Building Your Own

Introduction

Workflows are the automation engine of AskElephant. You set up processes that run on their own, turning conversation data into actionable outputs—meeting summaries, CRM updates, handoff documentation, and more—without manual effort.

A workflow is a series of connected steps that take information from one place, analyze it, and deliver results where you need them. Building your own takes some thought. Use this guide to shape custom automations that fit your use cases.

Key Terms

• Trigger: The event that starts a workflow—a new meeting, a deal update in your CRM, or a specific keyword in a conversation

• Node: A building block within a workflow; each node performs one specific task, like running an AI analysis, searching for information, or sending an email

• Action node: A node that processes information or performs an action, as opposed to trigger nodes, which start the workflow

• Prompt: Natural-language instructions that tell AI how to analyze information and what output you want

• Output: The final result your workflow produces—an email summary, a CRM update, or an alert to your team

Start With Your Outcome

Before building anything, get clear on what the workflow should accomplish. Specifics matter more than general ideas.

Instead of "I want meeting summaries," think: "I want a summary of sales calls sent to my manager every Friday that highlights customer pain points, competitor mentions, and next steps agreed upon."

Define:

• What information do you need?

• Where should it go? (email, Slack, your CRM, AskElephant itself)

• Who needs it?

• How often? (after every meeting, weekly, on demand)

This becomes the anchor for every decision that follows.

Choose Your Trigger

Your trigger is where the workflow gets its raw material. It determines what information flows into the rest of the process.

Common triggers:

• New meeting: Activates whenever a meeting ends; you can filter by group, attendees, meeting type, or tags

• Signal match: Triggers when a meeting contains specific keywords like budget, competitor, or churn risk

• CRM update: Starts when something changes in HubSpot, Salesforce, or another integration

• Calendar event: Begins before or after a scheduled meeting

• Manual trigger: You start it whenever you need

Pick the trigger that matches when the workflow should run. For real-time summaries, use New Meeting. For a quarterly business review, a manual trigger lets you control exactly when it runs.

Gather Additional Context

Your trigger gives you a starting point, but it's rarely enough on its own. Decide what else strengthens your analysis:

• Past meetings with this customer or contact

• Current deal information from your CRM

• LinkedIn or company data

• Slack conversations or documents

Each piece of context becomes its own node. These nodes might search meeting history, pull data from HubSpot, or perform web searches, and they all feed into the final analysis.

Example: if your trigger is a new customer meeting, add nodes to search past meetings with that contact and pull the opportunity details from HubSpot. Your workflow now has the full picture.

Evaluate and Analyze the Information

Once you've gathered information, tell AI how to process it. This is where prompt nodes come in.

• Run Prompt: A straightforward analysis node; you write instructions in plain language, and AI analyzes the information accordingly

• Loop Prompt: Useful when you're working with multiple items (like 10 past meetings); it runs your prompt against each item and collects the results

• Send Message to Conversation: Sends your prompt to a dedicated conversation where all gathered information lives, which keeps everything organized

Writing Prompts for Workflows

Your prompt is the instruction manual for AI. Three principles:

• Be clear: Don't assume AI knows what you mean. If you want "revenue impact," say whether that means deal size, contract length, or customer lifetime value

• Be concise: Include only information relevant to the goal; extras dilute the result

• Be consistent: If you say "customer objections" once and "buyer hesitations" later, you've confused the instruction; pick one and stick with it

Structure each prompt with headers:

• Role: "You are a seasoned sales coach with 20+ years of experience…"

• Task: "Identify the three biggest coaching opportunities from this call…"

• Context: Explain what information you're providing and why

• Output Format: Show exactly how you want results presented (bullet points, table, summary). Include an example if possible

The clearer the prompt, the better the results.

Choosing the Right AI Model

Different models have different strengths. For most workflow tasks, Claude 4.5 Haiku is your best bet—it's reliable across writing, analysis, and creative thinking.

• Gemini 2.5 Flash works well for quick, lightweight insights (good for looping through many items)

• O4 Mini handles analytical tasks and detailed number crunching

• Grok 4 Fast handles large volumes of information—dozens of meetings or extensive data pulls

When in doubt, stick with Claude 4.5 Haiku.

Choose Your Output Destination

Your workflow has done the hard work. Decide where the results land.

• Email: Send summaries, alerts, or action items to team members

• AskElephant conversation: Keep insights visible inside AskElephant

• CRM: Push summaries, next steps, or insights into HubSpot, Salesforce, or another platform

• Slack: Notify your team in real time

• Project management tools: Send action items to Notion, Asana, Monday, or Linear

• Meeting page: Surface insights on the meeting details page in AskElephant

Tie the output back to your original outcome. If you defined "send to my manager via email," that's your output node. If you said "update the opportunity in our CRM," that's the destination.

A Workflow Example: Sales Handoff to Customer Success

1. Trigger: A meeting tagged Sales to CS Handoff occurs

2. Action nodes: Search for all past meetings with this customer and pull their opportunity details from HubSpot

3. Create Conversation: Bundle the new meeting, past meetings, and CRM data into one organized space

4. Run Prompt: Analyze and identify customer pain points, feature excitement, and recommended onboarding focus areas

5. Output: Email the summary to the CS team lead with the recommendation

One event triggers a full information synthesis that would otherwise take hours of manual work.

Build With Confidence

Workflows follow the same pattern every time:

1. Define what you want to achieve

2. Decide where to pull information from (trigger and context)

3. Write clear instructions for analysis (prompts)

4. Choose where results go (output)

Start simple. Build your first workflow to solve one clear problem. Once you see it working, you'll know how to expand and layer in complexity.

Need Additional Help?

If you have questions or need further assistance, the AskElephant support team is here to help!

You can reach our support team in several ways:

• click the chat button in the bottom right corner of your screen,

• email us at [email protected],

• or use @askelephant support in your dedicated Slack channel.

We're committed to getting you the answers you need as quickly as possible.