Setup guides
Questions and flows
What the assistant asks, in your words: question cards, answer types, what it says before moving on, skip rules and not-a-fit rules.
The Questions tab holds what the assistant asks. Each question is a card: the words the assistant says, a short name your rules and reports use, and what kind of answer to expect.
Callers can answer in any order, and can answer two things at once. The assistant ticks off what it has heard and only asks for what is still missing. It never re-asks something the caller or the CRM has already answered.
One question at a time#
Set up the line of questioning
Field What to put Name For your team, like "New inquiry". Goal What you want to understand by the end of it. Use this when Describe the caller this fits. Used only when you have more than one line of questioning. Questions before giving something useful The assistant answers or shares something helpful before asking more than this many questions. Two works well. Tip
That last setting is the difference between a conversation and an interrogation. Leave it low.
Add a question
Press Add a question and fill in two fields.
Field What to put The agent asks The question in the assistant's own words, one question at a time. Short name How rules and reports refer to the answer, for example "Timeline". Answer type What kind of answer to expect. Choose the answer type
Type What it means Words Any answer in the caller's own words. A choice One of a few answers you list. Best for booking rules. An answer like "not memory care", or one that names two choices, is asked again rather than guessed. Yes or no A simple yes or no, however the caller says it: "yeah, she does", "nope", "not really". "Maybe" or "I'm not sure" is asked again. A number Like how many people, or a budget. A date Like a move-in or start date. Phone number Read back digit by digit. Email address Spelled back to the caller. Tip
If a booking rule needs to act on an answer, make it A choice. Free text is fine for colour, but rules match reliably on choices.
Say how callers word each choice
Nobody rings up and says "a parent". They say "my mum", "my dad", "my mother". Next to each choice, Callers also say takes those words, separated by commas, and the assistant hears them as that choice: when it asks the question, and when the caller says it long before the question comes up. Say "it's for my mother" in the first sentence and the assistant checks it back with you later ("and this is for your mother, yes?") instead of asking who the move is for.
Choice Callers also say A parent mom, mum, mother, dad, father Memory care dementia, alzheimer, memory loss, wandering Right away asap, straight away, this week Tip
Keep each one distinctive, and use the longer phrase where a short one would be wrong. "mother in law" on Another relative wins over "mother" on A parent, because the longer match wins. An everyday word like "me" or "one" will take answers nobody gave.
Mark the ones you must have
Required before booking means the assistant will not move on to booking without it. At least one question must be required, and the tab shows an error until one is.
Sensitive: health or care details hides the answer behind a Show button on the call record and keeps it out of notifications. Showing it is written to the audit log. Use it for anything about a person's health or care needs.
Always confirm the answer is for answers that would take the call the wrong way if they were misheard. The assistant never takes one on trust: it reads them back together as its notes ("okay, just so I have my notes right: memory care, for your mom, within the month. Does that all sound right?") and nothing acts on them until the caller says yes. Leave it off for everything else, so callers are not asked to repeat themselves.
Reorder
Drag the handle on a card, or use the up and down arrows. Keyboard users can pick a card up with Space, move it with the arrow keys and drop it with Space.
Delete a question
Press the bin on its card. If anything reads the answer (another question's Only ask this if, a talking point, a skip or not-a-fit rule, a booking rule, or a tool), the dialog lists each one first. The rules are not changed for you: after deleting, change or remove each one, or the playbook cannot be published.
Choices from your prices#
A Care type question works best when it offers only what the community the caller rang actually has. On a question whose answer type is A choice, Choices from says where its choices come from:
| Choice | The question offers |
|---|---|
| Written here (the default) | The choices you type on the card. |
| The care types each community offers | The care types switched on in that community's published prices. |
| Apartment options each community offers | The options that community prices in that option set. One line per set. |
Taken from your prices, each choice is named as your care types and options name it, and the assistant hears the words listed under Other words callers use. Lakeview, which offers no memory care, never offers it as a choice.
The answer is recorded as that care type or option, so:
- booking rules can act on it;
- when the caller later asks what something costs, the assistant already knows which care type or apartment they mean and does not ask again.
Note
At a community with no published prices, or one that offers nothing in that set, the question has no choices, so the assistant skips it. It does not hold up booking, even when it is marked Required before booking.
When the caller answers before you ask#
Callers open with half the answers: "I'm calling about memory care for my mother, we're hoping to move in the next month." The assistant keeps all of it, and asks about none of it again.
What a caller offers before being asked is held as mentioned, not confirmed until it is confirmed, the way a person on the phone would confirm it:
- Said plainly ("memory care for my mom"): the assistant says it back in passing as part of the conversation ("memory care for your mom, okay. Where is she living now?"). If the caller carries on without correcting it, it is confirmed. Nobody is asked "is that right?" about something they just said in so many words.
- Read between the lines ("she keeps getting lost"): the assistant checks it in its own words when its question would have come up ("it sounds like memory care might be the fit, is that fair?"), or together with others in one short sentence.
- Questions marked Always confirm the answer: read back as notes, and they count only with a yes.
A clear answer to a question the assistant asked is an answer straight away, however the question was worded. A caller who says the same thing three times is never asked a fourth: the third time confirms it (except on a question marked Always confirm the answer).
