Kaizen 233 Generating AI-Powered Follow-up Emails Using CRM Functions and Widgets

Hey everyone!

Welcome back to another interesting post in the Kaizen series!

Sales teams regularly capture interaction notes in CRM after speaking with prospects. However, drafting a follow-up email that reflects the conversation context can be repetitive and time-consuming.

What if CRM could automatically generate a contextual follow-up email draft based on recent interactions with the lead?

In this Kaizen post, we will create a practical tool that generates context-aware follow-up emails directly from a Lead record. You will see how it pulls recent notes, lead's details, and crafts a ready-to-send draft.

The solution uses three Zoho strengths:

1. Widgets for intuitive UI
   
2. Functions for secure backend processing
   
3. External AI APIs (like Groq or OpenAI)
   

The output displays in the widget. Review, tweak if needed, copy, and paste into your email composer.

The business challenge

Sales reps log calls like "Prospect interested in 20 user licenses but concerned about pricing. Explore volume discounts."

Now, crafting a response involves recalling details, matching tone, and ensuring professionalism. Miss a nuance, and trust erodes.

Our AI generator automates this. It scans the lead's details (name, company, status) and the three most recent notes, then prompts an AI model for a draft.

Example output

Subject: Follow-up on CRM Licensing Discussion

Hi John,

Thanks for the insightful chat today about your team's CRM needs. You're considering licenses for around 20 users, and I appreciate pricing being a top priority.

I'll review our volume options and discount eligibility right away. Expect specifics by EOD tomorrow.

Best regards,

[Your Name]

This keeps the rep in control while slashing draft time from 10 minutes to 10 seconds. Scalable for high-volume teams.

High-level architecture

Think of a layered cake!

1. UI Layer (Widget): Button launches it; displays, copies the draft, and sends the email.
   
2. Logic Layer (Function): Fetches CRM data server-side, builds prompt, calls AI securely.
   
3. AI Layer: External service generates natural language.
   

Flow

Rep clicks a button → Widget gets Lead ID → Calls function → Function queries CRM + AI → Draft back to widget

Secure (no client-side keys), reliable (server-side), and reusable across modules.

Developers often wonder "Why not fetch AI responses straight from widget JavaScript?"

Widgets run in a browser iframe, so embedding API keys exposes them to inspection or misuse. CORS policies can also block external requests, and complex logic like prompt building suits server-side better.

So, the best practice is to use widgets for UI and functions for secure server-side work. This hides credentials and reuses logic.

Follow these steps to build this solution.

Step 1: Add the custom Button

1. Head to Setup → Modules and Fields → Leads → Buttons → Create New Button.
   
2. Provide the following details:
   
1. Name: Generate AI Email
   
2. Placement: Record Detail Page (top or bottom)
   
3. Action: Open Widget (select your widget once built)
   
3. Save and add to layout.
   
4. Test: Button appears on Leads; clicking loads widget in context.
   

Pro tip: Position near the "Send Email" button for seamless workflow.

