A talking website for a one-person business

Hosted by Mr. NetShow.

If you run a business on your own, you already have two jobs. You do the work people pay you for. And you answer everyone who wants to ask about it.

The second job never stops. A question arrives while you are with a customer, on a ladder or driving. You answer it later, or you do not answer it at all. Either way, the person who asked has moved on.

This post is about handing the first conversation on your website to a NetShow agent. What it handles on its own, what it hands back to you, and how you stay the one who decides.

The receptionist you do not have

A bigger business puts someone at the front desk. That person greets visitors, answers the common questions and passes the rest along. A one-person business usually has nobody there. The website is the front desk, and it sits in silence.

A NetShow agent can take that seat on your own website. It greets the people who visit, with its face and its voice, and it can speak first. When your agent is set to speak first, a panel docks at the bottom right with its face. The greeting appears as a caption straight away.

The agent editor even asks for the job in plain words. Its Role field wants the job in a few words, and our guide notes that "Front desk for a dental practice" is more useful than "Assistant". Write the job you would give a receptionist.

What it handles on its own

Most questions a small business gets are the same ten questions. Opening hours. Prices you already publish. Which areas you cover. How returns work. What to bring to a first visit.

Those answers go into the agent's Knowledge Text, in the Knowledge tab of the agent editor. Our guide lists what to paste there: the text of your services page, your opening hours, your returns policy, and a pasted FAQ with the question on one line and the answer under it.

Once that text is saved, your agent answers from it. To see what it knows, come back to the Knowledge tab. The box shows exactly what you saved, nothing more and nothing less.

The visitor chooses how to ask. They can talk, once they tap and the browser asks their permission for the microphone. Or they can type: the panel's Menu holds Chat for typing instead.

What it hands back to you

Here is the part a one-person business cares about most. You do not want an agent that improvises on the questions only you can answer.

You set that line in the Soul MD box under Personality. Our guide calls it the natural place to write what the agent must never do. It gives three examples: never promise a delivery date, never give medical advice, always hand a complaint to a person.

Write your own version. Never quote a price for a custom job. Never book a date without me. Always hand a complaint to me. Those lines are how the agent knows where its job ends and yours begins.

Some work goes further than a conversation. When an agent wants to do something you asked to be consulted on, it stops. It parks that one action in the Approval Queue until you decide. You press Approve, Later or Reject.

You stay the voice of the business

The agent speaks for you, so it should sound like you.

You write its first line under Welcome Message. A good first line is short, says who is talking and asks one easy question. You pick its voice under Realtime Voice. And Tone in the Personality tab sets the register, so a plumber and a law office do not sound the same.

Then you listen to it before anyone else does. At the top of the editor, Chat opens a typed conversation and Talk opens a spoken one. Nobody else can reach a private agent, so this is the safe place to get it wrong a few times.

Doing it yourself, or with help

You can set all of this up on your own from the agent editor and the embed page. If you would rather not, our live avatars page offers the other way: "Done for you by our team: we put your avatar on your site with you and check it works."

Either way, the plans are on our plans page, and the steps are in our help guides.

FAQ

Will the agent make promises I cannot keep?

Not if you tell it where the line is. Write what it must never do in the Soul MD box, such as never promise a delivery date. Then ask it that question with Chat or Talk before you publish.

How does it know my prices and hours?

From the Knowledge Text you paste into the Knowledge tab. Paste your services page, your opening hours and a short FAQ. The box shows exactly what you saved.

Can a visitor type if they do not want to talk?

Yes. The panel's Menu holds Chat for typing instead, along with Mute replies and Stop listening.

Can I take it off my site again?

Yes. On the embed page, press the × beside your site's address to withdraw it, and the chat on that site stops answering. Removing the tag from your site takes the bubble away as well.

Give your website a front desk

Your agent can start taking the first conversation on your own website once three things are done. It is published, one tag is pasted into your site, and your site is verified as yours. Our step-by-step guide walks the embed page that hands you both the tag and the proof. It shows where the Speak first on this site switch appears, and how to take the agent off your site again. Pasting the tag before you verify breaks nothing. You keep your two jobs, but the second one gets a lot quieter.