Issue #1 · Sample issue · 5-minute read

Turn the questions you answer every week into an FAQ (and save the replies)

Most small businesses answer the same 10–20 questions over and over: hours, pricing, turnaround times, returns, "do you serve my area?" This issue shows you how to turn those repeat questions into an FAQ page and a set of saved replies in about an hour, using an AI assistant you may already have.

1. The workflow: inbox → FAQ in 5 steps

Time: 45–60 minutes. You need: access to your email or DMs, and any general AI assistant (ChatGPT, Claude, Gemini, or Microsoft Copilot all work for this).

Collect 20–30 real questions. Search your sent mail for phrases like "thanks for reaching out" or "great question," and copy just the customer's question into a document. Remove names, emails, phone numbers, addresses, and order numbers before pasting anything into an AI tool.
Group them. Paste the list into your assistant with the prompt in section 4. It will cluster duplicates ("What time do you open?" and "Are you open Sundays?" become one question).
Write answers from your facts. Give the assistant your real policies (hours, prices, service area, return window) in a short bullet list. Tell it to answer only from those facts and to flag anything it doesn't know. Don't let it guess a policy.
Check every answer yourself. Read each one out loud. Fix anything that's wrong, too vague, or promises something you don't do. This is the step that keeps you out of trouble.
Publish it twice. Put the final list on an FAQ page on your website, and save the most common answers as templates in your email tool. Gmail calls them "templates" (turn them on under Settings → Advanced), and Outlook calls them "My Templates" or Quick Parts, depending on the version.

Why it pays off: every question your FAQ answers is one you don't have to type again, and a clear FAQ page can help customers find you in search. Revisit the list every quarter.

2. The tool: the AI assistant you already pay for

Before you buy a new "AI customer service" product, check what's already in your subscriptions. Google Workspace and Microsoft 365 both now offer AI assistants (Gemini and Copilot), depending on your plan. Free tiers of ChatGPT, Claude, and Gemini can also handle a one-time project like this.

Who it's for: anyone with fewer than a few hundred support messages a month. Who it's not for: businesses that need a chatbot answering customers 24/7. That's a different tool category, and we'll cover it in a future issue. Verdict: start with what you have. Plans and features change often, so check your account's current plan before you pay for anything.

3. Three things that matter this week

Check your data settings. Most AI assistants have a setting that controls whether your conversations can be used to train their models, and business plans often handle this differently from free ones. Spend two minutes finding it in the settings of whatever tool you use. What it means for you: never paste customer personal data into a tool you haven't checked.
AI can sound confident and still be wrong. Assistants can produce plausible but false details, such as a policy, a price, or a law. What it means for you: use AI to draft and organize, and check facts against your own records or an official source.
Disclose when it matters. If customers might reasonably think they're talking to a person, say when they aren't. The U.S. Federal Trade Commission has warned businesses against deceptive AI claims. What it means for you: be clear about where you use AI in front of customers. (Source: FTC Business Blog)

4. Copy-paste prompt

Below is a list of questions customers have asked my business. 
1) Group duplicates and near-duplicates into a single clear question. 
2) Sort the groups from most to least common. 
3) For each group, draft a friendly answer of 2–4 sentences using ONLY the facts I give you below. If a fact is missing, write [NEED INFO: ...] instead of guessing.
4) Keep the language plain, with no jargon.

My business facts:
- [hours]
- [service area]
- [prices / how quotes work]
- [returns / cancellations policy]
- [turnaround times]

Customer questions:
[paste questions here, with personal details removed]

5. Coming in Pro

Thursday's Pro deep-dive: building a "reply library" of 15 saved responses for quotes, follow-ups, and late payments, plus how to keep it up to date. Pro launches soon.

This is a sample issue with no sponsors and no affiliate links. Tool names are given as examples, not endorsements.

Get the next one

Free. Twice a week. Unsubscribe anytime.