Instant Answers playbook

Use this guide when your team spends time answering the same support questions again and again.

Instant Answers is a reactive AI support playbook. It responds when a customer asks a common support question and uses approved knowledge, policies, and connected context to answer or hand off when a person should take over.

It is not a journey route, a campaign, a product recommender, or a custom agent with your own intents. It is the support playbook for repeat questions that should be answered quickly and consistently.

What Instant Answers does

Instant Answers helps customers get immediate support for common questions.

It can:

Respond when a customer asks a support question in an enabled incoming channel.
Use uploaded documents, approved websites, FAQs, policies, or other knowledge sources when available.
Answer questions about shipping policies, payment methods, store information, product care, warranty basics, sizing guidance, and other repeat support topics.
Ask a clarifying question when the customer’s request is missing important details.
Hand off when the answer is not available, the customer is upset, or the request needs human judgment.
Work alongside Webchat, Inbox assignment, response rules, and other support playbooks.

Instant Answers works best when the answer is already written somewhere your team trusts.

When to use it

Use Instant Answers when:

Your team answers the same FAQs repeatedly.
Customers ask questions before or after purchase that do not require a custom decision.
You have current policies, help pages, PDFs, product notes, or internal support guidance that the agent can use.
You want faster first responses outside business hours or during busy periods.
You want the agent to answer simple questions and hand off exceptions to the right teammate or team.

Good topics include shipping policy, return-window explanations, payment methods, store hours, product-care instructions, warranty basics, size-guide explanations, and where to find account or order information.

When not to use it

Do not use Instant Answers as the owner for every conversation.

Use Order-Update Delight when the question is about a specific order, shipment, tracking number, delivery state, or “Where is my order?”

Use Smart Recommender when the customer wants product discovery, comparison, or recommendations.

Use Return & Exchange Helper when your account has that playbook available and the customer needs a returns or exchanges flow, not only a policy explanation.

Use Order Cancellation Assistant when your account has that playbook available and the customer needs help requesting a cancellation, not only a policy explanation.

Use a Custom Agent when you need custom intents, a narrow specialist agent, external actions, or a support mission that is too specific for the prebuilt playbook.

Use a journey route when the experience must follow visible steps, waits, questions, branches, and assignments.

What it needs before launch

Before enabling Instant Answers, confirm:

The support topics it should answer are clear.
The policies, FAQs, documents, or approved websites it should use are current.
Conflicting or outdated support content has been removed.
The incoming channels where customers ask these questions are connected and ready.
A teammate or team is configured for handoff.
Your team knows which questions the playbook should answer and which ones it should leave to a person.
Response rules and business hours match the level of service you want for support conversations.

For setup validation, use Verify your data and signals after setup.

What you can configure

Open Playbooks, click Explore playbooks, and choose Instant Answers.

The available cards can vary, but you may be able to review:

Knowledge or upload documents: FAQs, policies, product notes, guides, or other approved support content.
Incoming channels: where the playbook can answer customer questions.
Tone: the voice used in replies.
Escalation or assignment: who should take over when the playbook cannot resolve the request.
Web search or approved websites, when available: public pages the agent can use for the support mission.

Keep the setup focused. If the playbook needs too many exceptions, split the work: use a specialized support playbook, a custom agent, or an Inbox process for the risky cases.

Prepare knowledge

Knowledge quality is the biggest factor in answer quality.

Use sources your team already trusts:

Help center pages.
Shipping, returns, exchange, warranty, and privacy policies.
Store hours, pickup instructions, and contact information.
Product-care notes, size guides, and material guidance.
Internal support instructions that are stable enough for customers.

Before uploading or approving sources, remove:

Expired promotions or old prices.
Draft policy language.
Contradictory return or warranty rules.
Internal notes that should not be shared with customers.
Unsupported claims about delivery times, refunds, or approvals.

If the source changes, update the knowledge before expecting the playbook to answer correctly.

Define handoff boundaries

Instant Answers should hand off when a customer needs a person, not a general answer.

Common handoff cases include:

The customer asks for a person.
The customer is angry, frustrated, or dissatisfied.
The customer reports a defective, damaged, wrong, or missing product.
The request needs approval, exception handling, refund, cancellation, exchange, account change, payment detail, or human sales action.
The answer is not in the approved knowledge.
The customer asks about a specific order and Order-Update Delight should handle it instead.
No active playbook can resolve the request safely.

For handoff behavior, use AI handoff to Inbox.

Connect it to Webchat and Inbox

Instant Answers can work well with Webchat Widget.

Webchat gives visitors a place to ask from the site. Instant Answers can answer supported questions after the conversation starts. The Inbox gives your team a place to handle exceptions, handoffs, and follow-up replies.

Before launch, confirm:

Webchat or the incoming channel is enabled.
The opening message does not promise support the playbook cannot provide.
The handoff owner is the right teammate or team.
Response rules reflect how quickly a person should reply after a handoff.

How to test it

Test with realistic support messages before enabling the playbook broadly.

Use test customer profiles and channels that match your launch plan, then try:

A common FAQ with a clear answer in the approved knowledge.
The same question written with typos, short wording, or casual language.
A question that needs a clarifying follow-up.
A question that is not covered by the uploaded documents or approved pages.
A question where two documents could conflict.
A specific order-status question that should go to Order-Update Delight or hand off.
A product recommendation question that should go to Smart Recommender or hand off.
A return, exchange, refund, cancellation, damaged-item, or complaint message that should hand off or route elsewhere.
A message from each incoming channel you plan to use.

Review whether the answer is grounded, concise, correct for the channel, and clear about next steps.

What to review after launch

During the first days, review:

Which customer messages activated the playbook.
Which questions were answered successfully.
Which questions should have gone to another playbook.
Whether answers cited or followed the right source.
Whether customers asked follow-up questions because the answer was unclear.
Whether handoffs went to the right teammate or team.
Repeated unanswered questions that suggest missing knowledge.
Response speed, resolution rate, handoff rate, customer replies, failed messages, and opt-outs when relevant.

Tune one thing at a time: knowledge, channel selection, tone, handoff target, or the support topics you expect the playbook to own.

If you want to measure satisfaction after resolved support conversations, use CSAT Pulse alongside the support playbook.