™Hours, prices, availability, policies, "where's my order?" Every business has a set of questions it answers dozens of times a week, by phone, email and message.
What it looks like
- Questions about opening hours, pricing ranges, service areas and policies
- Order, delivery or job status questions
- The same first reply written to every new inquiry
- Team members asking each other where to find things
An example
A small online shop selling handmade goods gets the same handful of questions every day: shipping times, returns, sizing and whether an item will be restocked. The owner answers each one personally, which takes an hour or more a day.
What AI can do
AI is well suited to this, as long as it answers from your own information:
- A chat assistant on your website that answers common questions from your policies and product details
- Suggested replies in your inbox, drafted from your FAQ, ready for a person to send
- An internal assistant your team can ask, so they stop interrupting the one person who knows
- Automatic status updates, so customers don't have to ask
A simple first step
List the ten questions you're asked most often. Write the answer to each in plain language. That document is useful on its own, as an FAQ page or a cheat sheet for your team, and it's exactly what any AI assistant would need.
What to watch for
- Answers must come from your information, not the AI's guesses. Lesson 4 of What is AI? explains why.
- Make it easy to reach a person. Some questions, especially complaints, need one.
- Keep the information current. Update it whenever prices or policies change.