Step 2: Build the CRM Function

1. Go to Setup → Developer Hub → Functions → + Create Function.
   
2. Enter the display name, function name, description, choose Standalone as the category.
   
   
3. Click Create. The Functions IDE opens.
   
4. Enter the following function code. Note that this example uses Groq AI API.
   

   string standalone.generate_ai_email(String leadId) { lead = zoho.crm.getRecordById("Leads",leadId); name = ifnull(lead.get("Full_Name"),""); company = ifnull(lead.get("Company"),""); status = ifnull(lead.get("Lead_Status"),""); // Fetch recent CRM Notes notesResp = zoho.crm.getRelatedRecords("Notes","Leads",leadId); recentNotes = ""; count = 0; for each  note in notesResp { noteContent = ifnull(note.get("Note_Content"),""); if(noteContent != "") { recentNotes = recentNotes + "[" + (count + 1) + "] " + noteContent + ". "; } count = count + 1; if(count == 3) { break; } } // Build AI prompt prompt = "You are a sales assistant helping draft follow-up emails. "; prompt = prompt + "Generate a professional follow-up email based on the customer's previous interactions. "; prompt = prompt + "Lead Name: " + name + ". "; prompt = prompt + "Company: " + company + ". "; prompt = prompt + "Lead Status: " + status + ". "; prompt = prompt + "Recent CRM Interaction Notes: " + recentNotes + ". "; prompt = prompt + "Write a professional follow-up email referencing the discussion."; // Sanitize prompt prompt = prompt.replaceAll("\"","\\\""); prompt = prompt.replaceAll("\n"," "); prompt = prompt.replaceAll("\r"," "); // Build AI request message = Map(); message.put("role","user"); message.put("content",prompt); messages = List(); messages.add(message); requestBody = Map(); requestBody.put("model","llama-3.1-8b-instant"); requestBody.put("messages",messages); requestBody.put("temperature",0.4); requestJSON = requestBody.toString(); // Call Groq API response = invokeurl [ url :"https://api.groq.com/openai/v1/chat/completions" type :POST parameters:requestJSON headers:{"Authorization":"Bearer YOUR_API_KEY","Content-Type":"application/json"} ]; // Extract AI email emailContent = ""; if(response.containsKey("choices")) { emailContent = response.get("choices").get(0).get("message").get("content"); } // Return generated email to widget return emailContent; }

Note for production

1. Connections: In the example, the API key is included directly in the function for simplicity. However, production deployments should use Connections instead of hard-coding credentials as they allow developers to store API credentials securely within Zoho CRM and reuse them across multiple integrations.
   
2. Error Handling: Wrap invokeurl in try-catch.
   
3. Limits: Cap notes at 3 to avoid token overflow and tune temperature (0.4 = consistent).
   
4. Logging: Add info prompt before API call for debugging.
   
5. Test: Execute with sample Lead ID. Expect clean email string back.
   
6. Extend: Add phone/email from Lead, or filter notes by date (e.g., last 7 days via criteria).
   

Step 3: Develop the Widget

The widget provides the user interface for generating and copying the AI email.

When the widget loads, it retrieves the current Lead ID using the CRM widget JS SDK. When the user clicks Generate Email, the widget calls the CRM function and displays the generated email draft.

The widget also provides Send Email and Copy Email buttons that send the email to the lead record's email ID and copies the email content to the clipboard so the rep can past it into the email composer, respectively.

Sample index.html

<!DOCTYPE html> <html> <head> <meta charset="UTF-8"> <script src="https://live.zwidgets.com/js-sdk/1.3-beta/ZohoEmbededAppSDK.min.js"></script> <style>  <!-- Add your style here--> </style> </head> <body> <div class="widget-card">   <div class="widget-header">     <svg width="16" height="16" viewBox="0 0 24 24" fill="none" xmlns="http://www.w3.org/2000/svg">       <path d="M20 4H4C2.9 4 2 4.9 2 6v12c0 1.1.9 2 2 2h16c1.1 0 2-.9 2-2V6c0-1.1-.9-2-2-2zm0 4l-8 5-8-5V6l8 5 8-5v2z" fill="white"/>     </svg>     <h2>AI Follow-up Email Generator</h2>   </div>   <div class="widget-body">     <div class="email-box-wrapper">       <textarea id="emailBox" placeholder="Click 'Generate Email' to create a contextual follow-up email..."></textarea>     </div>     <div class="action-bar">       <button class="btn btn-primary" id="generateBtn" onclick="generateEmail()">         <svg width="13" height="13" viewBox="0 0 24 24" fill="none"><path d="M12 2l2.4 7.4H22l-6.2 4.5 2.4 7.4L12 17l-6.2 4.3 2.4-7.4L2 9.4h7.6z" fill="white"/></svg>         Generate Email       </button>       <button class="btn btn-success" id="sendBtn" onclick="sendEmail()">         <svg width="13" height="13" viewBox="0 0 24 24" fill="none"><path d="M2 21l21-9L2 3v7l15 2-15 2v7z" fill="white"/></svg>         Send Email       </button>       <button class="btn btn-secondary" onclick="copyEmail()">         <svg width="13" height="13" viewBox="0 0 24 24" fill="none"><path d="M16 1H4C2.9 1 2 1.9 2 3v14h2V3h12V1zm3 4H8C6.9 5 6 5.9 6 7v14c0 1.1.9 2 2 2h11c1.1 0 2-.9 2-2V7c0-1.1-.9-2-2-2zm0 16H8V7h11v14z" fill="#3D4354"/></svg>         Copy       </button>     </div>     <div class="status-bar" id="statusBar"></div>   </div> </div> <script src="index.js"></script> </body> </html>

