Write a Single Prompt

Learn how to write effective prompts that your AI agent can follow reliably.

Creating a Prompt Within Your Agent

The single prompt approach allows you to define your agent’s behavior with one comprehensive prompt. It’s straightforward and great for simple use cases.

Good prompt writing is the most important part of building your agent—it can make your agent work great or not so much. This guide shows you what we’ve learned about writing prompts that agents can follow better and more consistently.

This guide is updated regularly as we learn new things. If you have ideas or feedback, please share them with us.

To see examples of good prompts, check out the templates in your Dashboard by creating a new agent and selecting a template.

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Breaking Prompts into Sections

When writing prompts, it’s best to break them into smaller sections. This makes them easier for you to edit and easier for the LLM to understand.

## Identity

You are a friendly AI assistant for UponAI. ....

## Style Guardrails
Be concise: ...
Be conversational: ...

...

## Response Guideline

Return dates in their spoken forms: ...
Ask up to one question at a time: ...

...

## Task

1. Greet the user

...

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Write Tasks as Steps

When writing your prompt, write your tasks in numbered order like steps. This helps the agent space things out and not ask everything in one long question.

## Task

1. Ask for user's name.
2. Ask if user needs a refund, a replacement, or is just retrieving information.
   - if user needs a refund, transition to refund state.
   - if user needs a replacement, transition to replacement state.
3. If user is just retrieving information, ask for the order number.

If your agent doesn’t pause and asks all steps as one large question, spell out exactly what you want:

## Task

1. Inform user why you are calling.
2. Ask user's name.

Wait for user response

3. Ask if user needs a refund, a replacement, or is just retrieving information.

Wait for user response
   - if user needs a refund, transition to refund state.
   - if user needs a replacement, transition to replacement state.

4. Ask for the order number.

Wait for user response

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Prompting More In-depth

It’s recommended to spell things out clearly for the agent to get the best results. The more explicit your instructions, the more consistent your agent’s behavior.

Example — Appointment or Demo Booking:

If a customer requests to book an appointment or demo, follow these steps:

1. Ask for full name.
2. Ask for preferred date and time.
3. Invoke check_available_appointments and return available slots.
4. Ask for company name.
5. Ask for full email address:
   - If spelled out: n-a-m-e-@-dot-com → interpret as [e-mail]
   - "name at" → interpret as name@
   - "dot com" → interpret as .com
6. Ask for purpose of the appointment.
7. Ask for best phone number:
   - Accepted formats: 4158923245, [phone], 415-892-3245
   - Pronounce as: "four one five - eight nine two - three two four five"
   - Important: Keep spaces around the dash when speaking
8. Reconfirm preferred date and time if needed.
9. Confirm all details (name, purpose, date, time, email, phone) with the caller.
10. Invoke book_appointment function.

If the agent says a phrase or phone number too quickly, instruct it to repeat slowly.