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Documentation

Everything you need to install, configure and get the most from AI Store Brain.

1. Install & activate

  1. Download the plugin zip from your purchase email (or your account).
  2. In WordPress go to Plugins → Add New → Upload Plugin, choose the zip and click Install Now, then Activate.
  3. Open AI Store Brain → License, paste your license key and click Activate.
Requirements: WordPress 6.0+, WooCommerce, PHP 7.4+. An SMTP plugin (e.g. WP Mail SMTP) is strongly recommended so handover emails are delivered reliably.

2. Get an OpenAI API key

  1. Sign in at platform.openai.com and add a small prepaid balance (US$5 is plenty to start).
  2. Go to API keys → Create new secret key, copy it.
  3. In WordPress open AI Store Brain → AI Settings, paste the key and save. Leave the model as gpt-4o-mini and embeddings as text-embedding-3-small unless you have a reason to change them.

Your key is stored in your WordPress database and used only server-side; visitors never see it.

3. Business details

In Business Details fill in your business name, support email, shipping and return policies, business hours (start, end, days) and any extra instructions for the assistant (tone, upsell rules, things never to say). Add one or more handover emails to receive human-handover requests.

4. Index your products

Open Product Index and click Build index. The assistant reads every product, category, attribute and variation and builds a semantic index with a progress bar. From then on, saving or deleting a product updates the index automatically. Use Rebuild (force) only if you change embedding models.

5. Chat widget & floating bubble

In Chat Widget set the title, welcome messages, brand colour, suggested question chips and size. Enable the floating bubble to show the assistant site-wide (position bottom-right or bottom-left, optional custom icon, "open by default" on desktop).

Prefer an embedded chat? Add the shortcode to any page:

[ai_store_brain]
[ai_store_brain title="Ask us anything" width="100%" height="520px" mobile_height="60vh"]
[ai_store_brain height="fill"]   <!-- fills the parent section -->

Open the chat from your own button or menu item: give it the class asb-chat-trigger or the attribute data-asb-chat, or call ASBChat.open() from JavaScript.

6. Discounts & FAQs

Discounts: add codes with a description and optional expiry date; expired codes are hidden automatically. Tick Auto-include WooCommerce coupons to let the assistant surface live published coupons.

FAQs: add question/answer pairs, or import/export CSV. In Conversations, click Add as FAQ on any good answer.

7. Leads & Klaviyo

Enable Lead capture to ask for name and email before the first answer (suggested questions remain clickable; returning visitors aren't asked again; logged-in customers are never asked). Add your Klaviyo private API key and list ID to subscribe leads automatically. Export or delete leads any time.

8. Human handover

When a customer asks for a person, or the assistant can't help, it emails the full transcript to your handover addresses with Reply-To set to the customer and tells them when to expect a reply (within an hour during business hours, as soon as possible outside). Handovers are counted on the Dashboard and highlighted in Conversations.

9. Cost controls

  • Rate limit per minute (per visitor) — default 10.
  • Daily message cap (site-wide) — default 500; the assistant shows a friendly "we're busy" message when reached. Set 0 to disable.
  • Max tokens per reply — default 700.

Set a monthly budget limit in your OpenAI dashboard as a second safety net.

10. Suggested privacy-policy wording

"Our website uses an AI shopping assistant. Messages you type into the assistant, together with relevant store information (such as product details, discount codes and — after verification — your order status), are processed by OpenAI, L.L.C. to generate answers. If you provide your name and email address to the assistant, we store them to follow up with you and may add you to our marketing list via Klaviyo. Conversations are stored on our server for up to [30] days."

Troubleshooting

  • Bubble not showing on some pages — purge your page cache/CDN (the plugin purges common caches on save, but a CDN may need a manual purge).
  • "Assistant unavailable" — check the OpenAI key and balance in AI Settings, and that your license is active.
  • Handover emails not arriving — install an SMTP plugin; wp_mail() on shared hosting is often unreliable.
  • Chat not loading with JS optimisation — exclude chat.js from combine/defer in LiteSpeed, WP Rocket or Autoptimize.
  • Product images look wrong — update to the latest version; card styles are theme-proof from 1.12.1.

Still stuck? Contact support — include your WordPress and WooCommerce versions and a screenshot.