Admins can change the company profile, answer sector requests, sync innovations, export contacts, see the Activity panel, delete any pitch and manage users. Admins set in Scout’s configuration can’t be changed here. People appear here after they first sign in.
Problem reports
What people have told you went wrong. Mark each one as resolved, with a note if you like. The person who sent it sees that it is resolved, and your note, the next time they open Scout. Scout deletes every report 90 days after it was sent.
Reports can name people. Scout removes email addresses and phone numbers, but not names. Replace any names before you paste a report into Claude or anywhere else.
Loading reports.
My focus
Tell Scout what you are working on, so your prospect searches and email drafts lean your way.
This changes your prospect searches and your email drafts, and puts your products first when you draft a pitch. Company briefs and pitches stay the same for everyone. The team can see the lists you build, and each one shows the focus it was built with.
Loading your focus.
How Scout uses this
My writing style
Tell Scout how you write, so the emails it drafts sound like you.
Only you can see this. Scout uses it for the emails you draft from pitches. It never changes briefs, pitches or anyone else’s emails.
Loading your writing style.
How your emails will look
To try it, click Save my style, then draft an email from a pitch on a company page. Change your style, save it and click Draft again until you’re happy. Each try replaces your last email to that person.
Appearance
Choose when Scout is light or dark, and how each one looks. Only you see this, and it is saved on this device.
Light or dark
Light theme
Used when Scout is light.
Dark theme
Used when Scout is dark.
If your computer asks for more contrast, Scout uses High contrast when it is light, until you choose a light theme here.
Scout researches target companies and produces sales intelligence briefs for Me Learning. It answers one question: "Why should Me Learning talk to this company, and how do I start that conversation?"
Sign in
Open Scout in your browser.
Click Sign in with Microsoft.
Authenticate with your Me Learning Microsoft account.
You'll see the Scout home screen with the research form. Your name appears top right.
Note: Scout uses your organisation's Microsoft Entra ID for single sign-on. Your session stays active between visits. You only need to sign in again if your session has expired. If that happens while Scout is open, Scout tells you, and signing in again takes you back to where you were. Anything you had typed but not saved is lost.
Take the tour
The first time you sign in, Scout shows you round in under a minute. If you used Scout before it changed, it offers to show you what is new, and you can say Not now. Take the tour again at any time:
Find your way around
The sidebar on the left is your main navigation. Here's what each item does:
Item
What it does
Scout a company
Research a specific company and get a sales brief.
Find prospects
Build a targeted list of companies matching your criteria.
Companies
Every company the team has scouted or found. Filter by scouted status or contacts.
Prospects
View prospect lists you've generated.
Contacts
Browse all contacts found across every company in a searchable table.
Company profile
What Scout knows about Me Learning. It shapes every brief.
Innovations
New ways we can build learning, and how ready each one is.
Users
See who uses Scout and change roles.
On a computer, you can fold the sidebar to get more room on screen. Use the button at its top, next to Actions. It becomes a narrow strip of icons. Point at an icon to see its name. Use the same button to open it again. Scout remembers your choice on this computer.
Along the top of every screen you'll find Jump to, What’s new, Help and your name. Click your name for My focus, My writing style, Light, Auto or Dark, Themes, Report a problem and Sign out. A blue dot on What’s new means there’s a release entry you haven’t seen.
On a phone, Company profile, Innovations, Users and Help are under More.
On a phone, Company profile, Innovations and Help are under More.
Jump to anything
Press Ctrl K (⌘K on a Mac), or / when you are not typing in a box, or click the magnifying glass at the top. Type a few letters to find a company, prospect list, contact, innovation, Help topic or screen. Choosing an innovation opens its card on Innovations. Use the up and down keys to move, Enter to open and Esc to close. The last line offers to scout what you typed: it only fills in the form, so nothing is spent until you press Scout.
Tip: Double-click the Scout logo, top left (or press Ctrl+Shift+U) to open the Activity panel, where you can see a team activity feed and API usage and costs. Only admins can open it.
Scout a company
This is Scout's core feature. It uses AI-powered web research to build a tailored sales brief for any target company.
Go to Scout a company in the sidebar.
Type the company name in the Company name field. This is the only required field. You can also paste the company’s website, a work email address or its LinkedIn company link; Scout fills in what it can and confirms the name before scouting. If you already have the company, Scout says so as you type.
Optionally, add a website. Sector and context are under More options. Target roles appears under What to get when your choice includes contacts. Scout remembers what you chose in What to get, and your target roles, for next time on this browser.
Under What to get, choose how much to find out, then click Scout (or Find contacts for Contacts only). Pressing Enter in a box does the same.
While Scout writes
Scout shows how long it has taken so far. You can go to any other screen while it writes. The browser tab shows how far it has got, for example “Scouting Harbour Trust (2 of 3)”.
When the brief is ready and you are looking at something else, Scout says so, with Open. To hear from Scout when you are in another tab or app, click Tell me when it’s ready and allow notifications when your browser asks.
You can close the tab, or your computer can lose its connection: Scout carries on and saves the brief. Find it in Companies. If the connection drops while you are looking at the brief, Scout picks it up again. When you come back after closing the tab, Scout tells you how the scout went, with Open. If you reload the page while Scout writes, you see the brief carry on from where it has got to.
If you open another company’s page while Scout writes, or close the tab, the brief is still saved. Any pitch you chose under Also pitch is not written: draft it from the company’s page.
Cancel stops the scout. If you start scouting another company while one is still being written, Scout asks before it stops the first one.
