Roster | AI-Powered Business Assistant Node.js Script

Roster is an AI staff member for a small business, and you host all of it

Most small businesses lose money in the same three places: calls nobody answers, leads nobody follows up, and customers nobody contacts again. Roster is a self-hosted platform that covers all three with an AI agent you configure, on a server you own, using API keys that belong to you.

Nothing is proxied through anyone else. There is no per-seat fee, no monthly platform charge, and no usage passing through a third party. You install it once and it is yours.

What it does

• Answers, in writing and out loud. An AI agent handles website chat, SMS, WhatsApp and phone calls. You set its persona, its knowledge, its boundaries, and whether it replies on its own or drafts for a human to approve.
• Finds new leads. Search Google Maps by niche and city and get back real local businesses, complete with phone, website, rating and review count, as leads ready to work.
• Texts back every missed call. Automatically, within seconds. For a business that misses calls, this single feature usually pays for the item.
• Brings customers back. Retention rules for win-back, review requests, birthdays and reactivation, running on a schedule across email, SMS and WhatsApp.
• Runs the pipeline. Leads, contacts, a drag-and-drop board with your own stages, and tasks assigned to people with due dates.
• Books and reminds. Appointments with real availability, automatic reminders, and optional two-way sync to Google Calendar or Outlook.
• Invoices and gets paid. Line items, taxes, recurring invoices, and a payment link through Stripe or Paystack that marks the invoice paid by itself.
• Manages reputation. Review requests after completed work, incoming reviews collected and answered, sentiment tracked over time.
• One inbox for all of it. Chat, SMS, WhatsApp and email in a single thread per person, whichever way they arrived.

One inbox, every channel

A website visitor, a text message, a WhatsApp thread and an email from the same person land in one conversation. The AI drafts or sends the reply depending on how you set each agent, and a human can take over at any point without losing the history.

Agents you configure, not a black box

Each agent has a role, a persona, a knowledge base and explicit boundaries. You pick the provider and the model, decide whether it replies on its own or drafts for approval, tell it what it must never say, and test it in a sandbox before it speaks to a single customer.

A pipeline that matches how you actually sell

Stages are yours to name, reorder, add and remove. Every card carries its conversation history and its next action, so nothing sits untouched because nobody knew whose turn it was.

Built to be resold

Turn on agency mode and one install serves many client businesses. Each workspace has its own name, its own logo, its own accent color and its own API keys, so a client sees only their own brand in the app and in every email that reaches their customers. There is a role hierarchy, per-workspace usage metering, and a Super Admin console over the top.

Rebranding takes about two minutes and no code: upload a logo, pick one color, change the name. Roster derives the hover shades and readable text colors for you.

Numbers you can act on

Where leads come from, what they convert at, what revenue is attributed to each channel, and how fast you respond. Every chart has a table view, so the data stays readable without relying on color.

What is included

• Complete source. Next.js 15, React, TypeScript, Prisma and PostgreSQL, with a background worker on Redis.
• A web installer that checks the server and creates your first account, so no files need editing to get started.
• Offline documentation: a single self-contained HTML manual with a sidebar covering quick start, installation, configuration, every integration, branding, production deployment, the API and troubleshooting, plus the same content as a PDF.
• An embeddable website chat widget, isolated in a shadow root so it cannot collide with the CSS of the site it sits on.
• English and Arabic, both complete, with right-to-left layout handled throughout.
• Demo data you can load to see every screen populated, then clear.

Requirements

Node.js 20 or newer, PostgreSQL 14 or newer, Redis 6 or newer, and a VPS or cloud server with shell access. Shared hosting limited to PHP cannot run it. Full details are in the documentation.

Third-party services and costs

Every external service is optional. Roster installs and runs with none of them, and each one names a built-in alternative in the documentation.

All third-party fees are billed to you directly by that provider, under your own account, at their own rates. None of them are included in the price of this item, and no usage is resold or proxied through the author. The services Roster can connect to are: Anthropic or OpenAI for the AI, Twilio for voice, SMS and WhatsApp, Google Maps Platform for lead gathering and reviews, Stripe or Paystack for invoice payments, any SMTP or HTTP email provider for outbound mail, Google or Microsoft for calendar sync, and Firebase Cloud Messaging for native mobile push. Browser push is built in and costs nothing.

Try it before you buy

The live demo has sample data loaded across every screen: leads, contacts, a populated pipeline, conversations, appointments, invoices, reviews and analytics.

• Demo: https://roster.foundrcode.com
• Administrator: admin@example.com / RosterDemo!
• Team member: staff@example.com / RosterDemo!

The demo runs with no AI or Google Maps keys connected, which is exactly how Roster ships: you bring your own keys and every request is billed to your own account, never resold through anyone. Adding a key takes about a minute in Settings, and the screenshots above show those features running. Click through anything you like on the demo. If you change something and want it back the way it was, the same sample data ships in the download and loads with one command.

Support

Support covers this item working as described: installation problems, defects, and questions about the documented features. Read the troubleshooting section of the documentation first, then get in touch through the item comments or the support tab with the three diagnostics it asks for.