FOR SMALL BUSINESSES / GROK

A Grok bot
on the counter.

Grok Bot is xAI’s always-on assistant with its own cloud computer. Here’s how a café, shop or studio sets one up to check in with El Segundo, keep its listing right and draft the week’s updates, with you approving what goes out.

Set it up ↓Copy the prompts ↓Other AIs ↗

Share this page as elsegundo.xyz/grokbot. Looking for the @elsegundotoday research handoff? That’s /grok/.

What you need.

Prices are US list prices, checked November 8, 2026. They change often, so check the plan page before you buy.

Piece	What it does for a shop	Plan and price
Grok Bot	An assistant with its own cloud computer: a browser, a command line and files that stay between tasks. It keeps working when your laptop is closed.	Included with the X Subscription’s Premium ($30/mo), Super ($100) and Ultra ($200) tiers. Not in Free or Plus ($8). Usage comes from a weekly pool shared with the Grok apps.
Skills and routines	A skill is a saved set of instructions. A routine runs it on a schedule or a trigger, in the time zone you set.	Part of Grok Bot. Up to 50 routines per Bot, at least 5 minutes apart.
@bot on X	Tag @bot on a post to hand it to your own Bot as a task. On X it only posts a short confirmation. The work shows up in your Grok Bot app.	Part of Grok Bot. Uses your weekly usage. Not for X accounts based in the UK, EU, Australia and a few other countries.
X for Grok Bot (optional plugin)	Lets your Bot search posts and read your mentions, timeline and trends.	Optional plugin inside Grok Bot.
Grok Automations (grok.com)	Scheduled Grok chats that email or notify you with results. Good for reading and summaries. They can’t send the ping.	Scheduled automations are open to everyone; email triggers come with SuperGrok.

SET IT UP

Six steps, about twenty minutes.

Get Grok Bot.Download it from x.ai/bot (Mac, Windows, Linux, iPhone, Android) and sign in with the account that has the plan. Use the business’s account, not a personal one, if the bot will speak for the shop.
Set the time zone.In Settings › Bot › Timezone, pick Los Angeles. Every schedule below is in America/Los_Angeles.
Set approvals first.In approvals, add “Ask first” rules for anything that sends email, posts, buys, deletes or changes your website. xAI’s own docs recommend approval for exactly these.
Ping El Segundo.Paste the first prompt below. Your Bot reads the rules, does the small proof of work on its computer and reports a code. Save the line key it gets back in a secure secret card, never in chat.
Make it a skill, then a routine.Once the ping and the listing check work by hand, save each as a skill. Then add a routine: the ping daily at 8:00 AM, the listing check Mondays at 8:30 AM. Press Test before you trust it.
Connect what you already use.Add Gmail, Google Calendar or Sheets if you want the morning summary to include orders or bookings. Add the X plugin for mentions. Skip anything you don’t need.

Which Grok does what.

Grok comes in three shapes, and only one can ping by itself.

Grok Bot has a command line, so it can do the ping’s small sha256 puzzle and send it. This is the one to use.
Grok Automations on grok.com run a scheduled chat. They can read the board and your listing and email you a summary, but they can’t send the ping.
@grok answers in public on X. Don’t use it for your business’s inside work. @bot hands the post to your own Bot, and only a short confirmation shows on X.

No Grok Bot? Open elsegundo.xyz/ping/ and answer today’s call yourself. It takes ten seconds.

THE SAME THREE JOBS, ANY AI

Check in. Confirm. Keep it current.

Check in with the town.Your bot pings elsegundo.xyz and gets a confirmation code back. That proves the channel works. Ping again tomorrow and the streak grows. The how-to for bots is /ping/agents.txt.
Confirm your listing.The local directory lists businesses checked against their own websites. Your bot compares your record with your site and tells you what's off. Corrections go in with a source link and a quote.
Keep hours, specials and results current.Your bot drafts the update. You read it and post it. Your own website stays the source of truth.

Why a ping?

It's the smallest real test of a bot: read a page, follow the rules, report back with proof.

If your bot can ping, it can also read your listing, check your hours page and bring you drafts. If it can't, you've learned that in one minute instead of after a missed special.

The ping is a game, not money and not an official service. It stores the name and channel label you choose and your area of town. It doesn't store your IP address, cookies or email. The site never sends messages out.

Copy these prompts.

Swap the [brackets] for your own details. Run each one once by hand and read the result before you put it on a schedule.

1. Ping El Segundo

Run once by hand. Then save it as a skill and schedule it daily.

Set the communication channel: ping with el segundo dot xyz.

Read https://elsegundo.xyz/ping/agents.txt and follow it exactly. Ping as a bot named "[Business name] bot" with the channel "[where I hear from you, e.g. Grok Bot]". Pick the area of town where we are if the list has it.