Understand the form fields
Field
Required
What it does
Company name
Yes
The company you want to research.
Website
No
Helps Scout find the right company, especially for common names.
Additional context
No
Steers the research. For example: "Focus on their compliance training needs."
Target roles
No
Comma-separated job titles. Scout looks for people in these roles. Shown when your choice includes contacts. Scout remembers the roles you used last.
Sector
No
Public sector, Private, Charity or not-for-profit, or Not sure. Helps tailor the brief.
Choose what to get
Choice
What it does
Speed
Cost
Quick scout
A short brief with Who they are and Why talk to them. Good for deciding if a company is worth pursuing.
Fastest
Cheapest
Full scout
The full brief: Who they are, Why talk to them and How to start the conversation.
A minute or two
More than a Quick scout
Contacts only
Searches LinkedIn, the company website, news and directories for people, then checks their emails with ZeroBounce. No brief.
Depends on how many people it finds
ZeroBounce credits for each new person
Full scout with contacts
The full brief and a contact search. The most thorough choice.
Slowest
Costs the most
Tip: Start with Quick scout to check if a company is worth pursuing. If it looks promising, click Run Full scout on its page to get the rest of the brief.
Read your research brief
When you scout a company, Scout shows each part of the brief as it writes it.
What’s in the brief
The brief is the Company profile panel. It opens with a one-sentence summary, then three parts, each backed by source links. The company’s website and LinkedIn page are links under Who they are.
Who they are: size, sector, locations, structure, and what they do.
Why talk to them: training and L&D signals, and why Me Learning is a fit.
How to start the conversation: angles for your first conversation.
Each part ends with a Sources link listing what it cites. Scout again, at the top of the panel, refreshes all of it, summary included. Staff numbers say what they count and where they come from, because sources often differ.
Earlier scouts
Nothing is lost when a company is scouted again, or when a part is retried. Scout keeps the profile it replaces. Open Earlier scouts, at the top of the Company profile panel, to see who scouted it and when, read it as it was, or download it as a Word document. Earlier scouts cannot be changed.
A pitch written from an earlier profile has a See that brief link to it.
A Quick scout includes only the first two parts. The last part shows a Run Full scout button so you can upgrade in place. Existing contacts and follow-ups are kept.
The rest of the page
Below the Company profile come Pitches, then Contacts, then a lighter More on this company panel with procurement, useful links and follow-up questions. The bar at the top of the page jumps to each one.
Charity Commission integration
When Scout matches a company to a charity registered in England or Wales, a green Matched to a registered charity banner appears above the brief. The brief then uses figures from the Charity Commission register: registration date, recent income and spending, trustees and stated activities. Scout looks for the match itself, so you don’t need to say it is a charity.
Already scouted
If you scout a company that’s been scouted before, Scout says when, and gives you two options:
Open company page: see the saved profile with its pitches and contacts. Nothing is spent.
Scout again: run a fresh scout with the latest information. The current profile is kept under Earlier scouts, and contacts, pitches and follow-ups stay.
The same Scout again button is at the top of the Company profile panel on any company page. A company not scouted yet has Scout this company there instead.
Clicking a scout button twice starts one scout, not two. If you start a different company while Scout is still writing, Scout asks before it stops the one before.
Ask follow-up questions
After a research brief is complete, you can ask follow-up questions to dig deeper into any topic.
Go to More on this company, at the bottom of the company page.
Type your question in the Ask a follow-up field.
Click Ask.
The answer appears under the question. Scout answers from the brief, and can search the web. Each question counts towards the team’s daily limit of 30, which scouts and contact searches share.
Tip: Good follow-up questions are specific. For example: "Tell me more about their compliance setup" or "What procurement framework do they use?"
Draft a pitch
A pitch is a short note on how to offer one of our products or innovations to a company you have scouted. Scout writes it from the company’s brief.
What it does and does not do
It uses only what the brief found. It won’t look anything up, so a pitch is only as fresh as the brief.
It never changes the brief. The brief stays the same for everyone.
It never sends anything. It is a note for you to adapt.
Everyone on the team can see it.
Draft one
Open a company you have scouted.
Under Pitches, click Draft a pitch.
Choose up to 3 products or innovations. Your focus is listed first, and your first focus product is already chosen. Choose more than one to pitch them together as a package.
Click Draft the pitch. It takes a few seconds.
If the brief is more than 3 months old, Scout tells you. You can still draft a pitch from it. For an up-to-date pitch, click Scout again first. It runs a Full scout, which takes a minute or two, and the pitches you already have stay.
You can also choose an offer in Also pitch when you scout a company. Scout drafts that pitch once the brief is ready. If scouting fails, no pitch is written.
Read a pitch
Strong fit, Possible fit or Weak fit is Scout’s judgement from the brief. Check it against what you know.
A weak fit says what is missing. It may suggest a better offer instead.
For a package, Scout says which offer to lead with and how each one fits. It tells you to leave out any that don’t fit, and an email from the package leaves them out too.
Who to approach gives job roles. If people with matching titles are already in Contacts, Scout lists them under it, and an email from the pitch is addressed to the best match.
A prototype is pitched as a pilot or co-development, never as something available today.
You can delete a pitch you drafted.As an admin, you can delete any pitch, not only your own. It goes at once, with Undo for a few seconds. Pitches are included in the Word export.
Draft an email from a pitch
Open a pitch and click Draft an email.
Choose who it is to. Pick a contact Scout found, or write to the role if you have no name yet.
