Using Auto Answer to respond to an RFx in Word

 

QorusDocs' AI-powered Auto Answer analyzes questions, finds matching answers within a knowledge.

QorusDocs' AI-powered Auto Answer analyzes questions, finds matching answers within a knowledge base of your question-and-answer content, and pre-populates questionnaires with answers with the highest matching score - allowing you to get to draft really quickly on RFIs, RFPs, and any other questionnaires received from prospective clients.

Before you can use the magic of AI with Auto Answer, your QorusDocs should have at least one Auto Answer content source configured. You can learn more about how that works here. Then, if you haven’t done so already, you’ll also need to have the QorusDocs Add-in installed in Word.

In this article, we’ll explain how to:

1. Access Auto Answer in Word

2. Select the questions you want to answer

• Selecting questions inside a simple table
• Selecting questions inside a complex table
• Selecting questions outside a table

3. Set your Answer preferences

• The Q&A library QorusDocs should search.
• The Search Filters to apply(optional)
• Whether QorusDocs should insert answers or not and if so, where.
  • Answering questions inside a simple table
  • Answering questions in a complex table
  • Answering questions outside a table
• Answer sensitivity settings

4. Get a draft in seconds

• When QorusDocs is set to 'Auto Insert'
• When QorusDocs is set to 'Do not Auto Insert Answers (below or next to questions or question cells)

1.    Access Auto Answer in Word

In Word, with the RFx or vendor questionnaire open, log in to your QorusDocs Add-in. Then click on the more menu in the top nav (the three dots) and then on ‘Answer’:

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2. Select the questions you want to answer

In Word, questions can either be contained within a table, or they can be outside of a table.

Here’s what you should know about selecting questions in each case.

Selecting questions inside a simple table

When the table layout is simple and it follows a repeatable structure, where you can predict where the answer should go, select the whole table.

Here’s an example of a simple table where the questions and answers are in the same columns every time:

Here’s an example of another simple table, where the questions and answers are present in alternating rows, and the number of rows between the question and the answer are always the same (one row between each question and answer):

Selecting questions inside a complex table

Complex tables don’t follow a predictable structure.  They often include merged cells and have an inconsistent number of columns or rows between the questions and the places where the answer should go.

Here’s an example of a complex table:

For complex tables, either select a single cell, or a click inside the cell to select a single question, at a time. Otherwise, you might see some unexpected behavior or get selection errors.

Note: You can also select a single question at a time within a simple table. If the table layout is simple however and you do want QorusDocs to auto-populate your questionnaire, it’s a lot more efficient to select the whole table and have QorusDocs auto answer multiple questions at once, rather than one question at a time.

Selecting questions outside a table

You are free to select multiple questions at a time. Each question should be on their own separate line.

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3.     Set your Answering preferences

Next, once you’ve made your first question selection, you can set your answering preferences by clicking on the ‘gear’ icon to the right of the ‘Answer':

 

Here, you can specify:

• the Q&A library QorusDocs should search
• the search filters to apply (optional)
• whether answers should be inserted automatically, and if so, where
• the answer sensitivity settings to apply

When you click on ‘Answer’, QorusDocs will always use the last answer preferences you’ve set.

This means that if you’d like to apply different filters, use a different Auto Answer library, or adjust the sensitivity for another set of questions in the same Word document, you can do so by clicking on the gear icon and adjusting your answer preferences. Your adjusted preferences will apply to the questions you select next.

Or you could use the same answer preferences to respond to the whole RFx. It’s really up to you.

The Q&A library QorusDocs should search

You can have more than one Q&A library connected to QorusDocs. To select the one you’d like to use first (you can always select another one later), use the drop down menu:

The Search Filters to apply (optional)

If you’d like the Auto Answer AI to limit the search for matching answers to Q&A records that meet certain criteria, you can select these in the ‘filters’ drop-down menu (this is entirely optional):

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Whether QorusDocs should auto insert answers or not, and if so where

The options you see in the Answering preference window for ‘Insert Answer’ will depend on whether the questions you selected are contained within a table or not.

• Answering questions inside a simple table

If you have selected the whole table, your answering preferences window will look like this:

Here, you can choose to:

• Insert answers next to questions
• Insert answers below questions
• Do not auto insert answer

Insert answers next to questions

If the questions are contained in table that is vertically structured, where one column has all the questions, and another column has been left blank for the answers, and you would like QorusDocs to auto insert the answers into the table, you can choose this option.

Optionally, you can also specify the number of columns that separate the question column and the answer column. For example, if the client specifies the level of compliance for each requirement in a column adjacent to the question column (‘Must have’, ‘Should have’, ‘Could have’, etc.), then you would indicate that there’s 1 column between the questions and answers.

Insert answers below questions

If instead the table has questions and answers in alternating rows, and you would like QorusDocs to auto insert the highest matching answer it finds, then choose the option “insert answers below questions”, and then specify if there are any rows in between each question row and answer row (if there are none, leave it as “0”):

Do not Auto Insert Answer

When you select this option, QorusDocs Auto Answer won’t automatically pre-populate your table with the highest matching answers it finds.

