Pam Noreault is a Principal Information Architect at Ellucian. She has over 25 years of experience in technical communications, education, and management. She specializes in content strategy, customer engagement, content conversions, and social networking strategies. Pam has an undergraduate degree in education from The Ohio State University and a master’s degree in English and Professional Writing from Wright State University. When she is not tinkering with new gadgets or taking care of her dogs, she is climbing mountains in Maine and New Hampshire.

Behind the Bot: Calculating the Cost of LLM-Powered Chat for Technical Content

This interactive session centers around the challenge of justifying the cost of deploying an AI-powered chatbot using large language models (LLMs). Finance demanded it. The Information Security team and the AI Counsel requested it. The project was dead on arrival without it.
After searching across Ellucian and reaching out to industry peers for answers on how to calculate LLM costs, Pam found no consistent approach. So, she built one.
Come to this session to hear the real-world story of how analytics, AI, and a lot of persistence led to the creation of a practical LLM cost calculator.

This session includes a breakdown of the cost model, a live demo of the calculator, and lessons learned from navigating cross-functional demands. Walk away with a framework you can adapt for your own chatbot initiatives—and the confidence to answer the question: “How much is this going to cost us?”