Best Practices for Instructions
Best practices to structure your Instructions for AI Agents and Recommendations.
Structuring high-quality instructions is key to ensuring your AI responds accurately, whether used for AI Agents or Recommendations. This best practices guide will help you get started.
AvoAI fees are deducted in real-time for your Account Balance. Exact cost will depend on the amount of data processed in each instruction. Realtime billing is available in Analytics and on the Billing page.
Use Recipes to Get Started
Using a recipe ensures you follow best practices from the beginning.
Start with one of the pre-set recipes available on the Instruct Agent section. These are templates that auto-populate common structures that you can customize to match your brand voice, workflows, and logic rules.
- Click the Recipe button to open available templates
- Make a selection
- Customize
- Save and enable the instruction
You can continue to edit, enable or disable all instructions after the first pass.
Follow These Best Practices
To ensure reliable and maintainable AI behavior, always follow the rules below:
- Start your Instruction with any rules first.
- Use explicit, plain logic. Avoid nesting. Be as clear as possible.
- Capitalize logic terms: write logic like IF, THEN, MUST, MUST NOT, UNLESS, WHEN, etc.
- Use double quotes (") for exact response text to clearly delineate the bot’s reply.
- Consolidate logic into one section. Do NOT repeat rules or logic.
- Use markdown headers and lists to structure, e.g. 1, 2, 3, and organize the instruction clearly.
Example Instruction Structure
Here’s how to format an effective AI instruction:
# Role
You are a customer support agent at Acme Corp.
# Objective
Your goal is to help users troubleshoot account issues and refer them to support documentation when needed.
# Rules
- IF the user mentions login problems, THEN reply with: "I'm sorry you're having trouble logging in. Please try resetting your password here: https://support.acme.com/reset-password"
- IF the user mentions billing, THEN direct them to: "Our billing FAQ is available at https://support.acme.com/billing. Let me know if you’d like help with a specific charge."
- DO NOT reference internal tools or links.
- ALWAYS respond in a professional and friendly tone.
Instruction Fields Explained
1. Instruction Name
Give your instruction a clear, internal-facing name (e.g. “Billing Troubleshooting” or “Sales Chat Intro”).
This helps you locate and manage instructions later. This name is not used for training.
2. Content
This is where the training happens. Add detailed instructions for your bot’s tone, purpose, workflows, and rules. There is no character limit, more context is better, but keep in mind that cost will depend on the amount of data processed.
Use:
- Structured markdown (#, -, etc.) to organize sections
- Explicit instructions and logic
Do include clear response scripts and conditional logic.
Do not leave rules vague or embed logic in prose paragraphs.
Using IFTTT-Style Logic
Use IF THIS THEN THAT (IFTTT) statements to define exactly what the bot should say and when. This ensures predictable responses and makes your instruction easier to update.
Example:
IF the user asks about refunds, THEN respond with: "You can request a refund by filling out this form: https://support.acme.com/refunds"
Managing Instructions
Enable / Disable
- Enable an instruction once it’s ready—your AI Agent will start using it right away.
- Disable instructions any time to pause usage without deleting them.
Save or Update
- Click Save when creating a new instruction.
- Click Update after editing an existing one (hover and edit inline).
Organize with Multiple Instructions
You can create multiple instructions to split different functions, such as:
- Sales responses
- Live chat troubleshooting
- Onboarding flow
This lets you disable specific areas for updates without disrupting others.
Summary
High-quality prompts are:
- Structured with clear rules and markdown
- Written with explicit logic and capitalized operators
- Designed with public references and copy-paste-ready replies
- Modular and easy to manage
By following this guide, you’ll train your Avochato AI Agent to be consistent, effective, and aligned with your business goals.