Click Draft the email. Scout writes a subject and a short email from the pitch and the brief.
Adapt it, then click Copy email and paste it into your email.
You can also start from a person. Click Write to on their contact card, or click their name under Who to approach on a pitch. Scout opens the email on the pitch that fits them best. If the company has no pitch yet, Scout asks what to offer them first, then opens the email.
Only you can see your email. The team can see that you drafted one, but not what it says.
Nothing is sent. Scout never sends email for you.
You keep one draft for each person you write to from a pitch. Drafting again to the same person replaces it. Click Write to someone else to add another.
An email to a team mailbox, such as an HR inbox, starts with your greeting but no name.
Changes you make in the box aren’t saved. Copy the email when you’re happy with it.
There is no email for a weak fit. Your emails are not included in the Word export.
Make emails sound like you
Click your name, top right, then My writing style. Choose your greeting, sign-off, tone, length and how the email ends, and add phrases you like or avoid. The preview shows how your emails will start and end. Scout uses it for every email you draft. Only you can see it.
How it ends: ask if it’s a priority for them, offer more details, offer an example, or suggest a short call. Asking if it’s a priority is the default, because in a first email it gets more replies than asking for a call.
Your name is optional. If your email signature adds it, delete it so it doesn’t appear twice.
Learn from your emails: paste one to three emails you have written and click Learn my style. Scout writes a short note on how you write, which you can change, then click Save my style. Scout keeps the note, not the emails. Take out names, organisations, prices and anything private before you paste.
Whatever your style, Scout starts with what it knows about them, and uses plain, everyday words.
To try a change, save it, open a pitch and click Draft again. Each try replaces your last draft to that person, so change it until you’re happy.
Find contacts
Scout searches multiple sources for real contacts at a target company and verifies their email addresses. Contacts appear as cards within the research brief and are also saved to the global Contacts screen.
How contact finding works
Scout searches LinkedIn, the company website, news, and directories for people in HR, L&D, People, Training, Talent, and Compliance roles.
For each person, ZeroBounce attempts to find and verify their email. Departmental mailboxes (e.g. hr@, training@) are added where they exist.
When Scout is connected to Force 24, it also shows whether each email is subscribed or unsubscribed there, and when it was last active.
A Searched… note above the contacts list tells you which providers Scout actually used on this run.
Email status markers
Every email carries a small status marker, and its colour, so you know how far to trust the address.
Marker and colour
What it means
Green tick / Verified. The address is green.
ZeroBounce checked the inbox and confirmed it.
Amber warning / Unverified. The address is amber.
ZeroBounce checked the inbox and could not confirm it. The email may bounce. This covers both catch-all domains and addresses that failed validation.
Grey question mark / Verify email. The address is in the normal text colour.
Not yet checked. This includes an address you typed or saved with Try. Click the marker to run ZeroBounce for that one contact. The marker and the address change straight away to green or amber. Costs one credit.
The contacts table shows small icons to keep the column tight. A company’s contact cards show the same three states and colours as larger pills.
Source badges next to a name explain where the contact came from:
Departmental: a general mailbox at the company’s web address, such as hr@.
Via Force 24: matched with a record Force 24 already has.
No badge: found by Scout’s web search, the usual case.
View contacts for a company
Open a company’s research brief from the Companies screen.
Scroll down to the Contacts section.
Refresh contacts
Click Check again above the contacts cards to re-search and re-verify. Existing contacts and verified emails are always preserved, even if a re-search finds fewer people.
Find an email for one contact
If a contact has no email yet, click Find email next to their row to try ZeroBounce for that person only. The card updates in place once the lookup finishes.
If others at the same company have checked emails, Scout offers the likely address instead, such as Try jo.berry@example.org, following their pattern. Try saves it as not checked yet. Verify, in place of Find email, saves it and checks it with ZeroBounce (1 credit).
Mark a contact as contacted
Two checkbox pills sit under every contact card and on every row of the Contacts table, under a small Contacted via label. Tap a pill to mark the channel:
LinkedIn: for messages sent on LinkedIn.
Email: for emails sent to that contact.
The pill fills green with a tick. Hover over it to see the date and time you marked it.
Click a green pill again to unmark it. Scout unmarks it at once and shows Undo for a few seconds. Undo puts it back with its original date.
State persists across refreshes, between the Contacts screen and the company detail page, and through Check again. Running Find email on a marked contact keeps the mark intact.
Open a contact’s LinkedIn profile
On a contact card, click the blue LinkedIn chip in the action row. On the contacts table, click the small LinkedIn icon to the right of the contact’s name. Both open the profile in a new tab.
Edit a contact
If someone’s name, job title, email or LinkedIn URL is wrong or has changed, correct it yourself. What you change is kept: Scout never overwrites it when it searches for contacts again, and a renamed contact is not added a second time.
In the Contacts table, click Edit at the end of the row. On a contact card, click the small pencil next to the LinkedIn icon.
Change the Name, Job title, Email or LinkedIn URL. Leave a field blank to clear it (a name is needed).
Click Save.
A new email shows as not checked yet. Click its grey question mark to check it with ZeroBounce (1 credit).
View all contacts
Click Contacts in the sidebar.
Use the search box to filter by name, title, email, or company.
The contacts screen shows a table with columns for Name, Email, Title, Company, Found, and Contacted via. The line under the title counts everyone, how many have an email, and how many have been contacted. Click any column header to sort. Click a company name to open its page. On a phone, each contact shows as a small card.
