Zest & Common: Talk about a record; decide on the record.
Conversations (Zest) keeps messages, mail, meetings and visits attached to the record they are about, with decisions shown above the discussion. Common provides Directory, Sign, Gather (forms) and Gate (visitors).
What does Kinnow Zest & Common do? Zest keeps messages, mail, meetings and visits attached to the record they are about, with decisions shown above the discussion. Common provides Directory, Sign, Gather (forms) and Gate (visitors). Nothing is filed, paid or posted without a person.
Monday morning, before and after
A distributor with a head office, two branches and a field sales team usually runs its conversations in a WhatsApp group, its mail in individual inboxes, and its decisions nowhere.
| Conversations today | Conversations on Kinnow |
|---|---|
| "Did we ever hear back from the steel supplier?" is asked in a group at 9 pm and takes four people half an hour | Still out lists what you are waiting on, longest silence first: unsigned, unanswered, gone quiet |
| A short-paid invoice is discussed over three mails and a call; the outcome is in somebody's memory | Press Discuss on the invoice; the conversation belongs to that record and the decision sits above the discussion |
| A rep's call report is a form on a laptop at 7 pm for a visit at 11:40 | One screen with two boxes and a button; the time recorded is when the rep pressed capture |
| Applications, supplier details and pulse checks arrive as a spreadsheet of forwarded emails | A form with a link anyone can fill in; responses are ranked, scored against your own criteria and kept on the record |
See what your own Monday looks like with the waiting and the silent in one list. Ask us to show Zest on a sample of your records.
See it work
A real cycle: a short-paid invoice, from first message to decision
| Step | Who | What Kinnow does | Where a person decides |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1. Open on the record | Accounts executive | Discuss on the invoice opens a conversation that already knows which invoice it is, who it is with, how much and what is due | The executive writes the first line; a conversation is never started empty |
| 2. Bring the mail in | Accounts executive | Mail from the customer is already filed on the customer or order if the sender matched; otherwise Kinnow offers it for one click | The executive confirms the place |
| 3. Get ready for the call | Sales manager | Get me ready reads the conversation and the record before the meeting and says what it read | Manager confirms the price and runs it |
| 4. Log what was agreed | Sales manager | Find what was agreed suggests decisions and who took on what, each with the message it came from | Nothing is recorded until the manager presses Mark as agreed |
| 5. Record the decision | Finance head | The decision comes first in the conversation: what was decided and why; or close with no decision and say why | If a colleague decides at the same moment, only one decision is kept, and you see theirs |
| 6. Chase the silence | Accounts executive | The Still out band shows the customer's reply as the number of days of silence, until they answer | Executive chooses when to chase |
| 7. Sign the revised terms | Finance head and customer | Kinnow Sign sends a private link to each signer; the signed copy comes back with a certificate | Nobody can sign for the other party |
How a conversation moves, step by step
Pick one open dispute or one stuck quote. We will take it through Zest with you.
What each part does
Conversations
Press Discuss on an invoice, a purchase bill or a lease. A private conversation is between the people you name and no one else, including an administrator; it can later be moved onto a record, with a warning that everyone who can see the record will read all of it. Messages cannot be edited or deleted. Clicking any name opens the person: who they report to and who they cover for.
Gmail and Outlook conversations filed on the customer or order they are about. Mail marks an email Important when your provider does or when it looks like an invoice, bank-detail change or payment advice; it is only a suggestion, and shows why.
Meetings
Meetings are booked against a record, with booking pages and rooms; a booking sets the time that appears under Ahead on the Day. Get me ready before a meeting and Summarise afterwards are helpers you choose to run. Kinnow has no note-taker for meetings with outside parties; only Google Meet or Teams recordings are used, and only for internal meetings.
Forms and surveys
Pick what you are asking for. Evaluate ranks named applicants against criteria you wrote. Fill proposes a fact to enter in a record. Measure is an anonymous quick survey of how people feel. Attest has people confirm each line. Start from a ready-made ask such as a cohort application, supplier details, a quarterly pulse survey or a quarterly compliance confirmation. The assistant scores and ranks but cannot shortlist or reject anyone; that is your decision.
Visitor gate
On site now lists everyone checked in and not checked out, all on one page with no search, because it is the list you would use in an evacuation. An expired pass stays on the list marked Overdue. If the visitor list cannot be read, the screen says so.
Org chart
Who reports to whom, which decides who signs off. If the chart has not been built, the screen says so instead of implying nobody reports to anyone.
