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Reaching Out to People

This is the day-to-day guide for starting a conversation with a new lead: you add the person, click one button, and the agent sends them a friendly opening message on their phone (over RCS). From there the agent takes over — answering questions, qualifying, and booking a call with your team. No technical knowledge is required to do any of this.

The whole job in one line. Add the person on the People page, click Outreach, confirm — done. The agent handles the rest and emails your team when a call gets booked.

Before your first send (one-time setup)

These are normally set up once, ahead of time, by whoever configured the agent — check with them rather than doing this yourself:

  • A messaging channel is connected — the agent has an active RCS channel (Settings · Channels). Without it, the Outreach button will report "No active RCS binding."
  • A greeting is written — the first message people receive is a pre-written, reviewed template (Settings · Message templates), not improvised text. You'll be able to pick which greeting to use at send time, or just accept the default.
  • Representatives are listed — the team members who take booked calls, with their email addresses (Settings · Representatives). This is who gets notified when an appointment is scheduled.

If all three are in place, everything below is point-and-click.

Step 1 — Add the person

  1. Open the agent in the console and go to its People page.
  2. Click Add Person.

  3. Fill in what you know. Only one field truly matters for outreach:

    Phone — the person's mobile number. Type it however you naturally would — (555) 123-4567, 555-123-4567, or +1 555 123 4567 all work. US numbers don't need a country code; for international numbers, include it (e.g. +44 …).

    The other fields help the agent personalize the conversation, so fill in what you have: Full Name, Email, Company, Title, Product Interest (what they said they're interested in, in their own words — it's fine if it's vague), Source (where the lead came from), and Notes. If your team's representatives are configured, you can also pick an Assigned representative. Leave Status as new.

  4. Click Save. You'll see "Person added." and the person appears in the list.

If you have a whole spreadsheet of leads instead of one person, use Import CSV/XLSX on the same page — see People & Intake.

Step 2 — Send the outreach

  1. Find the person's row on the People page. Rows with a phone number that haven't been contacted yet show an Outreach button.
  2. Click Outreach. A small Send outreach dialog opens.
  3. If the agent has more than one greeting written, pick one from the Greeting template menu — the default is already selected, so usually you just leave it.
  4. Click Send outreach.

What success looks like

  • A confirmation appears: "RCS message sent to Jane Smith (T-Mobile)" — the carrier name in parentheses confirms the number was verified as reachable before sending.
  • The person's Status changes from New to Contacted.
  • The Outreach column shows the date and time it was sent, and the button is replaced by a checkmark so the same person can't be accidentally messaged twice.

On the person's phone, the greeting arrives as a rich message from the agent, personalized with their name and interest. When they reply, the agent simply continues the conversation — nothing more for you to do.

If something goes wrong

The dialog tells you exactly what's missing. The common ones:

Message What it means What to do
Person does not have a valid phone number… The number is missing digits or isn't a real mobile number. Edit the person and check the number (a US number needs 10 digits; an international one needs its country code, e.g. +44 …).
This phone number is not RCS-capable. That phone can't receive RCS messages (some carriers and older phones don't support it). Nothing was sent. Reach this person another way for now.
No active RCS binding… The agent's messaging channel isn't set up or was disabled. Ask whoever administers the agent to check Settings · Channels.

Nothing is ever half-sent: if you see an error, the person was not messaged, and you can simply fix the issue and click Outreach again.

Sending again

Sent to the wrong person, or testing with your own number? The timestamp in the Outreach column has a small × next to it — clearing it brings the Outreach button back so you can send again.

Following the conversation

You don't need to babysit the conversation, but you can watch it any time:

  • Click the person's name on the People page to open their record. It shows their details, when outreach was sent, any scheduled calls, the agent's running notes on what it has learned, and every conversation with that person — click one to read the full exchange.
  • The agent's Messages page shows all recent conversations across everyone, newest first.

As the agent qualifies the person, their Status moves along the funnel: new → contacted → qualified → converted (or lost).

How you'll know when a call is booked

When the agent schedules (or reschedules, or cancels) a call, Anychat emails your team automatically — there is nothing to check manually:

  • The assigned representative for that appointment is always emailed.
  • Anyone listed under Notification recipients on the Scheduling settings page is emailed too (if that list is empty, the agent's contact email is used instead).

The email contains everything needed to make the call: the person's name, the agreed time in their timezone, which representative it's assigned to, and any notes the agent gathered.

If the agent is connected to Google Calendar, every booking also appears on that calendar automatically and stays in sync through reschedules and cancellations. The person, meanwhile, gets a confirmation with an add-to-calendar button and an optional reminder before the call.

Booked calls are also always visible in the console — on the person's record under Scheduled calls.

Full details on availability windows, reminders, and calendar setup are in Scheduling Calls.

The checklist

  1. People page → Add Person — name + mobile number, plus anything else you know. Save.
  2. Outreach → Send outreach — confirm the greeting; look for the "RCS message sent" confirmation and the Contacted status.
  3. That's it. Watch the conversation from the person's record if you're curious; the booking email arrives in your team's inbox when the agent schedules a call.