Filter the list
The filters beside the search box show how many contacts each one holds:
All. Every contact, with or without an email.
With email (default). Only contacts that have an email address on file. Hides the people you cannot reach yet.
Verified. Only contacts whose address ZeroBounce has confirmed.
Contacted. People someone has marked as contacted on LinkedIn or by email.
Not contacted. People nobody has marked as contacted on LinkedIn or by email yet.
Your choice is remembered between visits.
Verify an unchecked email
If a contact’s email shows a grey question mark in the table, or a Verify email pill on a contact card, click it to run a ZeroBounce check on that address only. The marker spins briefly, then resolves into either the green tick or the amber warning. Verified and unverified addresses are final outcomes, so clicking them does nothing. This avoids burning a credit re-checking an answer you already have.
Copy an email address
In the contacts table, click the copy icon beside an email address to copy it; it turns into a tick. Clicking the address itself opens your email app. On a contact card, click the email to copy it.
Export contacts
Only admins can export contacts, because contacts are personal data. If you need a list, ask an admin.
Only admins can export contacts, because contacts are personal data. Standard users do not see these buttons.
On a company’s page, click Export CSV at the top of the Contacts panel, or Export contacts (CSV) at the bottom of the page, to download all contacts for that company.
On the Contacts screen, Export CSV downloads exactly what the filters and search show, up to 5,000 contacts. Exports are recorded in the activity log.
Before your first download of personal data in a session (a contacts file or a Word brief, which can name people), Scout reminds you to keep the file on Me Learning systems, not send it outside the company, and delete it when you’ve finished with it.
Important: Contact data comes from third-party sources and may not always be current. Verify details before reaching out, especially for contacts marked Unverified or whose email is Not yet checked.
Build a prospect list
Prospect lists let you describe a type of company and have Scout find matching organisations. This is useful for prospecting across a sector or region.
Go to Find prospects in the sidebar.
Describe the kind of companies you’re looking for. Be specific about sector, size, location, or other criteria.
Click Build list, or press Ctrl+Enter (Cmd+Enter on a Mac).
You’ll see a list of up to 15 matching organisations, best match first. Organisations that are already Me Learning clients are left out. From there, click Scout on any card to scout that company.
Scout ranks the results using your focus, shown above the search box. It never overrides what you type. To change it, click Change or go to My focus.
Your three most recent lists appear below the form, so you can pick up where you left off.
Tip: The more specific your description, the better the results. Try “Housing associations in the Midlands with 500+ employees” rather than “housing associations” on its own.
View your lists
Click Prospects in the sidebar to see all prospect lists. Use the Mine only / Everyone toggle to switch between your lists and the team’s. Sort by newest, oldest, or name. Click any list to see its companies and research status.
Work through a list
A list numbers its companies best match first. Search it by name, filter it like Companies, and sort it by best match, name or most recently scouted. Each company keeps its number whatever you do. When you go back from a company’s page, the list is as you left it. Find contacts from each company’s page, where you can see what Scout found.
Manage companies and lists
The Companies screen shows every company the team has scouted or found through prospect lists. The Prospects screen does the same for prospect lists.
Search
Each screen has a search box at the top. Search keeps working as you navigate: open a result, hit back, and your search term is still applied.
Filter pills (Companies only)
Below the search box, filter pills narrow the list:
Filter
What it shows
All
Every company in your database.
Scouted
Companies with a completed research brief.
Has contacts
Companies where contacts have been found.
Not scouted
Companies with no brief yet, even if they have contacts.
Mine only / Everyone
Inline with the search bar on Companies and Prospects, the Mine only / Everyone toggle switches between work attributed to you and work across the whole team. Filtering happens on the server, so pagination stays accurate.
Sort and page size
The sort dropdown offers Newest first, Oldest first, Name A–Z, and Name Z–A. Companies and Contacts also have a page-size selector (20, 50, 200 per page, or Show all). On the Contacts table, click any column header to sort by that column.
When you go back from a company’s page, Companies and Prospects are as you left them: the same search, filters, sort, page and place on the page.
Companies remembers your filter, Mine only or Everyone, and sort on this browser. The filters and sort on Companies and Contacts are also in the web address, so a link you send opens the same view. What you type in the search box is never in the address.
Understand the cards
Each row shows the company name, its badges, the brief’s one-line summary (or a short description), and when it was scouted or added. A row you can open ends in an arrow; a company with nothing saved yet has a Scout button instead. Hover over a row to see what a click will do.
Badge
What it means
Full scout
A full brief is saved, with How to start the conversation.
Quick scout
Only a Quick scout is saved, without How to start the conversation. Open the company and click Run Full scout to add them.
3 contacts
How many people Scout has found at this company.
Open a company
Click any company card that has a brief or contacts to view the full detail. Companies without data show a Scout button instead, which takes you to the scout form with the name pre-filled.
Rename and delete
You can keep your data tidy without leaving Scout.
Rename a company or prospect list
Open the company detail page or the prospect list detail page.
Click the heading at the top of the page. It turns into an editable field.
Type the new name and press Enter to save, or Escape to cancel.
Empty names are rejected and the original is restored. Company names that would clash with an existing company are also rejected: Scout normalises names before checking, so “Acme”, “Acme Ltd”, and “Acme Limited” all count as the same company.
Tip: Hover over the heading to see a Click to rename tooltip. The cursor changes to indicate the heading is editable.
