Never point a real customer at an untested agent. answara.ai gives you two ways to hear your agent in action before anyone else does, and we strongly recommend using both.
The test call during onboarding
The fastest way to hear your agent is during the onboarding flow. There's a dedicated Test call step that places a real call to your cell phone using your configured agent.
- From the dashboard, work through the onboarding flow until you reach the Test step.
- Enter your cell phone number and click to start the test call.
- Your phone rings within a few seconds. When you answer, the agent greets you exactly the way it will greet real customers.
Use this to try every common conversation path: "I need to book an appointment," "What are your hours?", "Do you fix X?", "I have an emergency." Whatever your top three customer questions are, ask them, listen to the answer, and decide if it's right.
Re-testing after you change something
If you tweak the agent later (new prompt, new voice, new knowledge base) and want to hear the change before real customers do, the easiest option is to call your own number from a phone that isn't connected to your account. Your agent will answer exactly the way it will for any caller.
Things to listen for
- Pacing. Does the agent sound rushed or dragged out? You can tune response speed in the voice settings.
- Knowledge gaps. If the agent hedges or says "let me take a message," that's a signal to add information to the knowledge base.
- Tone. Does it sound like your business? If you're a funeral home, "Hey there!" is wrong. If you're a pizza shop, overly corporate is also wrong. Tweak the personality tone until it matches.
- Handoff triggers. If your agent escalates to a human on certain keywords (emergency, urgent, complaint), test each keyword to make sure the handoff works.
Going live
When the agent passes your tests, click the Activate button at the top of the agent configuration page (Dashboard → Agents → [your agent]). Real calls start routing to it immediately. Check the first few calls in Dashboard → Calls so you can catch any surprises in the first hour.
If you hit anything confusing, call us at (833) 309-4176 and we'll listen to the recording together.