Documents, lists and reports
| Output | What it shows |
|---|---|
| The Day | Three bands: Ahead, Landed and Still out, with the clock always showing the time since, or until, a person did something |
| Conversations list | Conversations with their decisions first; one that runs on is flagged as owing an answer |
| Form responses | Best first, each with a score out of 5 against your criteria, a one-line summary, a link to the words the score came from, and your decision; plus how many are still to reply |
| On site now | Everyone checked in, with overdue passes marked |
| Signature tracker and certificate | What is out, who has not signed, when each signed; a certificate with signer, time and a fingerprint of the document, which anyone can check without seeing the content |
Helpers that work here
These run only when you press them. Each shows its cost and what it will read, and asks you to confirm. They have no separate agent pages.
| Helper | What it does | What it does not do |
|---|---|---|
| Summarise (mail, meeting) | Short summary of a conversation or meeting notes | Send, share or move anything |
| Write it for me | Puts an AI draft in the reply box, marked as such | Send the reply |
| Find what was agreed | Suggests what was decided and who took it on, with the source message | Record it before you press Mark as agreed |
| Application scorer, detail picker, confirmation reviewer, survey summary | Scores responses with the words they came from, proposes values from an attached document, describes the evidence for each line, writes up survey results | Shortlist, reject, write into a record, or mark a line satisfied |
Each helper is checked with you before it works on your records, and everything it produces waits for a person.
Ask Kinnow, for this area
Ask in plain English; answers show where they came from and stay within what you may see.
| Question | What the answer contains |
|---|---|
| What are we waiting on from customers this week | The Still out band: items with whom they sit, and days silent |
| What did we decide about the Gulf Steel dispute | The decision in that conversation, with who decided and when |
| Who has not filled in the supplier details form | Responses received against the number invited, so you see who is still to reply |
Bring the three conversations that always go missing. We will show where each would live.
Controls an owner cares about
- Posting needs Member access on Zest or above; a Viewer can only read. Access is given service by service, so someone can have forms and not mail.
- A private conversation cannot be read by anyone outside it, including an administrator, and its people are fixed when it starts.
- A form link is shown once and stored in scrambled form; changing it stops every link already sent. The link also stops working when the form closes.
- Anonymous surveys keep no name, email or user ID, and hold back results for groups smaller than three.
- Keeping an audio recording of a visit is refused where Kinnow has not established what the law allows in that country or state; typed notes are always allowed.
- Kinnow Sign, our e-signature, uses links meant for one person each; nobody, including the sender, can sign on behalf of a counterparty.
- Veil, our privacy layer, holds names and ID numbers back before AI calls; it covers Ask Kinnow and most agents today.
Connects to
Discuss appears on records in Sell, Buy and Pact. Files from conversations go to Vault. The company chart decides who signs off, as set in Admin. Form answers can fill in records, and a shortlisted applicant on a form tied to a programme cohort enters the incubation pipeline at Shortlisted. WhatsApp and SMS go through Serve. Kinnow Sign is also described under capabilities.
Questions
Does Zest cost extra?
Zest and Common are part of Kinnow with no licence fee and no per-user fee. A few helpers, such as summarising an email or scoring a form response, use AI, and each one shows what it will do and asks you to confirm before it runs.
How is Zest different from team chat?
Every conversation is attached to a record and ends in a recorded decision, or an honest no-decision, shown above the discussion. Posted messages cannot be edited or deleted, so a wrong turn is answered, not rewritten. Retention follows the record. There is no @mention or presence yet.
Can a customer visit be captured from the phone?
Yes, in the phone browser. The time recorded is when you pressed capture, and a repeated save cannot create two visits. A capture made with no signal at all is not saved for later yet, and there is no offline app.
Are calls and WhatsApp covered?
Not as separate channels. The Day is blind to phone calls today. WhatsApp and SMS go through the channels in Serve, because Zest has no messaging service of its own.
Can we connect our company mailbox?
Yes, Gmail or Outlook, once an administrator has listed the company's email domains. Kinnow then checks for new mail every few minutes, files each message on the customer or order it is about where it can match the sender, and offers the rest for one click. It does not act on what an email says. Syncing is built and tested; we agree the mail setup with you before connecting a live mailbox.
What happens when a helper gets it wrong?
Nothing is sent, shared, moved or recorded by a helper. Write it for me puts an AI draft in the reply box for you to edit. Find what was agreed shows the message each suggestion came from, and nothing is recorded until you press Mark as agreed. A person always decides.
Is the anonymous pulse survey really anonymous?
Yes. A survey stores no name, email or user ID, stores the date and not the time, and reports only for groups of three or more. A smaller group is shown as held back, not hidden. You cannot ask for a file on one.
Inside this page
Conversations
Discuss an invoice on the invoice, and record the decision.
Gmail and Outlook threads filed on the customer or order.
Meetings
Book on a record, with the agenda built from what's still open.
Forms & surveys
Applications, data requests, pulse surveys and attestations.
Visitor gate
Who is on site right now, built to double as the evacuation list.
Org chart
Reporting lines that approvals follow.
Start with one need. Switch on the next in a day. Same records, same login, no new licence.
Tell Kinnow what slows you down.
Answer three questions. Get the applications, the agents and a two-week plan for your business.