On an agent's Agent tab you set three things before the steps: the Goal (what to achieve), the Triggers (what starts a run) and the Cadence (how it keeps going). Scope, such as "only companies from the website form", belongs in the goal.
Goal
The goal is free text. The agent reads it on every run, so it is both the brief and the rulebook. Put the outcome first, then the scope, then the stop condition, then any hard rules. Keep it under a short paragraph. If you find yourself writing ten rules, you probably want two agents.
Triggers
Triggers are the workspace events that start a run on a specific record. Events you will see in the Triggers column of the Agents list include:
New Company: a company is created, whether manually, by CSV import, by a Database reveal, by the API or by another agent.
Deal Updated: a deal changes, for example its stage, amount or a custom field.
Webhook: another tool posts JSON to the agent's own URL (see the webhook article).
An agent can have several triggers or none. With no trigger it only runs when you enroll it on a record or run it from the Action Bar. Timeline activity such as a logged call can also act as a signal for agents that react to record events, which is how a Call Debrief agent picks up right after you hang up.
A trigger says when, not which. New Company fires for every new company. To narrow it, add a condition to the goal.
Scoping with conditions in the goal
Write the filter as the first sentence of the goal and tell the agent what to do when the condition is not met:
Only act on companies whose Source field is "Website form". For any other company, do nothing and end the run.Only act when the deal moved into "Went Cold". Ignore all other deal updates.Only act on deals with an amount above 5000.Skip any company that already has an owner.
Because the agent checks the condition at the start of each run, a run that ends immediately costs very little. Still, if a trigger fires thousands of times a day and the agent only cares about a handful, prefer a webhook or an on-demand run so the agent is only started when it matters.
Cadence
Cadence controls how the agent keeps working after the first step. Continuous means the agent carries on through its steps, honoring any waits you wrote ("wait 2 days"), until the sequence finishes or the AI Analyzer sees a response. Waits and timing live in the steps and goal, for example "wait two business days between touches" or "send the second message three days after the first".
Putting it together
A win-back agent might look like this: Trigger Deal Updated. Cadence Continuous. Goal: Only act when a deal moves into "Went Cold". Send a short personal email referencing the last conversation, wait 4 days, send one SMS, wait 5 days, send a final email with a booking link. Stop as soon as they reply or book. Never contact a company more than once per quarter.
Related
Steps and the AI Analyzer
Webhook-triggered agents
Pipelines and deals: stages, board, won and lost
Good agent goals: examples you can copy