Your First Assistant

This guide walks you through building a working AI assistant from scratch. By the end, you will have an assistant that answers customer questions using your business information, deployed on your website or a messaging channel, and visible in your Inbox.

We will use Bean & Brew Coffee as our example throughout this guide, but follow along with your own business information for the best results.

Step 1: Create Your Assistant

From your dashboard, click Assistants in the sidebar, then click Create Assistant.

You will see a dialog asking for:

Name: The name customers will see. Enter something that represents your business (e.g., “Bean & Brew Assistant”). If you leave it empty and click a template card, a default name fills it in
Assistant Template: Customer Service is preselected. Pick Custom for now. Templates give you a head start for common use cases, but starting from scratch helps you understand how everything works

Prefer to be guided? Click Set up step by step at the bottom of the dialog to open the setup wizard instead. See The setup wizard below.

Click Create Assistant. A Connect Bean & Brew Assistant where people already message you step appears next, listing the Web Widget and the channels you have not connected yet. Click Finish later: we will go live in Step 5. You land on the assistant page with several tabs: Settings, Knowledge, Actions, and Channels. The Web Widget tab shows up once you switch the widget on.

Assistant configuration page after creation

The setup wizard

Your first workspace opens on the setup wizard right after you create it. In an existing workspace, click Set up step by step in the Create Assistant dialog. The wizard has five steps. Skip setup on the first step creates the assistant from the selected template and takes you straight to its page:

Start: Pick Describe it and type your website, a social page, or what you want in plain words (e.g., “An assistant for beanandbrew.com”). Invent reads the site or searches the web, drafts the name, avatar, template, actions, and instructions, and adds that page to your Knowledge. Or pick From a template and choose one from the gallery
Customize: Review the name, avatar, and instructions. If the draft is not right, click Pick a template to start from a template instead
Knowledge: Add files, text, or a website. You can continue without adding anything
Go live: Connect a channel, or set up the Web Widget. Click Finish later to skip this for now
Test: Chat with your assistant in the web chat, or on a channel you just connected

Click Complete. A Done screen suggests what to do next: connect a channel if you have not yet, add knowledge, connect tools, open your Inbox, and invite your team.

Step 2: Write Your Instructions

Instructions define your assistant’s personality, behavior, and rules. This is the most important configuration you will set. Click on the Settings tab and find the Instructions field. Write instructions that cover:

Who the assistant is (identity and role)
How it should behave (tone and personality)
What rules it should follow (boundaries and guidelines)

Here is an example for our coffee shop:

You are the friendly assistant for Bean & Brew Coffee.
Your purpose is to answer customer questions about our menu,
hours, location, and ordering.

## Your Personality
- Warm and casual, like a favorite barista
- Enthusiastic about coffee without being over the top
- Helpful and concise. Respect people's time

## Response Rules
- Keep answers to 1-3 sentences when possible
- If you do not know the answer, say so honestly. Never make
  things up
- For complaints or special requests, offer to connect with
  our team

## Knowledge Base Rules
- For menu items and pricing, always check the knowledge base
- Never guess prices or ingredients

Notice that we are defining behavior, not listing our menu or prices. Factual information goes in Knowledge (next step), where the assistant can search through it efficiently.

Keep instructions focused on how the assistant should act. Move factual details like menus, pricing, and policies to Knowledge. This keeps costs lower and makes both easier to update. See Instructions vs Knowledge for a detailed breakdown.

Configure Capabilities

The Settings tab is a stack of cards. Right below Instructions, make sure the switch in each of these card headers is on:

Auto Follow-ups: Re-engages idle conversations instead of letting them go cold. It uses AI credits each time it decides to follow up
AI Routing: Lets the assistant hand a conversation to one of your members when needed

Then scroll past Contact Properties to the Capabilities section and enable:

Memories Recommended: Your assistant will remember customer names and preferences across conversations

The Capabilities section holds more toggles, including AI Replies, Auto-resolve, Auto CSAT, and Spam Protection. Leave the defaults for now and revisit them as your needs grow. These features work automatically once enabled. No extra configuration needed.

Step 3: Add Knowledge

Click the Knowledge tab. This is where you give your assistant the actual information it needs to answer questions.

Under the Knowledge access row, a strip lets you drop files, Add text, or Add website. The buttons open the Add Knowledge dialog, which has three tabs: File, Text, and Website.

Option A: Add Text

The fastest way to start. Click Add text. Enter a Title (e.g., “Menu and Info”) and paste your business information in the Content field:

# Bean & Brew Coffee

## Menu
- Espresso: $3.50
- Americano: $4.00
- Latte: $5.00 (add $0.75 for oat, almond, or soy milk)
- Cappuccino: $5.00
- Cold Brew: $4.50
- Drip Coffee: $2.50
- Matcha Latte: $5.50
- Chai Latte: $5.00

## Food
- Croissant: $3.50
- Avocado Toast: $8.00
- Banana Bread: $4.00
- Bagel with Cream Cheese: $4.50

## Hours
- Monday to Friday: 6:30 AM - 7:00 PM
- Saturday: 7:00 AM - 8:00 PM
- Sunday: 8:00 AM - 5:00 PM

## Location
456 Main Street, Downtown
Free street parking available on weekends
Closest transit: Central Station (5 min walk)

## Policies
- Free Wi-Fi, no time limit
- Dogs welcome on the patio
- We accept all major credit cards and Apple/Google Pay
- Catering available for groups of 10+. Email hello@beanandbrew.com
- Allergen info available for all menu items on request

Click Add Content. The status will show “Processing” and then “Ready”. Once processed, your knowledge item appears in the list. Your assistant can now use this information to answer questions.

