Dyllen Nellis took her college consulting service to the next level
At Pickaxe, we see hundreds of online businesses use AI models in intelligent ways to transform their operations, from embedding AI tools into their customer-facing websites to creating internal dashboards of AI widgets for their team.
In this blog, we’re featuring Dyllen Nellis, a current Stanford student who runs a college application coaching business called Next Gen Admit. Today, we’ll be sharing how Dyllen integrated Pickaxe into her business to help prospective college students more efficiently and personably.
So let’s explore how Dyllen supercharged Next Gen Admit with AI.
The beginning of Next Gen Admit
While applying for colleges during the 2018-2019 cycle, Dyllen Nellis didn’t necessarily know what to do when applying for colleges. In other words, she and many others had to really rely on themselves when figuring out the best strategies to apply to their dream schools. By developing a structured strategy based on reading and watching a variety of sources about the college application process, she was ultimately accepted into every school that she applied to.
At the end of her freshman year at Stanford, however, the pandemic was in full swing. Undeterred, Dyllen decided to give back by creating content geared towards prospective college students about the college application process and the best strategies to use. As her content became more widespread, many people were asking her to take a look at their essays and it inspired her to start her own website, Next Gen Admit.
Supercharging lead generation through Pickaxe
As AI is becoming more commonplace, Dyllen wanted to know which tools would best serve her site. However, the majority of the AI tools that she had found were either too difficult to use or the tool itself only seemed to serve one singular purpose, such as use cases commonly found in marketing or sales. With Pickaxe, however, she found an easy-to-use platform for creating flexible AI tools and embedding them into her website.
Dyllen took her niche expertise in the college admissions process and created a tool that helped generate ideas for college applicants. The tool didn’t require any coding– it just required Dyllen to write a prompt based off her intimate knowledge of how to make college applications pop. The result, the AI Passion Project Generator, allowed Dyllen to offer a taste of her expertise at scale to hundreds of applicants seeking help.
Before implementing Pickaxe, she was relying on her old posts since she wasn’t posting much on social media, getting her less than 10 new email subscribers daily. In addition, the lead magnet that she was using before in the form of a small downloadable guide was too slow. She realized people would rather have access to a resource that offered immediate results. An AI tool that lived on her website as an embed was the perfect solution. The tool could generate helpful material to her users instantly. By putting the tool behind a sign-up form, Dyllen was able to generate tons of leads.
After implementing Pickaxe and using it in conjunction with her social media, she has been averaging between 100 to 200 new email subscribers a day.
The AI Passion Project Generator
Recently, Pickaxe hosted a Prompt Design Contest inviting all Pickaxe users to write prompts and enter them to compete for various prizes.Dyllen’s AI Passion Project Generator amassed more uses than any other entry winning her a prize for the most-used pickaxe in the competition.
When asked why she created her tool, Dyllen said:
“I recently used Pickaxe to create the AI Passion Project Generator because a lot of students don’t really know where to start on how to create a project that both satiates their intellectual curiosity and helps them stand out in admissions. AI has knowledge in every field that I can tap into and I also train it on the strategy behind passion projects and college admissions – so it’s a win-win for both myself and my students.”
Dyllen's TikTok video about her AI Passion Project Generator also went viral, adding over 700 new email subscribers to her mailing list. Her TikTok showed the importance of creating an independent project, and how her tool could be used to generate passion project ideas based on the student’s interests. In exchange for their email, students would also be able to access the tool for free. This generated much interest from potential students who wanted to learn more about the tool and how it could be used to make them stand out to elite colleges.
Since then, she has also built other bots and released a full suite of AI tools called EC (ExtraCurricular) Engine. These tools allow her students instantaneous access to personalized and tailored results, making similar resources more accessible and affordable to them.
What’s next for Next Gen Admit?
After Stanford, Dyllen plans to continue to work on Next Gen Admit as she is excited to see what the future holds. She hopes to continue to grow her existing audience of high school students who know that they want to get into the top colleges but they don’t know what steps to take. She also plans to eventually expand more opportunities to younger students so that they, too, can prepare for a successful college admissions process.
If you’re interested in seeing what will make you stand out to get into the college of your dreams, find out how you can create your own passion project and take that next step by visiting Dyllen's website.