Instead, you’ll be able to choose where to insert the answer for each question, at a granular level. It doesn’t have to be in the same column or in alternating rows.

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• Answering questions in a complex table

When you select an individual question within a complex table, a bit like this:

Then you’ll be presented with the following Answering Preferences to choose from:

Note: if you select a single question within a simple table, rather than the table as a whole, you will also have the options shown in the above screenshot.

Here’s what each of these do:

• Insert answer next to question
• Insert answer below question
• Do not auto insert answer
• Insert answer next to question cell
• Insert answer below question cell

Insert answer next to question

This is the very first option in the Answering preferences window:

This will insert the answer on the same line as the question, immediately next to it, like this:

 

Insert answer below question

The next option available is the ‘insert below question’:

This option inserts the answer immediately below the question, on a separate line, like this:

Do not auto insert answer

This works in exactly the same way as we described here. QorusDocs looks for potential answers but doesn’t automatically insert them.

Insert answer next to question cell

This also works in the same way as we described here. QorusDocs will insert the answer in a cell that is adjacent to the cell that contains the question. If there are any columns that separate the question-and-answer cells, you can specify how many there are.

Insert answer below question cell

We’ve described how this works earlier in this article here. QorusDocs will insert the answer in a cell that is below the cell that contains the question and can skip a few rows if there are any that lie between the question-and-answer cells.

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• Answering questions outside a table

You can either select one question at a time, or you can select multiple questions, provided that each question is on a separate line.

Once you have made your selection, your answering preferences window will offer up the following ‘Insert Answer’ options:

Here’s what each of these do:

• Insert answer next to question
• Insert answer below question
• Do not auto insert answer

Insert answers next to questions

When you select this option, QorusDocs will insert the answer immediately next to the question text, leaving a space between the question and the answer.

Insert answers below questions

When you select this option, QorusDocs will insert the answer on a separate line immediately below the question text.

Do not Auto Insert Answer

This works in exactly the same way as we’ve described above. QorusDocs will find matching answers but will not automatically insert them, leaving it up to you to choose where you’d like QorusDocs to insert each answer for every question.

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Answer Sensitivity Settings

Then the last preference setting is the ‘Answer Sensitivity’ QorusDocs should apply. This determines the minimum percentage match score an answer must meet before it gets included in the matching answer search results returned by the Auto Answer AI:  

If you have a lot of Q&A content, you can increase the sensitivity so that the results include only the very top matching answers.

For example, setting this to 60% (as shown above) will ensure that only answers with a 60% or more match score are returned.

Alternatively, you can broaden the match score range to include responses with a lower percentage match by decreasing the ‘Answer Sensitivity’. This also broadens the range of possible matches.

When you’re done, click ‘Save preferences'.

Tip: Using the Answer Sensitivity Settings efficiently Let’s say you have on average about 7 matching answers to each question, where the answer match score lies in the range of somewhere between 80% and 100%. When you have a long questionnaire of several hundred questions, browsing through 7 matching answers for each question will take a really long time. To cut down on the number of results, you could narrow the range of the answer sensitivity settings to the 90% to 100% range, so only matching answers with a score between 90% and 100% are returned.  Say these returns 2 results. One of these answers is likely to be the right one for most questions. For questions where this is not the case though, the most efficient approach is to shift the slider to the next best slice of matching answers rather than simply expanding it. QorusDocs will return the next best set of matching answers if you change the sensitivity from the 90% - 100% range, to the 80% - 90% range on the second pass. This would return the other 5 results that you have not yet reviewed. If you were to simply expand the sensitivity settings from the 90% to 100% range, to a broader 80% to 100% range – QorusDocs will return all 7 results, which would again include the first two results from the 90% - 100% range you’ve already seen. That’s why proceeding in slices is more efficient. It’s good to know that you can change the Auto Answer sensitivity settings at any time, and you’re free to run Auto Answer multiple times on the same question with different settings applied.

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4. Get to draft in seconds

Now that your preferences have been set, with the questions you’d like QorusDocs to answer selected, click ‘Answer’ in the QorusDocs Add-in.

 

What happens next depends on whether you chose to have QorusDocs auto insert the answers or not.

When QorusDocs is set to auto insert answers (below or next to questions or question cells)

Within seconds, you’ll see your document get populated with the highest matching answers, while other possible matches are made available for you to review in the QorusDocs Add-in:

When QorusDocs is set to 'do not auto insert answers'

Within seconds, you’ll see the QorusDocs Add-in fill up with answers, but the Word document will remain unchanged:

Next: Review answers, insert, complete, and suggest improvements

When you’re ready to review the draft answers, insert them, and possibly suggest improvements or edit answers to suit the exact requirements of your client, you can learn how to do that here. 

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