Workflow stages

A generation passes through six stages in order. Stages may be revisited and repeated at any time. Reaching a stage does not require the previous stage to be complete.

Open a stage from the stage progress list on the project page, or from the numbered circles at the top of any stage page.

The six stages

Number	Stage	What the stage does	Primary action
1	Design	Produces and revises a product specification from consumer intent and competing products	Start Analysis
2	Analyse	Finds competitors, compares price and specification, and reports the gap against the current specification	Compile Competitors
3	VOC	Clusters customer pain points from reviews and returns into a report and a factory dataset	Extract Pain Points
4	Iterate	Combines analysis, VOC findings and notes into an improved specification version	Draft New Spec Version
5	Generate	Produces listing copy and images that follow the brand guidelines	Generate
6	Reflect	Not available. The stage opens and shows Coming soon in place of its action	None

The Analyse stage carries eight research modules of its own. See The Analyse stage.

The stage page

Region	Contents
Stage header	The six numbered stages. The current stage is highlighted
Welcome text	What this stage does, and the note You can come back anytime!
File rail	An upload area and a file finder filtered to this stage's file types
Conversation	The messages of the current thread
Action bar	The primary action, and any secondary actions for this stage
Thread switcher	Every thread in this stage, plus New thread

Holding a conversation

1. Enter the message. Press Enter to send, or Shift+Enter for a new line.
2. The reply streams into the thread as it is produced.
3. Select Stop to interrupt a reply.

An interrupted reply is marked in the thread and its content is carried into the next turn.

Feature	Detail
Project context	The project record, the current specification, recent files and Notes for AI are supplied to the model on every turn
Model	Selected from Model. Leave on Default (stage routing) to use the stage's own model
Activity	Each tool the model uses appears as a chip: Searching, Reading page, Saving file, Generating image and others
Sources	Cited pages are listed under Sources below the reply
Retry	Retry resends the last message after a failure

Attachments

1. Select Attach, or drop files onto the conversation.
2. The files are listed above the composer.
3. Send the message.

Attach up to ten files per turn. Each file is limited to 25 MB. Slate reads PDF, Excel, Word, CSV, Markdown and plain text files, and reads images directly.

Skills

Skills are written playbooks the model can load: keyword research, FBA fee calculation, competitor analysis and others.

1. Type / in the composer.
2. Move through the list with the arrow keys.
3. Press Enter to add the skill to this turn.

Invoke up to ten skills per turn. Slate also loads the skills relevant to the current stage without being asked. Press Escape to close the picker.

Threads

A stage holds any number of threads. Use a second thread to run a separate line of investigation.

Action	Effect
New thread	Starts an empty thread in this stage
Rename thread	Renames the thread. Type a name and press Enter
Archive thread	Hides the thread from the recent lists
Restore	Returns an archived thread to the active list

Running a stage action

Select the primary action in the bottom right of the conversation. Slate starts a job, shows its progress inline, and writes the output to the project files.

Condition	Behaviour
Job running	Progress appears inline with a link reading View in Jobs
Job complete	The file lists refresh automatically
Job failed	The failure is shown with the reason. Retrying resumes from the last checkpoint
Another member already started it	The button reports Already started by another member and starts nothing

Running a stage action requires the operator project role or above.

Secondary actions

Some stages carry extra actions beside the primary one.

Stage	Secondary action	Requires
Design	Positioning	A VOC conclusion in this generation
Analyse	Market report	Nothing
VOC	Synthesis brief	The product problem report in this generation
Generate	Generate manual	A product specification in this generation
Generate	Compliance check	Nothing

A secondary action whose requirement is unmet is disabled. Hover the button to read what is missing. Material from an earlier generation is never reused.

The VOC stage

The VOC stage turns review exports and returns exports into a product problem report and a dataset the factory can act on.

1. Upload the review export and the returns export through the file rail.
2. Select Extract Pain Points.

Slate finds the uploaded files itself. It produces a deterministic report with severity bands, an evidence count for each problem, and a trace from each piece of evidence back to its file, sheet, row and ASIN. A separate summary written by the model is produced alongside it.

Property	Detail
Personal data	Reviewer names and profile addresses are hashed at ingestion. Profile images are discarded
Evidence	Up to three customer quotes per problem, and up to eight problems per product line. Any withheld count is stated under the table
Returns reasons	Grouped into a top six table per product line. Ambiguous reason codes are listed separately for you to place
Carrier and warehouse damage	Counted as its own category, never as a product fault

Category return rate comparison

The returns export carries no sales figure, and category baselines are external market knowledge. Both rates must therefore be entered by hand.

1. Open the return rate panel in the VOC stage.
2. Select Add row.
3. Enter the product family, the site, the category rate and your own rate.
4. Select Save.

Slate derives the percentage point gap, the multiple and the pressure verdict on save. The figures you enter travel into a report the factory reads, and are marked UNVERIFIED throughout. Left empty, the comparison section does not appear in the report at all.

The Generate stage

The Generate stage produces listing copy and product images from the latest specification. Select Generate v1 to produce the first draft.

Feature	Detail
Fields	Title, About this item bullets, Product description and Backend search terms
Counters	Each field shows characters or bytes used against its cap
Compliance	Each field carries a badge listing its errors and warnings. Select the badge to read them
Preview	Desktop and Mobile. Mobile marks where the title is cut
Tracked changes	A word level comparison against the previous version
Lock	A locked field is skipped when the draft is regenerated
Tell AI	Sends a fix instruction for one field into the conversation
Send for review	Sends one field to a chosen reviewer
Images	Seven roles: Main, Lifestyle, Infographic, Dimensions, Material, Comparison, Secondary
Image export	Download all images (ZIP)
Versions	Save as new version. Earlier versions remain readable

The price shown beside the copy comes from the Analyse stage price bands and carries the UNVERIFIED fee marking.

The Iterate stage

The Iterate stage combines the analysis, the VOC findings and your notes into a new specification version.

Panel	Contents
Output Sets	Every specification version produced in this generation
Final Files	The files marked as final for this generation

Related

• The Analyse stage covers the eight research modules.
• Files covers uploads and reading the files a stage produces.
• Jobs and review covers job progress and approvals.
• Diagnostics covers conditions encountered in a stage.