The discovery call and "Hey Alex"

Who this is for: anyone setting up a new business floor, or wanting to talk to Alex by voice instead of typing.

What you need first: nothing extra — the discovery call offers itself the first time it's relevant, and "Hey Alex" is a setting you turn on when you want it.

What the discovery call is

The discovery call is Alex's conversation to understand your business before it builds anything — it opens automatically over the street the first time it applies, as a card in the middle of the screen. On a personal (For Life) plan it's framed as "getting to know you"; for a business it's your discovery call. Either way, once the room is ready you choose how to do it:

• Chat with Alex — type it out, at your own pace.
• Do it as a call — talk out loud; Alex replies with voice too.

Both are the same conversation and the same thread — voice is just the difference in how you speak to Alex, not a separate chat.

If you have a co-owner

If your business has more than one owner, the discovery call waits for everyone to be online before it starts, because it lays out the whole business and Alex holds any binding decision (creating structure, connecting a service, opening a module) until every owner is present. While it's waiting you can:

• Send a notification to nudge a missing owner to join.
• Start without them — Alex will still talk with you, but holds anything that needs both of you until the other owner arrives.

Steps

1. When the card opens, choose Chat or Call. If you're picking up a conversation you already started, this step is skipped and you're taken straight back into it.
2. Talk Alex through your business — what you do, who you serve, what matters to you. Alex asks the questions; there's no form to fill in.
3. Watch what Alex builds as you talk. As the conversation gives Alex enough to act on, it sets things up on your floor for real — you'll see a running list of what's been made.
4. Finish when you're ready. Once you've had a real conversation, the option changes from "Not now" to Take me to my floor — that's what actually completes the discovery and stops it reappearing.
5. Take the tour. Completing the call can hand you a short walkthrough of exactly what Alex built, so you land on your floor already knowing where things are.

Tips

• "Not now" only puts the call off for this browser session — for a business it comes back next time until it's genuinely completed, so there's no half-finished setup left behind.
• You can leave and come back mid-conversation; the discovery call resumes exactly where you left off rather than starting again.
• Prefer a form instead? On a fresh signup there's also a guided floor setup you can use instead of talking it through — see "Getting started" for that path.

"Hey Alex" — talking to Alex anywhere, hands-free

Outside the discovery call, Alex is always available as the floating orb in the corner of the app. "Hey Alex" is a wake word that lets you start talking to that orb without touching a button first.

1. Open Settings and find the Alex pane.
2. Find the "Hey Alex" card. It's off by default — Alex explains this is an always-on microphone, so turning it on is your choice, not the default.
3. Turn it on. Your browser will ask permission to use the microphone the first time.
4. Say "Hey Alex" from anywhere in the app to open a call — after that you can keep talking without saying the name again for each question.
5. Turn it off any time from the same card if you'd rather Alex only listens when you start a call or a voice note yourself.

Tips

• The same Alex pane in Settings also has Call Alex (start a voice call without the wake word), Record a voice note (Alex turns what you say into tasks, notes and calendar entries), and your recent call history with full transcripts.
• Wake word off is the safe default if you share a screen or work somewhere with other people around — Alex only listens when you deliberately start a call or a voice note.

Related articles

• Getting started: from signup to your first floor
• Staff: hiring and transferring
• Safety and data protection

Ask Alex to do this for you

This one's the other way round — it's how you talk to Alex in the first place, whether that's the discovery call setting up your floor or "Hey Alex" opening a call from anywhere in the app.