If you've got a quick "how do I do this" question and don't want to leave the page you're on, AI Help is built for that. It's a small "Ask AI" input that lives in the top toolbar of every screen in the app, plus a second copy of the same feature tucked inside the Help icon's popover. Type a plain-English question, get a short answer with links back to the knowledge base — no new tab, no page navigation, no losing your place.
Two ways to open it
Both entry points run the same underlying feature; they just live in different spots.
The header input. Look for the "Ask AI about anything in the software…" box in the top toolbar, marked with a sparkles icon and a small "⌘K" badge on the right. Click it, start typing, or press Cmd+K (Mac) or Ctrl+K (Windows/Linux) from anywhere in the app — you don't need to already be focused on the box — and a popover titled "AI Help" opens right underneath it, cursor ready. On narrower screens this collapses to a sparkles-only icon button next to your other header controls.
The Help icon. The "?" icon in the header opens a general Help popover with a few options. The top block inside it, labeled "Ask AI" with a small "Grounded in the KB" tag, is the same question box — it just sits alongside links to the full knowledge base, guided tours, and contact support instead of standing alone.
Either way, it's a popover, not a modal: it drops open under whichever control you used, doesn't dim or lock the rest of the screen, and the page behind it stays visible while you type. Press Escape or click anywhere outside the popover to close it.
One thing worth knowing: these are two separate boxes with separate conversations. Asking something in the header's AI Help popover won't show up if you later open the Help icon's Ask AI section, and vice versa — pick one and stick with it for a given question.
Asking a question
Type your question and press Enter (or click the send button). While it's working you'll see a short loading state — the header version shows "Thinking…" — and the full answer lands at once rather than streaming in word by word.
Keep questions to how SalesThumb works — "how do I send a quote by SMS," "where do I change my hours," "how do refunds work." AI Help answers from the SalesThumb knowledge base only — the same articles published at /kb, including this one. It doesn't look at your shop's own records: no customers, invoices, revenue, or schedule. If you need something that reads your shop's actual data — and can even draft (never auto-send) a customer message or a reschedule — that's a separate tool called "Ask SalesThumb," reached from the AI Tools hub rather than from Cmd+K; see the dedicated article on it in this KB.
If your question isn't covered by anything in the knowledge base, AI Help says so rather than guessing, and points you to browse the KB or contact support instead of inventing an answer.
Reading the answer and its citations
When an answer draws on a specific article, you'll see small pill-shaped chips inline or underneath the reply — each one is a KB article slug, like `getting-started`. Click a chip and it takes you straight to that article's full page if you want more detail than the short popover answer gives you. Treat the popover answer as the quick version and the linked article as the complete one.
Asking a follow-up
You're not limited to one question per visit. Ask a follow-up in the same popover and it keeps the thread of the conversation — a shorthand follow-up like "where do I see that at the shop level" still works because it remembers what "that" refers to from your prior question, without you having to restate the whole thing. The header version also has a small "Reset" link once you've asked something, if you want to clear the thread and start over; the Help icon's version doesn't have a Reset control, so refreshing the page is how you clear that one.
If AI Help isn't available
A couple of things can block it, and the popover tells you which:
- Not configured yet. If the platform hasn't had an Anthropic API key set up, you'll see a notice that AI Help isn't configured yet — that's an infrastructure setting controlled by SalesThumb, not something you configure per shop.
- Plan doesn't include it. AI Help isn't part of the Free trial — it's included starting on the Starter plan and up. If your shop is on a plan below that, you'll see an upgrade message instead of an answer.
- Monthly quota reached. Plans that include AI Help still have a monthly usage cap. If your shop has used it up for the month, you'll see a notice that the allowance resets next month (or that an admin can raise the cap).
None of these are things you fix from the popover itself — they're plan or admin-level settings, and the message you see tells you which one applies.
Frequently asked questions
Q: What's the difference between AI Help (Cmd+K) and the Cmd+Shift+K search?
A: They're different tools. Cmd+K (or Ctrl+K) opens AI Help — the Ask AI popover covered in this article, which answers how-to questions from the knowledge base. Cmd+Shift+K opens a separate command-palette-style search for jumping to records and pages in the app. If you're trying to find a customer, quote, or a specific page, use Cmd+Shift+K instead.
Q: Does AI Help know about my shop's own data — my customers, invoices, or revenue?
A: No. AI Help only answers from the SalesThumb knowledge base — the same public articles at /kb. It doesn't look at your shop's records. For a tool that reads your actual shop data (and can draft, but never auto-send, a message or reschedule), see the separate "Ask SalesThumb" chat, reached from the AI Tools hub rather than from Cmd+K.
Q: How do I know which article an answer came from?
A: Look for the small chip(s) shown with the answer — each one names a KB article slug and links to that article's full page. Click through if you want more detail than the short popover answer gives.
Q: Why does the popover tell me to upgrade instead of answering?
A: AI Help isn't included on the Free trial — it's part of every plan starting at Starter. If your shop is below that tier, you'll get an upgrade message instead of an answer. If you're on a plan that includes it but see a different message about a monthly allowance, that's the usage quota, not the plan — it resets next month.
Q: Can I ask a follow-up question, or does every question start over?
A: You can ask follow-ups in the same popover and it keeps context from earlier in that conversation. Note the header's AI Help box and the Help icon's Ask AI box are separate conversations from each other, so follow-ups only work within whichever one you started in.