Getting started

Setup is a wizard. It saves as you go, so you can leave halfway through and pick up where you stopped. Nothing goes live until you finish the last step.

Before you start#

Have these to hand, because two of the steps stall without them:

• The address your business is registered at. Carriers check it against public records when they vet you for text messaging, and an address that does not match is the most common reason a filing is rejected.
• Your business tax ID (EIN in the US, BN in Canada) if you have one. Sole proprietors can register without one.
• The Google or Outlook calendar you book into, and the login for it.
• A card, for the last step.

1. Create your account#

Sign up with an email address, Google or Microsoft, then verify your email. The first person to sign up owns the organization and becomes its admin.

2. Your profile and theme#

Your name, and whether you want the dashboard light, dark or matched to your device. These belong to you rather than the business, so a teammate joining later answers these two and nothing else.

3. Business Profile#

What the receptionist needs in order to speak for you:

• Business name: what the AI says when it answers.
• Website: the pages the wizard reads when it drafts your FAQs later on.
• Default business fallback number: the number a call is transferred to when a caller needs a person and no department covers it. You verify it here, and setup does not continue until you have.
• Business category: sets the defaults for the rest of the wizard.
• Default language: what the receptionist opens every call in.
• Multi-language support: off by default. Turn it on and the AI follows the caller into any of 58 languages.

Verifying your fallback number#

Choose Text me a code or Call me with a code, then type the six digits back. Landlines take the call.

This is the one step you cannot skip. Until the number is verified there is no way forward: no phone number is issued, and no subscription starts. It keeps people from opening account after account, and it means the number your callers are transferred to is one that rings.

Once verified, the number stays. You can change it whenever you like by typing a new one and verifying that instead, and the new number replaces the old one the moment it is verified. There is no way to simply remove it and leave the receptionist with nowhere to send a caller.

If the code does not arrive, wait for the countdown and choose Send a new code. There is a limit on how many codes one number can be sent in a day, so if you run out, try again tomorrow or verify a different number you answer.

4. Locations#

One entry per place you operate from:

• Address, used for directions when a caller asks where you are.
• Time zone, which is what appointment times are interpreted in.
• Business hours, per day of the week.
• Fallback phone, the number a call is transferred to when it needs a person.

Add as many as you have. Multi-location businesses route callers to the right one.

5. Services and intake questions#

Each service you offer:

• Name, as you would say it to a customer.
• Duration, which is what the AI blocks out in the calendar.
• Price, optional. Leave it blank and the AI declines to quote rather than guessing.
• Intake questions, asked while the booking is being taken.

Intake questions are worth the time. Anything you would ask at the front desk works here:

• "Is this your first visit with us?"
• "Do you have insurance?"
• "What is the reason for your visit?"

Answers are attached to the appointment and shown on the call record.

6. Staff#

Who can be booked:

• Name and email, both required.
• Phone, optional. It is what rings when a department routes to them.
• Locations they work at.
• Services they can perform.

Staff connect their own Google Calendar or Outlook Calendar. Once connected, the AI reads real free and busy time and cannot double-book them.

Giving a staff member an email address also invites them to the dashboard as a member, so they can see their own appointments.

7. Frequently asked questions#

Question and answer pairs the AI uses verbatim. If you give it a website, it can read your pages and draft a set for you to edit, which is faster than starting from nothing.

Anything you leave out, the AI answers from your business profile, hours and services instead.

8. Phone numbers#

Pick how customers reach you:

• Take a new local, mobile, national or toll-free number in any of 30 countries. In the US and Canada you can search by area code.
• Keep the number you already use and forward it to your Asisto number. This is what most businesses do, because nothing on your van or your website has to change.

Some countries want an address on file before they will sell you a number, and a few want identity or business documents that the regulator approves first. The wizard says which applies and collects it.

Number porting is not supported. Forward instead: it takes minutes rather than the business days a port needs, and your published number never changes. The How calls work guide on the phone numbers card of your home page has the steps for both forwarding and publishing the Asisto number directly.

Text messaging registration is deliberately not part of this wizard, because carrier review takes days and it should not stand between you and a working phone line. Once you have a number, go to Settings → Organization → Text messaging and start it. Calls work in the meantime; only texting waits. See Text messaging registration.

9. Review and settings#

Four switches decide what the AI does on a call: Call Recording, Spam Filtering, Call Summaries and Caller Recognition. Transcripts, FAQ responses and intent detection are on and are not switchable here.

Turning on call recording requires a disclosure line the AI reads to callers. Recording law differs by jurisdiction, so make sure the wording suits yours.

The same step sets what happens during your business hours and after them: forward the call to your team, or let the receptionist take it and book.

All of these can be changed later from Reconfigure business. See AI features.

10. Checkout#

Choose your plan:

• Pay Per Appointment: no monthly fee, $7.99 for each appointment the AI books.
• Unlimited: $279 a month, no per-appointment charge.
• Enterprise: quoted, for franchises and multi-location groups.

Full comparison in Pricing and plans.

After setup#

Your number answers immediately. From here:

• Watch the first few calls come in on the dashboard.
• Read a transcript or two and see which questions your FAQ does not cover yet.
• Set up call routing if callers need to reach different departments.

Stuck on something? Email hello@asisto.one or use the contact form.