Sample index.js

let leadId; let leadEmail; let generatedEmail = ""; // Widget initialization ZOHO.embeddedApp.on("PageLoad", function(data){     if(data && data.EntityId){         leadId = data.EntityId[0];         // Fetch Lead email         ZOHO.CRM.API.getRecord({             Entity: "Leads",             RecordID: leadId         })         .then(function(response){             if(response && response.data && response.data.length > 0){                 leadEmail = response.data[0].Email;             }         });     } }); ZOHO.embeddedApp.init(); // --- Helper functions used by email generation/sending --- // function formatEmailText(raw) { /* formatting logic */ } // function textToHtml(text) { /* convert plain text to HTML */ } // function setStatus(message, type) { /* UI status logic */ } // Generate AI email using a CRM function function generateEmail(){     var req_data = {         arguments: JSON.stringify({             leadId: leadId         })     };     ZOHO.CRM.FUNCTIONS.execute('generate_ai_email', req_data)     .then(function(response){         if(response && response.details){             generatedEmail = formatEmailText(response.details.output);             document.getElementById('emailBox').value = generatedEmail;         }     })     .catch(function(error){         console.log('Function error:', error);     }); } // Send email using ZRC async function sendEmail() {     const emailContent = document.getElementById('emailBox').value.trim();     if (!emailContent) return;     try {         // Get allowed "From" addresses         const fromRes = await zrc.get('/crm/v8/settings/emails/actions/from_addresses');         const fromAddress = fromRes.data.from_addresses[0];         const htmlContent = textToHtml(emailContent);         // Send mail         const response = await zrc.post(`/crm/v8/Leads/${leadId}/actions/send_mail`, {             data: [                 {                     from: {                         user_name: fromAddress.display_name || fromAddress.user_name,                         email: fromAddress.email                     },                     to: [                         {                             email: leadEmail                         }                     ],                     subject: 'Follow-up',                     content: htmlContent,                     mail_format: 'html'                 }             ]         });         console.log('Mail sent:', response);     } catch (error) {         console.error('Send mail error:', error);     } } // Copy generated email // function copyEmail(){ /* copy logic */ }

The  ZIP containing the complete index.js and index.html files used in this example is attached at the end of this post.

Refer to Creating a Widget in Zoho CRM and the JS SDK for more details on CLI installation, creating, packaging, and hosting a widget.

User experience walkthrough

1. The salesperson clicks Generate AI Email on the record detail page and the widget opens.
   
2. The salesperson clicks the Generate AI email button. The widget retrieves CRM context and generates a contextual follow-up email draft.
   
3. The email appears inside the widget, allowing the salesperson to quickly review the generated message, and use the Send Email button to send it to the lead's email ID.
   

This workflow ensures that AI assists with drafting the message while still allowing the salesperson to review and control the final communication.

Here is a GIF explaining the use case in action.

Key takeaways

This example demonstrates how Zoho CRM developers can integrate generative AI into CRM workflows using platform-native tools.

Combine CRM Widgets for user interaction and Functions for secure server-side processing to safely integrate external AI services without exposing credentials or compromising security.

