{"id":32,"date":"2026-09-09T04:25:47","date_gmt":"2026-09-09T04:25:47","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/nirohelp.com\/docs\/32\/custom-instructions\/"},"modified":"2026-09-09T04:26:10","modified_gmt":"2026-09-09T04:26:10","slug":"custom-instructions","status":"publish","type":"nirohelp_doc","link":"https:\/\/nirohelp.com\/docs\/ai-assistance\/custom-instructions\/","title":{"rendered":"Custom AI instructions"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><strong>NiroHelp \u2192 AI \u2192 Instructions<\/strong> is a single box. What you write there is<br \/>\napplied to every answer the AI produces for your site \u2014 chatbot replies and<br \/>\nauto-responder replies alike.<\/p>\n<p>Use it for the rules the AI cannot work out from your docs: tone, what to<br \/>\nrefuse, and where to send someone your docs cannot help.<\/p>\n<h2>The grey text is an example, not a value<\/h2>\n<p>The box shows this in grey:<\/p>\n<blockquote>\n<p>Only answer using our own documentation. Never mention or recommend<br \/>\ncompetitor products. If the answer is not in the docs, say you are not sure<br \/>\nand point the user to support.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n<p><strong>That is placeholder text.<\/strong> An empty box stays empty and the service applies<br \/>\nits own defaults. Nothing is saved until you type something.<\/p>\n<h2>Writing good instructions<\/h2>\n<p>Keep them short, concrete, and about <em>behaviour<\/em> rather than <em>content<\/em> \u2014 your<br \/>\ndocs are the content, and syncing is how you change that.<\/p>\n<p>Worth stating:<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li><strong>Scope.<\/strong> <em>&#8220;Answer only from our documentation.&#8221;<\/em><\/li>\n<li><strong>What to do when the docs do not cover it.<\/strong> Naming a fallback \u2014 a support<br \/>\n  email, your ticket form \u2014 is far more useful than &#8220;say you do not know&#8221;.<\/li>\n<li><strong>Tone and length.<\/strong> <em>&#8220;Two sentences, then the steps.&#8221;<\/em><\/li>\n<li><strong>Hard refusals.<\/strong> Pricing negotiation, legal advice, competitor comparisons.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>Not worth stating: facts. <em>&#8220;Our refund window is 14 days&#8221;<\/em> belongs in a doc,<br \/>\nwhere it can be cited, found by search, and edited by whoever owns the policy.<\/p>\n<h2>What happens when you save<\/h2>\n<p>Your text is <strong>stored on your own site first<\/strong>, then pushed to the AI service.<\/p>\n<p>If the push fails you will see either <em>&#8220;Saved locally, but could not reach the<br \/>\nAI service&#8221;<\/em> or <em>&#8220;Saved locally, but the AI service rejected the update&#8221;<\/em>. Both<br \/>\nmean what they say: <strong>your text is safe<\/strong>, and the service is still running the<br \/>\nprevious version. Save again once it is reachable.<\/p>\n<h2>Requires a connected site<\/h2>\n<p>There is nowhere to push the instructions to until the site is connected, which<br \/>\nis why <strong>Instructions<\/strong> does not appear until then.<\/p>\n<h2>Instructions versus the confidence threshold<\/h2>\n<p>The two fix different failures:<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li><strong>Instructions<\/strong> change <em>how<\/em> the AI answers when it has something to say.<\/li>\n<li>The auto responder&#8217;s <strong>confidence threshold<\/strong> decides <em>whether<\/em> it answers at<br \/>\n  all.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p><strong>An assistant that is confidently wrong needs a higher threshold, not a longer<br \/>\nprompt.<\/strong> See<br \/>\n<a href=\"https:\/\/nirohelp.com\/docs\/workflows-automation\/ai-auto-responder\/\">The AI auto responder<\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"template":"","meta":{"site-sidebar-layout":"default","site-content-layout":"","ast-site-content-layout":"default","site-content-style":"default","site-sidebar-style":"default","ast-global-header-display":"","ast-banner-title-visibility":"","ast-main-header-display":"","ast-hfb-above-header-display":"","ast-hfb-below-header-display":"","ast-hfb-mobile-header-display":"","site-post-title":"","ast-breadcrumbs-content":"","ast-featured-img":"","footer-sml-layout":"","ast-disable-related-posts":"","theme-transparent-header-meta":"","adv-header-id-meta":"","stick-header-meta":"","header-above-stick-meta":"","header-main-stick-meta":"","header-below-stick-meta":"","astra-migrate-meta-layouts":"default","ast-page-background-enabled":"default","ast-page-background-meta":{"desktop":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-5)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"tablet":{"background-color":"","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"mobile":{"background-color":"","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""}},"ast-content-background-meta":{"desktop":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-4)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"tablet":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-4)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"mobile":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-4)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""}}},"nirohelp_product":[],"nirohelp_topic":[9],"class_list":["post-32","nirohelp_doc","type-nirohelp_doc","status-publish","hentry","nirohelp_topic-ai-assistance"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/nirohelp.com\/docs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/nirohelp_doc\/32","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/nirohelp.com\/docs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/nirohelp_doc"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/nirohelp.com\/docs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/nirohelp_doc"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nirohelp.com\/docs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/nirohelp.com\/docs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=32"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"nirohelp_product","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nirohelp.com\/docs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/nirohelp_product?post=32"},{"taxonomy":"nirohelp_topic","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nirohelp.com\/docs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/nirohelp_topic?post=32"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}