Guide 
Pick the Channel. The Genie Answers on It.
By the end of this guide, you’ll have a live genie deployed on at least one channel, with a clear plan for any others you want to add. One genie. One knowledge base. Every channel speaking in the same brand voice.
It used to take four separate projects to cover QR, phone, email, and web. A different vendor for each one. Different answers depending on which channel a customer used. That’s gone now.
One genie, four channels, about ten minutes.
Before You Start
You need a few things in place before picking your channel.
A Help Genie account. The free plan is enough to follow this guide. No credit card required.
A basic knowledge base. This doesn’t have to be perfect. A PDF of your FAQs, a link to your website, or even a short list of common questions and answers is enough to get started. Your genie pulls answers from this, so the better the source material, the better the answers.
A clear use case in mind. Are you trying to capture leads? Answer after-hours calls? Handle product questions? Knowing the job helps you pick the right channel first.
If you haven’t uploaded your knowledge base yet, head to /send-us-your-manual to see how.
Step 1: Decide What Job This Genie Does
Before you pick a channel, lock in the job.
A coffee shop genie that answers menu questions is different from a real estate genie that qualifies buyer leads. The job shapes everything: which channel makes sense, what questions the genie should handle, and what a successful conversation looks like.
Write down one sentence: “My genie helps [who] do [what] at [when].”
A plumber might write: “My genie helps callers book emergency jobs after 5pm.” A retailer might write: “My genie helps website visitors check if a product is in stock before they buy.”
That sentence becomes your filter for every decision in the next four steps.
Verifiable result: You have a one-sentence job description written down.
Step 2: Match the Job to the Channel
This is the actual channel pick. Help Genie supports four main deployment channels. Here’s how to match them to real situations.
QR code. Best for physical locations. A coffee shop counter. A product shelf. A trade show booth. A real estate sign. The customer is already standing somewhere relevant and has a specific question right now. Scan, ask, done. QR codes work well when you want to catch in-person curiosity without needing staff available.
Phone number. Best for service businesses, trades, and anyone whose customers default to calling. A plumber, HVAC company, or car dealership gets calls all day. A phone-connected genie answers after hours, qualifies the caller, and captures the job request before it goes to a competitor. For small businesses, this is often the highest-value channel to deploy first.
Link in an email. Best for follow-up sequences, newsletters, or post-purchase touchpoints. A warranty question before a booking. A spec query after a quote goes out. The reader is already engaged. A click-to-genie link in the email lets them get an answer in seconds without waiting for a reply.
Website widget. Best for product or service sites where visitors are comparing options. A visitor on your pricing page wants a quick estimate. A shopper on a product page wants to know about compatibility. The widget catches them before they leave.
The rule: put the genie where the question already exists.
For a small business picking a channel for the first time, start with the one where you lose the most business right now. If you miss calls at night, start with phone. If your website has a high bounce rate, start with the widget. Don’t try to deploy everywhere on day one.
Verifiable result: You’ve picked one channel to go live with first.
Step 3: Set Up Your First Channel
Log into your Help Genie account and open your genie’s settings.
From the deployment panel, select the channel you chose in Step 2.
For QR code: Help Genie generates a QR code linked directly to your genie. Download it, print it, and place it where your customers will see it. You can test it yourself with your phone camera before it goes live.
For phone number: You’ll be assigned or connect a phone number (US, Canada, UK, Australia, and NZ numbers are supported). When someone calls that number, your genie picks up. No forwarding rules, no complicated phone system setup.
For email link: Copy the direct link to your genie from the deployment panel. Paste it into your email as a button or hyperlink. Label it something specific: “Ask about warranty terms” or “Get a quick estimate” converts better than a generic “Chat now.”
For website widget: Copy the embed code from the deployment panel. Paste it into your website’s HTML before the closing </body> tag. Most website builders (Squarespace, Wix, Webflow, WordPress) have a custom code section where this takes about 90 seconds.
Verifiable result: Your channel is live. You can interact with your genie from the customer’s side right now.
Step 4: Test It as a Customer
Don’t assume it works. Test it.
Scan your own QR code. Call your own phone number. Click your own email link. Type a question into your own widget.
Ask the exact questions your customers ask most often. Then ask the ones that trip people up. Check that the answers match what’s in your knowledge base. Check that the tone sounds like your brand, not a generic script.
Three things to verify:
- The genie gives accurate answers based on what you uploaded.
- The genie handles an off-topic question gracefully (it should redirect, not make something up).
- The conversation ends with a clear next step: a booking, a form, a callback request, or a “we’ll be in touch.”
If an answer is wrong, update the knowledge base. Add the missing information as a clear FAQ entry. The genie will reflect the update quickly.
Verifiable result: You’ve completed at least five test conversations and confirmed the answers are accurate.
Step 5: Add More Channels When You’re Ready
Once your first channel is live and tested, adding the others takes minutes. The genie is already built. The knowledge base is already there. You’re just opening another door to the same room.
A small business that starts with a phone number can add a website widget in under five minutes. A retailer running a QR campaign in-store can add an email link to their newsletter the same week. The answers stay consistent because the source of truth is the same.
This is the part that used to mean four separate projects. Now it’s four toggles.
Verifiable result: You have a plan for your second channel with a target date.
Common Gotchas
The genie gives a vague answer. This almost always means the knowledge base is vague. Find the question in your test conversations and add a specific, direct answer to your uploaded content. Specificity in, specificity out.
The QR code doesn’t scan reliably. Print size matters. A QR code smaller than 2.5 cm x 2.5 cm can fail on older phone cameras. Test it at the size you plan to print, in the actual lighting of the location.
The website widget slows down the page. This is rare, but if you’re running a heavily optimized site, load the embed script with an async or defer attribute. Your developer can do this in a few seconds.
Customers don’t know the genie is there. This is the most common small business mistake. Label the QR code. Put a “Ask me anything” prompt near the widget. Mention the phone number in your email signature. The channel only works if people know to use it.
The phone number isn’t connecting. Check that the number has been activated in your deployment settings and that any call forwarding rules aren’t intercepting it before the genie can answer.
You’re Done Building the Technology
This is the shift worth noticing. When you’re not managing four separate vendors, four separate contracts, and four sets of slightly different answers, you get to focus on the actual customer experience.
Where does confusion happen? What question comes up most? Which channel are customers using most? Your genie’s analytics will tell you.
Ready to see what this looks like for your specific business? Visit /explore to browse genies built for your industry, or run the numbers on what missed calls are costing you with the ROI calculator.