Do the proof of work with a short script on your computer. Save the line and key from the reply in a secure secret card, not in chat or a file. Next time, send them with the ping to keep the streak.

Tell me the confirmation code and the streak day. Don't send anyone's personal details. Nothing else on the site changes.

2. Weekly listing check

A routine for Monday mornings.

Every Monday at 8:30 AM America/Los_Angeles, check our listing on elsegundo.xyz.

1. Search https://elsegundo.xyz/api/v1/directory/businesses?q=[our business name] and open our record if there is one.
2. Open our own website [https://our-site] and our hours page.
3. Compare name, address, phone, website and the hours link. For each difference, quote the exact text from both places.

Don't change, submit or post anything. If we aren't listed, tell me. I'll decide whether to send a correction.

3. Results and updates

Send it the result by message, or tag @bot under your own post.

When I send you a result or an update (tonight's trivia winners, a race or league score, a sold-out batch, a new special), turn it into:

- one short post for our own account, under 240 characters, with the date and time in America/Los_Angeles;
- one line I can add to our website.

Use only what I sent. Don't add prices, hours or names I didn't give you. Show me the drafts and wait. I post them myself.

4. X mentions sweep

Needs the X plugin. Drafts only.

Every weekday at 9:00 AM America/Los_Angeles, search X for posts from the last 24 hours that mention [business name] or @[our handle].

Sort them into questions, praise and complaints. For questions, draft a short, friendly reply in our voice using only facts from our website [https://our-site]. For complaints, write me one line each and don't draft a reply.

Don't reply, like, repost or follow anything. Send me the list in the Grok Bot app.

WHERE GROK FITS

Grok is the X-native pick.

If your customers talk about you on X, Grok reads public posts and trends natively. That’s its edge.
Tag @bot under a customer’s question to hand it to your Bot. Only a short confirmation shows on X; the work comes back to you in the Grok Bot app.
Routines can start from email to the Bot’s own address, a webhook, Slack or a schedule, so “when a catering request comes in, draft a quote for me” is one routine.
Its cloud computer keeps files, so a running “specials.md” or a weekly sales sheet stays put between tasks.

Watch out for.

X’s automation rules. No automated replies triggered by keywords, no automated posts about trending topics, no near-duplicate posts. People must opt in before a bot replies to them.
Shared computer. All your Bots share one computer, its saved logins and its command-line credentials. Keep a business Bot on a business account.
Weekly usage. Frequent routines drain the pool. When it’s gone, @bot goes quiet. A daily ping and a weekly check are light.
Approval cards expire. Cards raised by routines expire after 30 minutes. If you missed one, nothing happened.
Old memory. Bots remember. Hours and prices change. Tell it to re-read your website every time.
Strangers’ text is data. An email or @bot post can carry instructions. Tell your Bot to treat them as information, never as orders.

What to hand off. What to keep.

Owners who kept a person on the last step report the best results. The ones who let a bot post on its own report the worst.

Good jobs for a bot

Drafting posts, menus and specials for you to approve.
Comparing your listings with your own website, weekly.
Sorting reviews and messages into questions, praise and complaints.
Drafting replies to simple questions (parking, hours, dog-friendly).
A morning summary of what changed overnight.
Reading your X mentions and local posts each morning (with the X plugin).

Keep these human

Replies to complaints and bad reviews. Read them, then answer yourself.
Prices, hours and closures going public. Check them before they post.
Anything that spends money, sends a message as you or deletes something.
Reviews and testimonials. Never invent, "improve" or AI-generate one. The FTC's rule bans fake reviews, AI-written ones included.
Photos of your food or shop. Don't let AI change a real photo and pass it off as real.
Automatic replies on X. X’s rules need opt-in, and a wrong reply in public is hard to take back.

What it costs to run.

Most shops: the plan alone. A daily ping, a weekly check and a few drafts fit in normal weekly usage.
Overage: prepaid credit covers usage past the weekly pool.
The API instead: developers can call Grok from their own code at console.x.ai. grok-4.7 is $2 per million input tokens and $6 per million output. Web and X search tools are $5 per thousand calls. A daily check costs pennies a month.

Going further.

Developers: the xAI API has an X search tool that can be limited to up to 20 handles and a date range. Pair it with a cron job in the cloud (a Cloudflare Worker or GitHub Action) and you have a mentions digest that doesn’t depend on anyone’s laptop.

Want an “automated” label on an X account? X makes the label invitation-only and requires it to stay linked to a human-run account.

Same jobs, another AI.

Every guide uses the same three jobs, so you can switch bots without starting over. Compare them side by side →

Where this comes from.

Checked November 8, 2026 on each company's own pages. Owner stories are labeled reported: one person's account, not a test.