From inquiry to next step

Who is this guide for?

This guide is for freelancers, small service providers, studios, web makers, consultants, small agencies, and small businesses that receive inbound inquiries and need to quickly decide what information is missing before replying.

What this guide helps with

The workflow helps safely evaluate and structure inbound sales inquiries:

• summarize what the client is inquiring about;
• separate confirmed facts from assumptions;
• highlight missing information;
• prepare qualification questions;
• suggest a safe next step;
• draft a response without promising price, timeline, or project acceptance.

How to use this guide

To qualify inbound inquiries using AI, follow these steps:

1. Anonymize the inquiry: Remove all names, emails, and sensitive details from the input.
2. Paste the prompt: Copy the text from the "Prompt / materials" section and paste it into the AI tool.
3. Paste the anonymized inquiry: Enter the anonymized inquiry text as the input data.
4. Review the output: Verify the findings and manually customize the reply for the client.

Safe-use rules

Always follow these security rules when using AI to evaluate inquiries:

• Anonymize Prospective Leads: Remove names, emails, phone numbers, company names, and sensitive commercial details.
• No Confidential Documents: Do not paste private contracts, credentials, internal prices, or proprietary documents into public AI tools.
• Not a Binding Offer: Never treat the AI output as an offer, contract, or acceptance of the project.
• No Instant Commitments: Do not confirm price, timeline, feasibility, or project acceptance without human review.
• Human Verification: The final reply must always be checked and sent manually by a human.

The sample prompt below helps turn an anonymized inquiry into a summary, missing information, qualification questions and a safe next step. It does not replace a commercial decision, proposal, feasibility assessment or confirmed timeline.

- Work only with information provided in the input.
- Do not invent missing facts.
- Mark every assumption as “To verify”.
- Do not confirm price, deadline, feasibility or project acceptance.
- If scope is unclear, propose qualification questions.
- If important information is missing, explain why it matters.
- The draft reply is only a working draft for human review.
- Never treat the reply as automatically sendable.

WHEN I PASTE AN ANONYMIZED INQUIRY, CREATE OUTPUT IN THIS STRUCTURE:

1. SHORT INQUIRY SUMMARY
- what the client likely needs;
- maximum 4 sentences.

2. CONFIRMED INFORMATION
- only information explicitly stated in the input.

3. MISSING OR TO VERIFY
- ambiguities, conflicts and missing information;
- explain why each point matters.

4. QUALIFICATION QUESTIONS
- up to 5 priority questions;
- focus on scope, timeline, budget, inputs, decision process and technical or operational context.

5. RECOMMENDED NEXT STEP
- suggest whether a short discovery call, follow-up questions or internal review is more appropriate;
- do not say that the project is accepted or confirmed.

6. SAFE DRAFT REPLY
- write a short draft reply to the client;
- thank them, summarize your understanding and ask the most important questions;
- do not promise price, deadline, scope or feasibility.

Always end with:
“Before sending, check price, timeline, scope, feasibility and all commitments toward the client.”

Example input

Here is an example of anonymized inquiry details that you can use as input:

Client is inquiring about a customer portal for tracking orders. They state an indicative budget and requested timeline, but the number of users, integration with existing systems, login method, data handling, order management, and operational/maintenance responsibility are unclear.

Short example output

Sample format of the output prepared by the AI assistant for your review:

1. SHORT INQUIRY SUMMARY
- Inquiry regarding the development of a customer portal for tracking orders.

2. CONFIRMED INFORMATION
- Goal: Order tracking.
- Indicative budget and timeline are provided.

3. MISSING OR TO VERIFY
- Number of users and database integrations.
- Hosting preferences and maintenance responsibility.

4. QUALIFICATION QUESTIONS
- What is the estimated user count for the portal?
- Which systems do we need to integrate with?

5. RECOMMENDED NEXT STEP
- Propose a 15-minute discovery call to clarify scale.

Note: Do not confirm price, timeline, feasibility or project acceptance without human review.

What to check in the output

Before utilizing the output from the AI assistant, verify the following:

• Personal and Sensitive Data: Have all personal, sensitive, and identification details been thoroughly removed?
• Separation of Assumptions: Are confirmed facts clearly separated from unverified assumptions?
• Ambiguity Flags: Are all unclear details and missing inputs explicitly marked as "To Verify"?
• No AI Decisions: Does the output avoid making final sales, pricing, project acceptance, or feasibility decisions that the AI should not make?
• Useful Questions: Are the qualification questions specific, constructive, and relevant to the inquiry?
• Human Check: Is the final response reviewed, adjusted, and sent manually by a team member?

Related guides

• JMHZ and Czech payroll reporting — AI as a control assistant – How to use AI as a preparation and control assistant for payroll processes.
• From client chat to clear brief – Extract structured requirements and draft clean briefs from raw client communications.