Delete a company or list
Deleting a company also deletes its research, contacts, pitches and follow-ups, and clears anything Scout had stored about it. Deleting a list removes the list itself but leaves the underlying companies in place. Both actions are recorded in the activity feed.
Important: There is no Delete button. To remove a company or list, tell the developers with Report a problem.
Export your work
After a research brief is complete, an action bar at the bottom of the page collects every option in one place:
Button
What it does
Copy brief
Copies the whole brief, with follow-ups and pitches. It pastes with headings and lists into Teams, Outlook or Word, and as markdown into anything that reads markdown.
Download docx
Downloads the brief as a Word document, with follow-ups and pitches. Contacts are not included.
Export contacts (CSV)
Downloads all contacts for this company as a CSV. Only shown when contacts exist.
Scout another company
Returns to the scout form so you can start a new search.
Share a link
Click Copy link, next to the date at the top of a company’s page, and paste it into Teams or an email. Anyone at Me Learning can open it. To point at one part of the brief, use the link icon beside Who they are, Why talk to them or How to start the conversation. Each section of this Help has a link icon too.
A new brief gets its link once it is saved.
Procurement intelligence
Under More on this company, click Check procurement to search Contracts Finder and Stotles for LMS and eLearning contracts, values, and renewal dates. It is most useful for public sector organisations.
Refresh checks again. Earlier results are kept under Earlier checks.
Useful links
Below the brief, Scout provides direct links to external research sources for the company, including LinkedIn, Companies House, Contracts Finder, and Stotles.
Tip: The Word document has every part of the brief, with follow-up answers and pitches. Contacts are not included.
Usage and activity
The Activity panel, with what everyone has done in Scout and what Scout costs, is for admins. If you need to know who did something, ask an admin.
The Activity panel shows a team activity feed plus API usage and costs. Only admins can open it. Open it by double-clicking the Scout logo, top left, or press Ctrl+Shift+U. It lands on the Activity tab by default. Press Escape to close it.
Activity tab
The Activity tab is a chronological feed of everything the team has done in Scout. Each entry shows who performed the action, what they did, and when.
Filter by time range or by individual team member using the user pills.
Use the search bar to filter by a person’s email, a company name or a prospect list.
Company names, prospect lists, and contact names are all clickable. Click a company to jump to its brief, a list to open it, or a contact name to filter the Contacts screen.
The feed records what was done to a contact, not their details. It shows the contact’s current name, or a deleted contact once they have been deleted.
Scout keeps the activity log and usage for 24 months, then deletes them. The feed shows when it does.
Actions tracked include: scouts, contact searches, follow-up questions, prospect lists, charity lookups, pitches, email drafts, marking people as contacted, procurement checks, renames and deletions.
Usage tab
The Usage tab shows how Scout is being used across the team. Filter by time range: Today, 7 days, 30 days, or All time.
Summary cards: total API calls, tokens used, estimated cost, and ZeroBounce credits remaining.
Usage by type: a breakdown by Quick scout, Full scout, contacts, follow-ups, prospect lists, procurement, pitches, brief summaries and email drafts.
Recent activity log: the latest actions, with type, company name, tokens and time.
Note: All actions in Scout are attributed to your Microsoft account. This supports team visibility and audit compliance.
What’s new
The release notes panel records every meaningful change to Scout. It’s the quickest way to see what’s shipped recently.
Open the panel
Look for the What’s new icon in the header, top right, next to Help.
Click it to open the panel. Click outside, or hit Close, to dismiss.
A small blue dot appears on the icon when there’s a release entry you haven’t seen yet. Opening the panel marks it as read on this device.
How entries are organised
The newest entry is at the top. Earlier entries follow, newest first.
Feature tips
When a release adds something worth pointing out, a NEW pill appears next to it. Some also get a short tip the first time you reach the screen they are on. The tip says what it is and links straight to the release note.
Dismiss the tip with Got it, by pressing Esc, or by clicking outside. Its NEW pill goes with it. A pill with no tip goes once you use what it marks. Each one is tracked separately, so dismissing one won’t skip the next.
The tour covers some tips, so you won’t see those again after it. If you’re new to Scout, you won’t see tips about things that changed, because you never saw them before.
Your account and My focus
Your name, top right, opens a menu with your own settings. Only you can change them.
Set your focus
Click your name, top right, then My focus. You can also click Change next to your focus on Find prospects.
Choose who you sell to, the size of organisation, what you are promoting, and where. Leave Size of organisation empty for any size, and Where empty to cover the whole UK. How Scout uses this, under the lists, shows what changes as you choose.
Click Save my focus.
What you are promoting includes innovations that are ready now or at prototype stage. Each shows its status. Scout tells your searches what the innovation is, and treats a prototype as something to pilot, not something to sell today.
Products come from Company profile, in Products. An innovation shows once it is Ready or Prototype on the Innovation Dashboard and you click Sync from dashboard on Innovations.
Products come from the company profile, and innovations from the Innovation Dashboard. If something you are promoting is missing, ask an admin to add it.
Can’t see your sector?
The sectors come from the company profile, so everyone works from the same list. Add a missing one yourself on Company profile, in Sectors we serve. Requests from the team show there too.
The sectors come from the company profile, so everyone works from the same list. Under the sectors on My focus, click Ask an admin to add it, name the sector and say why. An admin adds it or tells you why not. You see the answer the next time you open Scout, and on My focus. If it is added, it goes into your focus straight away.
Your focus changes two things, both your own:
Find prospects: Scout ranks matching organisations higher but never overrides what you type. Size only changes the order: Scout never leaves an organisation out because of its size.
