Starting without a card

With the Intro screen switch off, there is no card. The respondent lands on the first question and the conversation has already begun.

This is the right choice more often than it sounds. Nobody has to read anything before answering, and a short eflow behind a link you have already explained in an email does not need explaining twice.

What you give up

Four things the card was carrying have to land somewhere else, or not at all:

• How long it takes. There is no question count or minute estimate on the first question. Put it in the opening statement if it matters.
• The framing around where the answers go. Partly survives. Your organization’s name and brand are in the header of every screen, and the footer’s Privacy link is unconditional — every surface, your privacy notice URL or Acquainto’s fallback. What the card says and the conversation does not is the rest of the sentence: that you see the answers, and that the respondent can stop at any point. If that matters to your respondents, either turn the card on or put it in your opening statement.
• The AI disclosure. Still present — it is in the header of every conversation, next to the eflow title, on every surface, and cannot be switched off — but it is now a header line rather than a sentence someone reads before starting.
• The robot filter. Every link check, preview fetch, and crawler that opens the link starts a real conversation. See The start card for what that does to your completion rate.

What you can put in its place

An opening statement — up to 400 characters, on the eflow’s Overview tab. It appears once, above the first question, clearly marked as from you rather than as something the assistant said.

It works with or without the card. With the card on it sits on the card; with the card off it sits above question one. That makes it the place to put “why we are asking” when you have chosen not to have a card.

The floating chat box has no choice

On the floating chat box the switch does nothing: there is never a card. This section describes what every chat-box respondent already gets.