The same architecture can be extended to build more advanced AI features, such as:

1. Automated meeting summaries
   
2. Deal health insights
   
3. Proposal drafting assistants
   
4. Intelligent follow-up recommendations
   

We hope you liked this post. Let us know what you think in the comments or reach out to us at support@zohocrm.com.

Cheers!

===================================================================================

See Also

1. Functions in Zoho CRM
   
2. Widgets in Zoho CRM
3. Zoho CRM JS SDK
   
4. Zoho CRM API V8
   
5. Deluge
   
6. Previous Kaizen - 232 - Building a Ticket Escalation Mechanism from Zoho CRM
   
7. Kaizen Directory
   

• Topic Participants

• Shylaja S

  

• Sticky Posts

• Kaizen #198: Using Client Script for Custom Validation in Blueprint

  Nearing 200th Kaizen Post – 1 More to the Big Two-Oh-Oh! Do you have any questions, suggestions, or topics you would like us to cover in future posts? Your insights and suggestions help us shape future content and make this series better for everyone.

• Kaizen #226: Using ZRC in Client Script

  Hello everyone! Welcome to another week of Kaizen. In today's post, lets see what is ZRC (Zoho Request Client) and how we can use ZRC methods in Client Script to get inputs from a Salesperson and update the Lead status with a single button click. In this

• Kaizen #222 - Client Script Support for Notes Related List

  Hello everyone! Welcome to another week of Kaizen. The final Kaizen post of the year 2025 is here! With the new Client Script support for the Notes Related List, you can validate, enrich, and manage notes across modules. In this post, we’ll explore how

• Kaizen #217 - Actions APIs : Tasks

  Welcome to another week of Kaizen! In last week's post we discussed Email Notifications APIs which act as the link between your Workflow automations and you. We have discussed how Zylker Cloud Services uses Email Notifications API in their custom dashboard.

• Kaizen #216 - Actions APIs : Email Notifications

  Welcome to another week of Kaizen! For the last three weeks, we have been discussing Zylker's workflows. We successfully updated a dormant workflow, built a new one from the ground up and more. But our work is not finished—these automated processes are

• Recent Topics

• Request to Recover Deleted Task List – Project ID: RIV-MOD-10722

  Hi Zoho Team, I hope this message finds you well. My Zoho task list associated with Project ID: RIV-MOD-10722 appears to have been deleted. When I clicked on the task link from the email notification, I received the following message: "Task has been deleted

• Email Insights included in Bigin emals are marked as SPAM everywhere

  Today I noticed that email recipients who use Office 365 never receive emails sent from Bigin. Further examination showed that all Email Insights links in email headers are marked as spam/phishing by Office 365. Example screen included. The problem is

• How do I import Connected Records for a Deal?

  Can you point me to an example of the CSV file that would add related records to an existing CRM Deal? I imported a Deal, then tried importing a connected record using a unique ID that references the Deal ID, but it doesn't attach it to the Deal rec

• File Upload Field in Zoho Forms Not Updating Existing File in Zoho CRM

  Hi everyone, I’m trying to understand the behavior of a file upload field mapped from Zoho Forms to Zoho CRM. Scenario There is a File Upload field in a Zoho CRM module. A Zoho Form also has a File Upload field, which is mapped to that CRM field. When

• Zoho Training

  Greetings! I am trainer. My focus area is Project Management and MS Project. I have used Zoho CRM to a good extent. Though, I was interested in using ZOHO projects, as there were no live projects, I could not take it up for studies. Recently a client

• Detailed list of scoring rules in Zoho CRM

  Good morning Zoho community, warm greetings The reason for my message today is that I have a problem with my CRM, which I will explain below: Our organization has scoring rules designed to rate our potential customers or leads in the application based

• How to create a summary document from Projects details

  Hi, Our team is creating many projects inside Zoho Project. When closing a project, they write a summary document containing data from the projects it-self (understand project budget, customers, etc...), and editable (ie the document is either a Writer

• Host in US Data Centre

  I humble apply to be registered on US Data centre

• convert the project to templet

  i have some deployment ME product for different customer , i need to create a fixed template for use it rather then keeping creating this template every time

• Best practices for managing Project Charters, Business Case and RAID logs within Zoho?