Email drafts: Scout writes with the sectors and areas you look after in mind, when the organisation is one of them. What you are promoting and the size of organisation do not change them. It never adds an offer the pitch does not include.
Company briefs and pitches stay the same for everyone. Draft a pitch lists your focus products first.
The team can see the lists you build, so each list shows the focus it was built with.
Change how Scout looks
Open the menu under your name and choose Light, Auto or Dark. Auto matches your computer, so Scout can be light by day and dark at night.
To change how each one looks, choose Themes. Light has Scout light and High contrast. Dark has Brand ink and Nord. If your computer asks for more contrast, Scout uses High contrast until you choose a light theme. Scout remembers your choices on this device.
Sign out
Open the menu under your name and click Sign out.
Company profile
Company profile is what Scout knows about Me Learning: what we sell, the sectors we serve, buying signals, and who we are the right fit for. Scout uses it in every brief and every prospect search.
Everyone can read it. Only admins can change it, so if something is wrong or missing, ask an admin.
Everyone can read it. As an admin, you can change it.
Change a section
Click Edit on the section you want to change.
Make your changes, then click Save. Other sections are not affected.
To change one item in a list, such as a sector, click its words. Change it, then press Enter. Press Esc to leave it as it was. Click Save when you have finished.
Sectors are always listed A to Z, so a new or changed sector moves to its place in the list.
If someone else saved the same section while you were editing, Scout shows their version instead of overwriting it. Make your change again on top of theirs.
Changes apply to briefs you scout from then on. Briefs you already have keep what they said.
Scout sends the whole profile with every brief and prospect search, so it has a length limit. While you edit, a counter shows how long the profile will be. If a change would take it over the limit, shorten that section or another one before you save. Shorter, sharper sections also give more focused briefs.
Sector requests
When someone asks for a sector, a number appears next to Company profile in the sidebar. The requests are listed at the top of the page. Tidy the name if you need to, then click Add to Sectors we serve. Or click Decline and say why. The person who asked sees your answer.
Size sweet spot
The size sweet spot is the size of organisation that usually fits best.Set the size of organisation that usually fits best. Scout uses it to rank prospect searches, never to leave anyone out.
Briefs and pitches never call an organisation a poor fit because of its size. They give its size so you can plan the conversation, and judge fit by its training needs.
Innovations
Innovations lists new ways we can build learning, grouped by how ready each one is. Click Features, where it fits, considerations on any card for the detail.
To see innovations working, click Open the Innovation Dashboard at the top of the page. It opens in a new tab with every innovation and its demo, and asks for its access key the first time. Pick the innovation from the dashboard’s list.
Ready: available to offer now.
Prototype: working examples, not yet ready to sell.
Proof of concept: early exploration.
Only offer Ready innovations to a prospect as available today.
Sync from the dashboard
Click Sync from dashboard. Scout checks the Innovation Dashboard and lists every difference. Nothing changes yet.
Untick anything you don’t want. Innovations no longer on the dashboard stay unticked unless you tick them.
Click Apply.
Manage users
Everyone who signs in to Scout appears in Users the first time they sign in, as a standard user.
Change someone’s role with Admin or Standard in their row. Admins can change the company profile, answer sector requests, sync innovations, export contacts, see the Activity panel, delete any pitch and manage users. Admins set in Scout’s configuration show Admin, with no choice, because they cannot be changed here.
Report a problem
If something goes wrong, tell the developers. Select Report this problem next to the error, or Report a problem here or in the menu under your profile name.
Say what you were trying to do and what happened. Scout adds what the developers need to find it: the version, the page you were on, and the error’s reference if there was one. It never sends what you typed into a search.
Leave out people’s names and contact details. Scout removes email addresses and phone numbers, but it cannot spot names.
When a developer has looked at your report, Scout tells you the next time you open it.
Tips for better results
Be specific with context
Adding context like "Focus on their apprenticeship programmes" or "They recently acquired XYZ" helps Scout prioritise what matters to your conversation.
Include the website
For companies with common names, adding the website URL helps Scout find the right organisation.
Set target roles
If you know who you want to speak to, add their job titles. Scout will prioritise finding people in those roles.
Choose the right sector
Selecting a sector helps Scout tailor the brief. Public sector briefs focus on frameworks and procurement. Private sector briefs focus on commercial drivers.
Use follow-ups
Follow-up questions are powerful. Use them to explore angles the initial brief didn't cover, or to get more detail on a specific section.
Write specific list queries
When building prospect lists, include size, sector, location, and any other distinguishing criteria. “NHS trusts in the South East” works better than “healthcare companies”.
Scout has run out of credits
Scout has run out of AI credits. Tell the developers with Report a problem.
Edit contact
Update anything that has changed, such as a new job title. Your changes are kept when Scout searches for contacts again. A changed email shows as not checked until you verify it.
Enter a name.
That doesn't look like an email address.
That doesn't look like a LinkedIn profile URL.
Activity
What's new
Version 2.22: Emails in your own voice, and size in My focus
In My writing style, paste one to three emails you have written and click Learn my style. Scout writes a short note on how you write and matches it in the emails it drafts. It keeps the note, not the emails. Take out names and anything private before you paste.
My focus has Size of organisation. It changes the order of your prospect searches, never who is in them.
Briefs and pitches never call an organisation a poor fit because of its size.
On Company profile, click an item in a list to change it, instead of removing it and adding it again.
Sectors on Company profile and My focus are listed A to Z.
