Episode
# 164 How I Built an AI Voice Agent With Claude + Voiceflow (Zero Code)
- Podcast
- Build With AI
- Published
- May 12, 2026
- Duration seconds
- 3554
- Processing state
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- https://share.transistor.fm/s/e9f12b86
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Summary
Build your voice agent in 10 minutes (No code required) https://corey-ganim.kit.com/18da152cf4 In this episode, I sat down with Susan Westwater, co-founder of Pragmatic Digital and a conversational AI veteran since 2017, to build a working voice agent in Voiceflow live, with zero code. Susan walks through her exact prompt template for an appointment-scheduling agent, explains the difference between in-the-loop, on-the-loop, and fully autonomous agents, and shows how to separate your agent instructions from your knowledge base so you can update facts without breaking the whole build. We test the agent live (it called her cell phone mid-episode), connect it to a Google Sheet to capture customer intake, and talk about competitors like VAPI, ElevenLabs, and Voiceify. By the end, you'll have the exact playbook (and the template Susan is giving away) to spin up your own MVP voice agent in under an hour. Timestamps 03:42 – Inside Voiceflow and what makes it different 04:23 – Chatbot vs voice agent: listen, decide, act 05:30 – In the loop vs on the loop vs fully autonomous 09:09 – The system prompt: identity, purpose, and boundaries 11:54 – Voice, persona, and speech sculpting 13:22 – Separating agent instructions from knowledge base 17:14 – Stopping the agent from troubleshooting electrical issues 20:31 – Rules for collecting info one question at a time 23:21 – Pasting the prompt and one-shotting the build 26:34 – Voiceflow competitors: VAPI, ElevenLabs, Voiceify 30:22 – Connecting tools at each conversation step 33:13 – Why faster builds give up control 38:21 – Adding the knowledge base as a Word doc 43:13 – Sending customer intake to a Google Sheet 45:57 – Live phone call with the voice agent 50:09 – Branching, exit conditions, and iteration 54:52 – Custom voices, ElevenLab…