  Hello everyone, I’m currently refining our PMO setup within Zoho Projects and I’m curious how others are handling high-level governance documentation. We’ve been using the standardized Project Charter, Business Case and RAID frameworks from projectmanagertemplate.com

• Work Orders / Bundle Requests

  Zoho Inventory needs a work order / bundle request system. This record would be analogous to a purchase order in the purchasing workflow or a sales order in the sales cycle. It would be non-journaling, but it would reserve the appropriate inventory of

• Izettle or Sumup Integration for Zoho Books.

  The Stripe & Square clearing works great in Zoho Books. Any further integrations planned in the future for Izettle or Sumup? These card processors are very common for taking payments with a card reader.

• Trying to access records in a custom module in Zoho Desk and not having luck

  I've built a custom module in Zoho Desk and am using a custom function to query the records in the module and I'm not having any luck. The only way I have found to retreive a record is by getting it by its recordID (the long zoho assigned one). The function

• ZOHO Books Smart Accounting Software for Travel Agency

  Dear Travel partner, Contact for Travel Agency Accounting Setup & Training Vansh Travel (ZOHO Books Authorised partner) Email: info@vanshtravel.com Mo: +91 98984 95155 Please find PDF   

• 452 Mailbox delivery restricted by policy error

  We have been testing Zoho desk for about a week now and have been forwarding emails in via an Exchange Online Mail flow rule without issue until yesterday. Suddenly yesterday morning we started getting the vast majority of the emails stuck in Pending

• Send Email reply on behalf of Agent

  Hi, When using the send email reply via the API I can set the reply on behalf of the customer by using impersonatedUserId in the header of the API call. Is there a way to do this for Agents too? I need to be able to send an email reply on behalf of an

• Sharing Tickets to a team within a department

  Hi there, We have a need for one department to be able to share tickets to a specific team within a department, I'm wondering if this is possible? All the shared tickets are going into the 'Shared Tickets' view for the whole department but is there a

• Do not use isnull()

  Does not always return booleans. Can also return null. Never use this function. Just use var==null instead.

• FSM integration with Books

  Hi, I have spent a few months working with FSM and have come across a critical gap in the functionality, which I find almost shocking....either that, or I am an idiot. The lack of bi-directional sync between Books and FSM on Sales Orders/ Work Orders

• Unable to load a specific image

  Hi I am trying to upload an svg file, which reports that there is "a problem with the file", but does not say what sort of problem. I can't find anything which says which files are supported, so it may be it does not support svg. (which would be a real shame) The file itself will open in either Firefox or Chrome without problem. For the moment I am using a png file, which does not zoom well of course. David

• Why does the Address field show the wrong map location even with a correct Pincode?

  I am noticing an issue with the Address field map in Zoho Creator. When I enter a city name that exists in multiple locations within the same state, the map sometimes points to the wrong area even if I have entered the correct Pincode. Currently, it seems

• Archive Option in Conversation View

  Hello, I have a suggestion\request to add an "Archive Thread" button in conversation view of Zoho Mail. The best suggestion I have is to put an "Archive Thread" button next to the "Label Entire Thread" button in conversation view. Most users don't just

• Outlook/Hotmail Blocking Zoho SMTP IPs (S3150)

  We are currently facing a serious deliverability issue with Zoho SMTP while sending transactional OTP emails for our production application. Emails sent to Outlook / Hotmail addresses are being rejected with the following error: 550 - 5.7.1 Unfortunately,

• Outlook is blocking incoming mail

  Outlook is blocking all emails sent from the Zoho server. ERROR CODE :550 - 5.7.1 Unfortunately, messages from [136.143.169.51] weren't sent. Please contact your Internet service provider since part of their network is on our block list (S3150). It looks

• Zoho Social API for generating draft posts from a third-party app ?

