design work connected the conversation to a concrete next step. A useful answer alone would leave coordination unfinished. Qualification, scheduling, and confirmation therefore formed part of the same pilot scope.
The workflow we designed
- Capture the enquiry. A prospect's details and interests enter through a form, with a CSV import option included in the pilot scope.
- Start a product-informed conversation. The assistant uses a knowledge base built around the supplier's offering and the questions its buyers ask.
- Qualify the opportunity. The conversation gathers context about the prospect's needs and helps distinguish the appropriate next step.
- Bring in specialist judgement. Questions requiring deeper expertise are directed toward a human specialist.
- Arrange the follow-up. Scheduling and confirmation connect the initial enquiry with a discovery meeting.
This workflow provided a shared description of what the pilot was intended to do. It connected the customer-facing interaction with the information and coordination needed behind it.
Keeping the pilot focused
We defined an initial scope that could be evaluated before expanding the system's responsibilities. Broader CRM integration was positioned as a later step, beyond the initial pilot. Scheduling requirements were considered within the pilot design without making the entire existing sales environment part of the first release.
That boundary mattered. A pilot can become difficult to interpret when it attempts to replace too many processes at once. Here, the initial journey gave the client a focused way to experience the assistant with a selected group of clients, while keeping broader integration and rollout decisions visible as subsequent work.
Our contribution covered opportunity definition, workflow design, technology selection, development, and preparation for the pilot rollout. The engagement brought business understanding and technical work together: the proposed experience had to make sense to the sales team and be expressed clearly enough to build.
A limited live rollout in Canada
The solution was rolled out to a selected group of clients in Canada. Feedback from that pilot was strongly positive. A larger rollout in the United States is planned.
What this experience brings to our advisory work
This engagement illustrates the decisions that sit between an AI idea and a usable pilot: choosing a bounded workflow, defining the knowledge the system needs, identifying where specialists remain involved, and deciding which integrations belong in the first phase.
For leaders considering a similar opportunity, those decisions are a useful place to start. A clear scope gives a delivery team something concrete to implement and gives the business a basis for deciding what to evaluate next. Authentia's advisory work draws on this practical implementation experience to help clients shape their own opportunities, briefs, and pilot decisions.
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