Version 2.16: Signed out while Scout is open
If Scout signs you out while it is open, it now tells you, instead of saying a page failed to load. This happens when Scout has been open for a long time.
Sign in again and Scout takes you back to the page you were on.
When you come back to Scout after a while away, it checks you are still signed in, so you see the sign-in screen before you click anything.
Anything you typed but had not saved is lost when you sign in again.
Version 2.14: Shorter emails with a better ask
Emails are shorter. In My writing style, choose Short (50 to 80 words), Standard (80 to 120) or Longer (120 to 160).
Choose how your email ends: ask if it’s a priority for them, offer more details, offer an example, or suggest a short call. Asking if it’s a priority is the new default, because it gets more replies than asking for a call.
Emails now start with what Scout knows about them, and use plain, everyday words.
Your name at the end is optional. If your email signature adds it, delete it in My writing style so it doesn’t appear twice.
Good morning is no longer a greeting, because emails are often sent later in the day. If you chose it, Scout now uses Hello.
Version 2.13: Write to a contact
Click Write to on a contact card to draft an email to them. Scout uses the pitch that fits them best, or asks what to offer them if the company has no pitch yet.
On a pitch, the people under Who to approach now open an email to them.
You can keep an email to each person from the same pitch. Before, writing to someone new replaced your last email.
An email to a team mailbox, such as an HR inbox, no longer greets it with part of its name.
Version 2.12: Report a problem
When something goes wrong, select Report this problem next to the error. Say what you were trying to do, and Scout sends it to the developers with the details they need.
You can also report a problem from Help, or from the menu under your name.
An error now shows a short reference. If you tell someone about the problem, give them the reference.
When a developer has looked at your report, Scout tells you the next time you open it.
Company pages open faster.
Each scout in the activity feed shows its own cost, however long it took.
Problem reports has Open and Resolved tabs and a search. Each report is one line that opens for the details, and resolved reports show twenty at a time.
Version 2.11: Small fixes
The Sector choice under More options now shapes the brief. Before, only Private made a difference. Not sure leaves it to Scout.
If Scout refuses a follow-up question or Retry this part, for example at the daily limit, it says why and gives your question back.
Check again on contacts shows that it is working, and any message, under the Contacts heading.
Editing a contact while looking at the Contacts part of a company page no longer empties the page.
Find email only fills a missing address. It never replaces one that is already there.
Links in a brief open correctly, even when the address has brackets or asterisks in it.
Companies whose names are written in another alphabet each get their own page.
The activity feed shows the tokens and cost of each scout again, and Close clears its search.
Older entries in the activity feed no longer name contacts, and Scout keeps the activity log and usage for 24 months.
While Scout writes, it says you can close the tab. When you come back, it tells you how the scout went, with Open.
Version 2.10: Fewer lost scouts, less waste
Refresh contacts keeps the email addresses Scout already has, so it only looks up people who are new.
Cancel on a Full scout with contacts now stops the contact search too, and saves no contacts.
If the AI service stops part-way through a brief, Scout tells you and keeps the brief you had, rather than saving half of one.
If ZeroBounce does not answer, an address is left as not checked, so Verify can check it later. It used to be marked as one that may bounce.
If you come back to a scout while Scout is still saving it, Scout says so, rather than asking you to scout again.
Contacts only and Refresh contacts count towards the daily limit of 30, like a scout.
If the connection drops while Scout writes, Scout picks the brief up again. Starting another company never stops a scout that lost its connection.
Scout again and Full scout use only the company you are looking at, never what you typed for an earlier one.
Version 2.9: Looking after people’s details
Scout no longer keeps people’s names or email addresses in its record of who did what, or in its logs. It records what was done, such as marking a contact as contacted.
The activity feed shows each contact’s current name. A contact who has since been deleted shows as a deleted contact.
Deleting a company now also clears everything Scout had stored about it straight away, rather than after two hours.
Version 2.8: Scout while you work
While Scout writes a brief, go wherever you like. The browser tab shows how far it has got, and Scout tells you when it is ready, with Open.
Close the tab if you need to. Scout finishes the brief and saves it, and you find it in Companies. Only Cancel stops a scout.
Click Tell me when it’s ready to get a notification when you are in another tab or app.
Press Enter to scout. On Find prospects, Ctrl+Enter (Cmd+Enter on a Mac) builds the list.
Each browser tab is named after the screen or company you are on, so tabs, history and bookmarks make sense.
A new brief gets its own web address as soon as it is saved.
Copy link on a company’s page gives you a link to paste into Teams or an email. The link icons beside each part of the brief, and each section of Help, link straight to that part.
Companies remembers your filter and Mine only. Filters on Companies and Contacts are in the web address, so a link opens the same view.
Press Escape to close a dialog, What’s new or the Activity panel.
If your computer is set to reduce motion, Scout scrolls and loads without animation.
On My focus, How Scout uses this explains what Scout does when you have no focus set, and says that what you are promoting does not change your email drafts.
The Activity panel, with everyone’s actions and what Scout costs, is now for admins only.
Each company on Companies and in a prospect list says whether it had a Full scout or a Quick scout.
Your role shows under your name in the top corner.
A company with no brief yet offers Scout this company, rather than Scout again.
Version 2.7: More room on screen
On a computer, fold the sidebar to a narrow strip of icons and give every screen more room. Use the button at the top of the sidebar, next to Actions. Point at an icon to see its name.
Scout remembers your choice on this computer.
