Chatting with AI is where most of us start, and for a lot of people it’s also where they stop. On 16 September, AI automation expert Shadan Behzadian showed a live audience the next step: an AI agent built in n8n that takes a single idea and turns it into a researched, written and delivered newsletter, with nobody touching it in between.
Why n8n and not just another connector tool
Shadan started by drawing a clear line between tools like Zapier and Make, which are built to connect apps to each other, and n8n, which lets you build and control a complete workflow that combines AI agents, logic, code and APIs. The practical differences came up again later: you can add your own code, download backups of your workflows, share them with your team, and self-host n8n for the cost of a small server instead of paying per execution, which matters once you’re running thousands of them.
The demo: from one idea to a newsletter in the inbox
The agent starts with a simple form. Shadan typed in the topic tennis, the audience women aged 30 to 40, and the tone “real, factual and romantic”, then hit submit.
From there, the workflow ran on its own. A planning agent used Tavily, a search tool built for bots that scans hundreds of sources in milliseconds, to research the topic live on the web. An editor agent then wrote the newsletter following strict instructions on tone, audience, citations and quotes. The finished piece landed in an inbox through Gmail, and the same workflow can also run on a timer or from a spreadsheet instead of a form.
Then Shadan shared the form link in the chat so attendees could try it themselves. Within minutes, the agent had produced newsletters on dementia and care, sustainability at IBM and Latin music, each one researched and written for the audience its sender described.
How an agent is built
The part that made it click for a lot of people was how Shadan described an agent: think of it as a virtual employee with a brain, memory and tools. The brain is the chat model (here, OpenAI), memory connects to a database, and tools are things like Tavily or Gmail. Every block in n8n works the same way, with an input, a process and an output.
When Alexandra asked how to write the system message, Shadan’s answer was to treat it like hiring someone: define the agent’s personality, responsibilities, context, examples and constraints, in plain language.
Where this goes next
A newsletter is only the starting point. Shadan showed how the same workflow grows by adding agents for fact-checking, tone review, design and publishing, plus an approval step by email, direct posting to LinkedIn or a backup in Notion. The same pattern works across roles:
- Sales: researching prospects, qualifying leads and drafting replies
- HR: screening CVs, writing up interview notes and supporting onboarding
- Customer support: sorting tickets, answering with your documentation and escalating when needed
Attendees also asked whether the output could be more visual, like one-pagers or slides, and the answer was yes: you add blocks to the flow to generate PDFs or designed formats instead of plain text.
From watching it to building it yourself
Daniela said it honestly during the session: the first time you open n8n, it can feel frustrating. That’s exactly why it helps to learn it step by step, with someone showing you how each block fits, until you own the system instead of watching someone else run theirs.
That’s what the AI Builder Membership is for. It gives you a year of unlimited access to our five self-paced courses, taught by female industry experts. AI Agents & Workflow Automation is the one behind this demo: you build four working no-code workflows in n8n, using the same tools you’ll see Shadan use here, n8n, OpenAI and Tavily. We recommend pairing it with AI Foundations & Prompting and AI for Productivity if you’re newer to automation, and all five are included. Every course comes with a verified certificate you can add to LinkedIn, plus lifetime access to our community of 30k+ women in tech.
More than 2,000 women have already built real tech skills with us online, and you can start today at your own pace.
Watch the full live demo
Leave your details here or above and we’ll take you straight to the full recording of Shadan’s demo, from the first form submission to the newsletter in the inbox.