4 min lesson
Using playbooks
Chat playbooks are SOPs Max follows in conversation and on tasks. Email playbooks draft replies, like a Stripe invoice link or a meeting booking.
A playbook is a reusable instruction set for your Max. It is how you want a job done, written once, then used whenever that job shows up.
You can write one in the Playbooks UI or the CLI. You can also ask Max. “Write a playbook for how we run a pipeline review.” He will draft the name, the description, and the instructions. Read it, then assign it. Assigned playbooks are the ones Max can use.
There are two types. Chat playbooks and email playbooks.
What is a chat playbook?
A chat playbook is an SOP. Description is when to use it. Instructions are how to do it.
Max follows chat playbooks in conversation: desktop, WhatsApp, Slack. He also follows them on tasks. Write the review once. Ask for it in chat. Point a Monday task at the same playbook.
Pipeline review. Description: Use this when I ask for a pipeline review, a standup brief, or when a task named pipeline review runs. Instructions: Review my open Deals. Group by stage. Call out anything with no activity in fourteen days, anything sitting too long in the same stage, and the largest values at risk. Use the Company, the People on the deal, last interaction, and open Tickets. Give me a short brief I can run in standup.
In Slack you say “run the pipeline review.” Max uses that playbook. The Monday 8am task can say “Follow the Pipeline review playbook and send me the brief.” Same steps. Same objects. One playbook.
After a call. Description: Use this when I tell you about a call that already happened. Instructions: Find the Person and the Deal. Log a note on the Deal with what we covered. Update the stage if I said it changed. Set a next step on the record.
Chat playbooks run with Frontline in reach. People, Companies, Deals, Tickets, tables. You write the SOP. Max already has the book.
What is an email playbook?
An email playbook is for drafts. Tone, what to pull, what to put in the reply. The email agent uses it when Max writes. You still approve the send.
Description is when this draft applies. Instructions are how to write it and which systems to use. You can attach Stripe, Calendar, CRM objects, a custom tool, or one file. You can apply the playbook to every mailbox, or only work email.
Last month’s Stripe invoice. Someone writes asking for last month’s invoice. Description: Use this when a customer or Company asks for an invoice, a receipt, or last month’s Stripe bill. Instructions: Match the sender to a Person and Company in Frontline. In Stripe, find that customer’s invoice for the last calendar month. Put the invoice link in the draft. Short, clear, one link. If you cannot match the Company or the invoice, say what you found and ask for the account name.
Access: People and Companies, read. Integration: Stripe.
Sequence reply that wants a meeting. Someone answers a sequence and asks to book time. Description: Use this when a Lead or Contact replies to a sequence and wants a meeting, a call, or to “find a time.” Instructions: Open the Person and any open Deal. Draft a short yes. Include my calendar scheduling link. If Calendar shows a conflict this week, offer the next open window in the same note. Keep it under five sentences.
Access: People, Deals, read. Integration: Calendar. Max can also use the scheduling links you already saved in settings.
How chat and email playbooks work together
A chat playbook is the method. A task can run that method on a schedule. An email playbook is the draft when the same work shows up in the inbox.
Pipeline review lives in a chat playbook. Monday’s task uses it. A Stripe invoice request lives in an email playbook, because the reply needs the link in the thread. A meeting ask from a sequence lives in an email playbook, because the draft needs the calendar link in the send.
Give each playbook a name a human would say out loud. Pipeline review. Stripe invoice reply. Meeting book from sequence. Then assign it so Max can find it.