Getting started with AI Assist

The instructions below are for desktops and laptops only.

tawk.to’s AI Assist offers a suite of AI-powered tools that give you tailored 24/7 support via:

  • AI agents
    These customizable AI agents can engage in customer conversations, providing instant assistance across various channels (e.g., chats, tickets, Facebook, etc.).

  • Smart replies
    AI Assist can provide suggested replies in seconds, helping your team address customer queries quickly and accurately.

  • AI commands
    Simple AI-powered commands can help you automate repetitive tasks, brainstorm ideas, and streamline workflows.


In this guide, we’ll walk you through the steps to getting started with AI Assist and training it to deliver exceptional customer service.

Activating AI Assist

Follow these steps to activate AI Assist:


1. Log in to tawk.to.


2. On your dashboard, select the property for which you want to activate AI Assist. Hover over the property name to ensure you’ve selected the correct one.

3. Click Add-ons on the top menu.

4. Click Get Started under AI Assist.

5. Click Activate Now.

6. Follow the instructions by the setup wizard. Enter your website address and click Next. AI Assist will crawl your website to learn about your business.

If AI Assist has difficulty crawling your website, check out this guide:
Why AI Assist’s web crawler might not be able to crawl some sites

You can also select a business category and AI Assist will suggest relevant frequently asked questions. You can edit or add FAQs, or click Next to continue.

7. Customize your AI agent’s persona by entering the Alias and Position Title, and changing the profile image. These will be visible to your visitors in chats. You can also set the agent’s language or select Multilingual Support.

You can also enter a Short Description with key details to help AI Assist understand your business better.

8. Select an AI Assist plan that fits your business needs. Hobby is free, while Growth, Business, and Enterprise are paid and can be billed annually or monthly.

9. Click Activate Now on the confirmation screen.

10. Click Close.

11. Once AI Assist is activated, you’ll be brought to the main AI Assist page.

Your AI Assist plan includes a monthly message allocation. Message Usage (on the right of the page) shows a real-time count of messages AI Assist sends in chats, tickets, Smart Replies, and AI Commands.
Once you reach your monthly limit, AI Assist will pause until the next billing cycle. You can upgrade your plan or purchase additional credits. To learn more, check out this guide: How to add message credits (overages) to your AI Assist plan

12. Select your AI agent to explore Settings, Data Source, and Integration/API.

Or, click the plus (+) icon to add more AI agents. To learn more about adding AI agents, check out this guide: Deploying multiple AI Agents across support channels
Settings

You can customize your AI agent with the following settings:

Channels

Assign your AI agent to specific support channels:


  • Live Chat: Enable your AI agent to handle real-time customer inquiries.

  • Ticketing: Allow your AI agent to process and respond to support tickets.

  • Knowledge Base: Utilize your AI agent to enhance your knowledge base by generating or improving articles.


Note: You can assign an AI agent to either Live Chat or Ticketing, but not both. To use AI Assist for multiple channels, create and assign separate AI agents for each. To learn more about adding AI agents, check out this guide: Deploying multiple AI Agents across support channels

Persona

Modify your agent's Alias, Position Title, and profile image. These will appear in chats and tickets as your AI agent responds to your customers.

Short description

Provide a brief description to help AI Assist understand your business better.

Base Prompt

Give AI Assist specific instructions to help it better understand how to respond to customers. To help you get started, we’ve provided a generic base prompt.

Your base prompt can include instructions on:

  • How to greet customers

  • What to say and not to say

  • What tone of voice to use

  • What information to include in your responses

  • What to do if AI Assist doesn't know the answer to a question


Note: Modifying the base prompt should be done cautiously, as it can negatively impact Apollo's response quality.


You can always go back to the default prompt by clicking Use default.


To learn more about modifying the Base Prompt, check out these guides:

Modifying the Base Prompt

Using Base Prompt to restrict AI Assist responses

Using Base Prompt instructions for escalation

Behaviour and Escalation

Note: These settings are for paid plans only.

Schedule AI agent's availability - Set specific timeframes when your AI agent is active and available to respond to customer inquiries.


Delay live chat answering - Configure a delay before the AI agent responds to incoming live chat messages. This can help simulate a more human-like response time.


Revise AI agent's answers - Enable AI Assist to refine and improve its responses based on the ongoing conversation context. This ensures more accurate and relevant answers.


Multilingual support - Equip your AI agent with the ability to understand and respond to customer inquiries in multiple languages.

Escalation - Set shortcuts with specific actions or messages that your AI agent should use when:

  • A visitor requests to speak with a human agent.

  • The AI agent cannot find a suitable response within your knowledge base or previous conversations.


To learn more, check out this guide: How to train Apollo AI to transfer chats to human agents

Apollo, Smart Reply, and AI Commands

Enable/disable your AI agent for chat, Smart Replies, and AI Commands.

Apollo AI bot responds to your customers’ queries in live chat.


Smart Reply generates suggested responses for chats and tickets in seconds.


AI Commands gives you a list of simple commands for AI Assist to help you brainstorm ideas, adjust the tone of your responses, and more.


To learn more, check out these guides:

Using Smart Reply

Using AI Commands

Data sources

AI Assist relies on your data sources to deliver accurate and helpful responses to customers’ inquiries. You can add data to help AI Assist learn about your business, products, and services.


The quality of the data you provide is crucial; the better it is, the more accurately AI Assist will respond on your behalf. To learn more about AI Assist’s data sources, check out this guide: Understanding AI Assist’s Data Sources

Integration/API

You can create API integrations allowing AI Assist to get data from third-party platforms to respond to customers’ queries. To learn more about API integrations, check out these guides:

How to set up a custom API integration with AI Assist

How to integrate Apollo AI with WooCommerce

How to integrate AI Assist with Shopify

Test and preview

Use the widget preview on the right of the page to test and refine AI Assist's responses.

Additional information

To ensure AI Assist’s optimal performance, consider the following:


  • Data quality matters
    The quality of the data you provide to AI Assist directly impacts the quality of its responses. Ensure your data is accurate, relevant, and up-to-date.

  • Continuous monitoring
    Regularly review and refine AI Assist's responses to maintain high standards and address any issues that may arise.

  • Security and privacy
    Prioritize data security and privacy when using AI Assist. Implement robust measures to protect sensitive customer information.

  • Start small and focused
    Begin by implementing AI Assist in a specific area of your support operations, such as handling common FAQs or initial customer inquiries.


  • Train your team
    Ensure your team is familiar with AI Assist's capabilities and how to effectively utilize its features.


Check out these guides to fine-tune AI Assist’s responses and fix possible issues:

How to fix incorrect responses delivered by AI Assist

How to whitelist tawk.to's AI Assist crawler bot


Explore more ways to take advantage of AI Assist with these guides:

Using Suggested Message and AI Assist to create scripted chat sequences

How to get AI Assist to create leads via Google Forms

How to get AI Assist to query a Google Sheet


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