Chapter 3 of 39 · Start
Memory, alerts and launch check
Further down the home page are three tools that make Winston feel like he truly works for you. Winston's memory holds the rules he always follows. Alerts tell you on your phone or team chat when drafts are waiting. The launch check reviews your website and domain and tells you in plain words what to fix.
How it works
What you can do here
- Teach Winston rules, decisions and notes that every task follows
- Accept or ignore the rules Winston suggests from how you work
- Get alerts on Slack, Discord, Teams, Google Chat, Telegram, ntfy or Pushover
- Send a test alert to make sure it arrives
- Check that your website and domain are ready to launch
1. Teaching Winston a rule
A rule is anything you'd tell a new assistant on their first day, like "never discount more than 10%" or "we don't work Sundays".
- 1
Find Winston's memory
Scroll down the home page to the section called Winston's memory.
- 2
Press Teach Winston
A box opens. Type the rule in plain words, for example "Never discount more than 10%", or start from one of the examples shown and make it yours.
- 3
Add the why (optional)
Saying why helps Winston apply the rule sensibly, for example "our margins are thin".
- 4
Choose the kind
Pick Rule (always do or never do), Decision (something you've settled) or Note (useful background).
- 5
Choose where it applies
Pick Everything, or just Marketing, Sales, Money or Operations.
- 6
Save it
The rule is saved to the list and every future task follows it.
- 7
Forget a rule
Press the forget button beside any rule you no longer want.
You can also teach Winston in any chat. Say "from now on, always…" and he'll remember it.
2. Accepting Winston's suggestions
Each night Winston looks over the drafts you approved and rejected and your chats, and suggests rules to keep.
- 1
Ask for suggestions now
Press Learn from my usage. Winston looks over your approved and rejected drafts and your chats. If he hasn't spotted a pattern yet, approve or reject a few more drafts and try again.
- 2
Read each suggestion
They appear under Winston suggests, from how you use it, each with the reason he noticed it.
- 3
Keep or dismiss
Press Keep to turn a suggestion into a rule, or Dismiss to throw it away.
3. Setting up alerts
Alerts tell you when drafts are waiting for approval or when one of Winston's runs fails, so you don't have to keep checking.
- 1
Pick where to send them
Under Alerts, choose Slack, Discord, Microsoft Teams, Google Chat, Telegram, ntfy (a free phone notification app), Pushover or a webhook.
- 2
Paste the details
Each one asks for what it needs, usually a webhook address. Telegram needs a bot token and chat id; ntfy needs a topic name.
- 3
Choose what to hear about
Tick Drafts waiting for approval, A run failed, or both.
- 4
Send a test
Press the test button on the channel to make sure a message arrives.
- 5
Remove a channel
Press the remove button beside it.
Keys and webhook addresses are stored encrypted and never shown again after you save them.
4. Running the launch check
The launch check reads your website and domain the way a browser and an email server would, and tells you what's ready and what to fix. It only reads; it never changes anything.
- 1
Enter your domain
Type your own domain, such as yourbusiness.com, in the Launch check section.
- 2
Run it
Winston checks the site's security headers, page details, DNS and the email records that stop your emails landing in spam.
- 3
Read the results
Each check is marked pass, warning or fail, with a plain explanation and how to fix it.
- 4
Fix and re-run
Make the changes with your domain provider, then run the check again until everything passes.
Try it yourself
Doing is the fastest way to learn. Open the tab and try these:
- Teach Winston one rule about how you like to talk to customers.
- Set up ntfy or Slack alerts and send a test alert.
- Run the launch check on your website's domain.