How to brief an AI sales agent in ten minutes

Ten minutes, a quiet room and your browser. The interview is spoken, in English or Portuguese, and it writes up what you said for you to correct. Four things in your head before you press start make the difference between a playbook you approve on the first read and one you rewrite.

It asks what you sell, to whom, and what you would say about yourselves in one breath. A good answer is specific and sounds like you. A weak answer is a category.

Good: 'We clean offices and medical practices on the North Shore, same vetted cleaners every visit, and we're the ones they ring when the last cleaner kept missing days.' Weak: 'We do commercial cleaning.'

Who makes the decision, what prompts them to look around, and what they say about you afterwards. The agent uses this to recognise a decision maker on the phone and to ask the question that finds out whether anything is changing.

Good: 'The practice manager decides. They look around when the cleaner keeps missing visits or when the contract is up for renewal, usually March or September.' That one sentence becomes two qualifying questions.

Not a sale. The agent books a next step, so define it narrowly: a twenty-minute site visit with the owner, Tuesday or Thursday afternoons. A narrow step is easy to offer, easy to accept, and easy to measure.

If you say 'a sale' or 'whatever they want', the playbook has nothing to book, and the agent will be vague where it should be precise.

Your opener, the proof points you always mention, and the objections you hear every week with your answers to each. This is the part owners enjoy, because it is the conversation they have had a hundred times.

Say the objection and then your answer, in your words. 'They say they've already got a cleaner. I say most of our clients did, and ask when the contract's up.' The agent will use your answer, not a generic one.

Two lists. The never-say list is the things that must not come out of the agent's mouth in your name: cheapest, a price before a visit, a competitor's name, a promise about results. The handoff rule is the moment it stops and you take over: when a lead asks for a person, wants a price, raises something outside the playbook, or hits a condition you name.

Both lists are short and both are yours. The agent cannot cross the first and cannot ignore the second, whatever the lead says.

It reads back what it understood, you correct anything wrong, and it writes your profile. From the profile it drafts the playbook: the opener, the qualifying questions in order, the objection answers, the never-say list and the handoff rule. Read it line by line. Edit any line. Nothing is dialled until you approve the version.

A spreadsheet with the business, a contact name, a phone number, an optional email and a note is all it needs, or let the agent find leads for your market and check them before a call. What makes a list bad is not its size.

Read the first five transcripts. Where an answer sounded wrong, change it. Where a new objection came up, add your answer. Where something was said that you would not say, add it to the never-say list. The agent gets better because the playbook does, and every change takes effect on the next call.