Option B: Crawl Your Website

If your business already has a website, click Add website, paste your URL or sitemap URL, and select a mode: Single Page to index one page, or Crawl Pages to follow links and index multiple pages. Click Add Website. This works well for businesses with existing help centers, product pages, or FAQ sections.

You can use both methods. Many businesses crawl their website for broad coverage, then add text knowledge for specific details like internal policies or promotional offers that are not on the site.

Step 4: Test in the Playground

Before deploying anywhere, test your assistant. On the right side of the assistant page, you will see the Test Assistant panel. Click Create Conversation and start chatting.

Try questions your real customers would ask:

“What’s on the menu?”
“Are you open on Sundays?”
“Do you have oat milk?”
“Where are you located?”
“Can I bring my dog?”

What to look for:

Does the assistant use the right tone from your Instructions?
Does it pull accurate information from your Knowledge?
Does it handle questions it cannot answer gracefully?
Are responses concise and helpful?

If something feels off, go back and adjust your Instructions or Knowledge, then test again. This cycle of test, refine, test is how you build a great assistant.

The Playground shows a token breakdown for each message, including cost. Use this to understand how much each conversation costs and optimize your Instructions length if needed. Learn more about pricing

Step 5: Deploy Your Assistant

Your assistant is tested and working. Time to put it in front of real customers. You have two main paths. The fastest way to go live. Open the Channels tab on your assistant page and turn on Web Widget. The Web Widget tab shows up: open it and select the Embed Script tab (the default). You have two ways to add it:

Copy the HTML snippet and paste it into your website before the closing </body> tag
Click “Copy prompt for AI agent” and paste it into your AI coding tool (Cursor, Claude Code, etc.). It will add the widget to your project for you

Either way, a floating chat bubble appears on your site and customers can click it to start a conversation.

Option B: Connect a Messaging Channel

Click the Channels tab to connect your assistant to platforms where your customers already are:

WhatsApp Business: Customers message your business number and the assistant responds instantly
Instagram: Handle DMs automatically
Messenger: Connect your Facebook page
Telegram: Create a bot and link it

Click Connect next to the channel you want, follow the authentication steps, and enable it. Your assistant is now live on that channel.

Start with one channel. Get it working well, then expand to more. Your assistant shares the same Instructions, Knowledge, and Memory across all channels, so adding a new channel later is quick.

Step 6: Check the Inbox

Once your assistant is live, try sending it a message. In this example, we are using the web widget. If you connected a channel like WhatsApp or Instagram instead, try sending a message from there:

Now click Inbox in the sidebar. This is your central hub for all customer interactions. Every conversation from every channel appears here with the full chat history:

Inbox showing the web widget conversation

You will see:

Every conversation across all channels in one list
Channel indicators showing where each message came from (WhatsApp, Instagram, web widget, etc.)
Conversation details with the full chat history when you click on any conversation
Contact panel on the right showing customer information, memories, and conversation history

What to monitor

Unresolved conversations: Messages the assistant may need help with
Waiting for Human: Conversations the assistant transferred to your team
CSAT scores: If Auto CSAT is enabled, satisfaction ratings appear alongside resolved conversations

The Inbox gives you full visibility into how your assistant is performing and where it might need improvement.

What You Have Built

In just a few minutes, you have:

Component	What it does
Instructions	Defines your assistant’s personality and rules
Knowledge	Gives your assistant accurate business information
Playground	Lets you test and refine before going live
Channel / Widget	Puts your assistant where customers can reach it
Inbox	Shows you every conversation in one place
Memory	Remembers customers across all conversations

This is the foundation. Every assistant you build in Invent starts with these same building blocks.

Next Steps

Now that you have the fundamentals, explore the features that make your assistant truly powerful:

Actions

The next most powerful step. Give your assistant the ability to book appointments, send emails, process payments, and more. Actions transform your assistant from a chatbot into an agent that actually gets things done

Instructions vs Knowledge

Learn exactly what information goes in Instructions vs Knowledge, and why getting it right matters for performance and cost

Writing Effective Instructions

Go deeper on crafting instructions with templates, real examples, and the 11 building blocks of great instructions

Build a Booking Assistant

Ready for a full build? Walk through a complete yoga studio assistant with Google Sheets, Stripe, Calendar, Gmail, and WhatsApp

Getting Started

Assistants

Features

Broadcasts

Workspace Management

Your First Assistant