  Hello everyone, I hope you are all well. I have a question regarding Zoho Social. I am developing an application that generates social media posts, and I would like to be able to incorporate a feature that allows saving these posts as drafts in Zoho Social.

• Temporarily rate limited due to IP reputation.

  We have suddenly started receiving the following Mail Delivery Status Notification: Diagnostic-Code: 4.7.650 The mail server [136.143.184.12] has been temporarily rate limited due to IP reputation. For e-mail delivery information, see https://aka.ms/postmaster

• IMPORTANT: It doesn´t search for letters with portuguese characters.

  Some of my articles have for example the word "vídeo". But if I search for "vídeo" it doesn´t find them. If I search for "video" it does find them. Idealy, it should find the articles either way. But if I have to choose, it would be better to find the

• IMPORTANT: It doens´t show full article name on search - Should add line break

  When we search for articles, it doesn´t show the full name. There should be a line break so the user can see the full article name, otherwise the user can´t know if that´s the article he/she is looking for. This is very important, otherwise the user has

• Zoho Books - Payment Gateway - Revolut

  Hi Books Team, My feature request if to include the popular platform Revolut as a payment collection option on invoices in Zoho Books. Please upvote if you are also looking for this option.

• Zoho Books | Product updates | January 2026

  Hello users, We’ve rolled out new features and enhancements in Zoho Books. From e-filing Form 1099 directly with the IRS to corporation tax support, explore the updates designed to enhance your bookkeeping experience. E-File Form 1099 Directly With the

• Kaizen #233 - Generating AI-powered Follow-up Emails Using CRM Functions and Widgets

  Hey everyone! Welcome back to another interesting post in the Kaizen series! Sales teams regularly capture interaction notes in CRM after speaking with prospects. However, drafting a follow-up email that reflects the conversation context can be repetitive

• Connect Bank in Zoho Books

  Can I connect UOB or Ariwallex in Zoho Books?

• Using MPN across multiple SKUs and inventory tracking

  I have several different SKU's that share a common MPN and would like to track inventory by MPN. SKU1 has MPN1 assigned SKU2 has MPN1 assigned Here is an example If I start with 5 of MPN 1 in stock I want each SKU1 and SKU2 to show as 5 in stock, If I

• Marketing Tip #1: Optimize item titles for SEO

  Your item title is the first thing both Google and shoppers notice. Instead of a generic “Leather Bag,” go for something detailed like “Handcrafted Leather Laptop Bag – Durable & Stylish.” This helps your items rank better in search results and instantly

• Feature Enhancement Request – Text Formatting Options in Item Description (Zoho Books/Quotes Module)

  Dear Zoho Development Team, Greetings from Radiant360 Integrated Technical Services LLC. We would like to bring to your attention a functional limitation we've encountered within the Item Table / Quote Description section of Zoho Books (and Zoho CRM Quotes).

• ZOHO Books Query

  Good day, Can someone please advise. I recently migrated from ZOHO Invoice to ZOHO Books. No that I want to use the inventory on Books I cant as all my items have transaction history. The person I spoke to at ZOHO said I need to create a new Company profile

• Best way to schedule bill payments to vendors

  I've integrated Forte so that I can convert POs to bills and make payments to my vendors all through Books. Is there a way to schedule the bill payments as some of my vendors are net 30, net 60 and even net 90 days. If I can't get this to work, I'll have

• inventory removal at packing list or shipment.

  currently our system is set to remove inventory at invoice. This is creating an inventory nightmare? Is it possible to change the settings to remove the item from inventory at either the packing slip stage or shipping the item.

• How to add employee and not invite them to log in?

  I want to add 50 employees, but invite them only when everything will be configured and ready. Is it possible? Should we create employee profiles and then convert them later? Thank you,

• Any Offline Developing Environements or IDE's for Zoho Creator

  Hi there, Is there any offline developing environment for zoho creator like the Eclipse for sales force.com? So that i could make my development faster. Its taking a laot of time to write save and verify the code in Zoho Creator online. Thanks in advance

• Next Page