Until it is confirmed, it is not an answer:
- no rule reads it, so a mishearing cannot send a caller down another line of questioning or rule them out;
- Required before booking is not satisfied by it;
- it is not counted as an answer in your reports;
- the CRM record is not changed on it.
A caller who corrects the assistant ("no, assisted living", "actually, it's my mother in law") has the corrected answer, straight away, and nothing they pushed back on is confirmed by carrying on. The same goes for an answer they give and later take back ("sorry, I'm so confused, it was for my aunt"): the answer changes, and any rule that reads it is checked again.
An answer to an optional question that nothing on the call acts on is not checked at all: said plainly, it is simply the answer; read between the lines, it is kept as mentioned. One who never gets to it is not lost either: the call record keeps what was mentioned, labelled, and the CRM activity says it was mentioned and not confirmed.
Before moving on#
Sometimes the assistant should say something rather than ask: a line you want every caller to hear before booking, or a point that ties what they told you to what you offer. Before moving on, under the question list, holds these talking points. Once the required answers are in, the assistant says them, in order, in the same reply, just before it offers the tour.
Each talking point is one of two kinds:
| Kind | You write | The assistant |
|---|---|---|
| Say this | The exact words. | Says them word for word. |
| Talk about | The topic and what you want it to get across. | Puts it in its own words, in two or three sentences. |
Talking points are for things that are not price. A point that states a price or an offer cannot be published: prices come from your price book, and an offer belongs in a special, which is dated and approved. Move to a draft special, under such a point, turns it into a draft special for every community and takes the point off. These are not the same as a community's Local highlights, which are on its profile.
Both can use details like the community name: press Insert detail, or type {. A Talk about
point can also use two more kinds of detail, because the assistant rewords them for the caller:
- Their answers: the caller's answer to any question on this line, for example "Connect [Care type] for [Who it's for] to how our team helps day to day." A choice is filled in by its label, "Assisted living", not how it is stored.
- Lookup results: a value from a tool that runs once all required answers are in and that the agent may say, for example "Mention that [Open floor plans] are available." The assistant waits for that tool (up to its usual 3 seconds) before it replies.
A Say this point cannot use answers or lookup results. Said word for word, a raw answer or a value from another system rarely sounds right; use Talk about for those.
Only say this sometimes adds a condition, built like a skip rule, for example only when the care type is memory care.
What happens on a call:
- Each point is said once. A caller who is sent to another line of questioning, or who is not a fit, does not hear this line's points.
- A point whose answer the caller never gave, or whose lookup failed or was too slow, is left out rather than said with a gap. The call's path says which detail was missing.
- If the assistant rewords a Say this point, the call debugger says so. It does not count against the call.
Tip
Keep them short. The checklist warns when a Say this point takes more than about 20 seconds to say, or a line's points add up to more than about 40 seconds before the offer.
Sending some callers a different way#
Two optional sections sit under the question list.
Both kinds of rule are checked after every answer, and a rule waits for the answers it reads: "Care type is none of assisted living, memory care" does nothing until the caller has said a care type. Words are compared without regard to capital letters or extra spaces.
If the answer is X, skip to Y#
Send some callers down a different line of questioning. Answers they have already given are kept.
This only helps once you have more than one line of questioning. Add another with the + beside the tabs at the top, then set Start every call with to say which one opens a call. The assistant switches to another when the caller's stated reason fits it better.
Not a fit#
When an answer means the caller is not a fit, the assistant says so honestly and offers an alternative rather than booking them anyway.
| What to do | The assistant will |
|---|---|
| offer to send information | Offer to email information and capture an address. |
| suggest a better-fitting partner | Point the caller elsewhere. |
| end the call politely | Wrap up warmly without a booking. |
What the agent says (optional) is your wording. Leave it empty for a standard, polite line.
Warning
Be careful with rules that turn callers away. Housing and consumer protection laws apply to senior living sales. Have your counsel review any not-a-fit rule before you publish it.
Read it back#
At the bottom of the tab, Preview: a sample conversation writes out a whole call using your own greeting, your own questions and plausible answers.
What good looks like#
- Every question reads like something a colleague would say out loud.
- At least one question is marked required, and the header says so.
- Anything a booking rule depends on is A choice, not free text.
- Health and care answers are marked Sensitive.
- The sample conversation does not stack two questions into one turn.
Note
If something goes wrong. Mark at least one question as required before booking blocks publishing. So does a choice question with fewer than two options, two questions sharing the same short name, a condition, rule, tool or talking point that still reads a question you deleted, and a Talk about point using a lookup result that is not there when the line is done (the tool is off, does not run once all required answers are in, or keeps that value for rules only). Each message in the Ready to publish? checklist (open it from the item count in the toolbar) links to the field that needs fixing.
How the answers are used#
| Where | What happens |
|---|---|
| On the call | The assistant collects them, reflecting each one back briefly. |
| In talking points | A Talk about point can work them in, in the assistant's own words. |
| In booking rules | Every answer becomes a detail you can build a rule on, once the caller has confirmed it. |
| In the CRM | Each answer can be mapped to a CRM field on the CRM & calendar tab. Only confirmed answers go. |
| On the call record | Shown under What the caller told us, with sensitive answers hidden and unconfirmed ones labelled. |
| In the CRM activity | Listed in the call summary written to the prospect, with anything unconfirmed said as such. |
Next: Booking rules, which act on these answers.