Version 2.6: Choose how Scout looks
Light, Auto or Dark is under your name. Auto matches your computer, so Scout can be light by day and dark at night.
Brand ink is the new dark look: Me Learning blue on deep blue-slate. Nord, the old dark look, is still there under Themes.
High contrast has black text and strong edges. Scout uses it for you if your computer asks for more contrast.
If Scout turned light for you, choose Dark under your name.
A new prospect list opens straight away.
Going back from a company’s page keeps your place: the same search, filters, sort, page and place on the page.
Not scouted now includes companies that have contacts but no brief.
Version 2.5: Your focus, where it counts
Your focus has moved off the top bar. Find it above the search box on Find prospects, and under your name in My focus.
Email drafts now use your focus. When the organisation is in a sector or area you look after, Scout writes with that in mind.
Version 2.4: Finding your way
If you used Scout before it changed, it offers a short tour of what is new. Say Not now if you would rather find your own way. Take it again any time from Help.
The tour now stops at every item in the sidebar, then goes along the top from left to right.
A NEW pill sits next to Draft a pitch on a scouted company until you first use it.
Version 2.3: Scout thinks a step ahead
A pitch’s Who to approach now shows the matching people already in Contacts, and the email is addressed to the best match.
Paste a website, a work email or a LinkedIn company link into Company name and Scout fills in what it can. Type a company you already have and Scout says so, with a link to open it.
When others at the same company have checked emails, Scout offers the likely address for someone without one. Try saves it, not checked yet. Verify saves it and checks it with ZeroBounce.
Unmarking a contact, deleting a pitch and deleting your email draft now happen at once, with Undo for a few seconds, instead of asking if you are sure.
Press Ctrl K (⌘K on a Mac) or / to jump to any company, prospect list, contact or screen, or to start a scout.
Scout remembers what you chose in What to get and your target roles. Draft a pitch opens with your first focus product already chosen.
Copy all is now Copy brief. It pastes with headings and lists into Teams, Outlook or Word. Download Word document is now Download docx.
Exporting contacts as a CSV is now for admins only, because contacts are personal data.
Admins can switch the Admin tag under their name to Standard, to see Scout as the rest of the team does. From 2.8 this is View as, for developers on staging only.
Version 2.2: Contacts
Not contacted shows the people nobody has reached yet. Every filter shows how many contacts it holds.
Export CSV downloads exactly what the filters and search show.
Click an email to copy it, or a company to open it. Rows highlight as you move along them, and on a phone each contact is a small card.
Version 2.1: Scout a company and Find prospects
Scout a company is shorter. Choose what to get (Quick scout, Full scout, Full scout with contacts, or Contacts only), then click one Scout button. Sector and context are under More options, and Target roles appears when your choice includes contacts.
Find prospects shows your focus under Build list, and your three most recent lists below the form.
Version 2.0: Company profile, My focus and Innovations
Fairer on smaller organisations
Briefs no longer write off an organisation because of its size. Fit now depends on the training need, not headcount.
Find prospects ranks results by how well they match your request, and keeps small and mid-sized organisations in. New lists show the best match first.
Prospect lists leave out organisations that are already clients, and only list real, named organisations.
Your settings have moved
Your name, top right opens a menu with My focus, light or dark, and Sign out. What’s new and Help sit beside it.
New to Scout? A short tour shows you round the first time you sign in. Take it again from Help.
My focus
Tell Scout what you are working on: who you sell to, what you are promoting, and where. Your prospect searches lean that way but never override what you type.
Lists are shared with the team, so each list now shows the focus it was built with. Company briefs stay the same for everyone.
Can’t see your sector? Ask an admin to add it from My focus. You’ll see their answer in Scout.
My writing style, under your name, sets your greeting, sign-off, tone and length for the emails you draft. Only you can see it.
Draft an email from any pitch, to a contact Scout found or to the role. Only you can see your email, and nothing is sent.
Pitch up to 3 offers together. Scout says which to lead with and how each one fits.
A clearer company page, with the same information. The brief is one Company profile panel that opens with a one-sentence summary, with the website and LinkedIn as links under Who they are. Older briefs get a summary too, written once from what they already say. Pitches, Contacts and a lighter More on this company panel follow, each with its own header. Pitches list the strongest fit first, contacts show the first six, and sources fold into a link.
Nothing is lost when you scout again. Scout keeps the company profile it replaces. Open it from Earlier scouts at the top of the panel, or download it. Pitches written from an earlier profile link to it, and earlier procurement checks are kept too.
Scouting a company you already have now offers Open company page, and says Scout again keeps the current profile.
Clicking a scout button twice no longer starts two scouts, which could mix two briefs together while they loaded.
Companies and prospect lists are easier to scan. Each company is one compact row with its summary, the date it was scouted or added, and a Scout button if it has not been scouted. Filters show how many companies each one holds. A prospect list numbers its companies best match first, with the same filters.
Prospect lists no longer have Find all contacts or Refresh all. They searched every company at once, and you could not see what they found without opening each company. Find contacts from each company’s page instead.
Pitches no longer include a suggested opening line. Draft an email from the pitch instead.
Draft a pitch on any scouted company. Scout writes a short pitch for one of our products or innovations from the brief, and says plainly when it is a weak fit. It never changes the brief or sends anything.
You can promote an innovation as well as a product. Only innovations that are ready now or at prototype stage are offered, and each shows its status.
Company profile
Company profile shows what Scout knows about Me Learning: products, sectors, buying signals and who we are the right fit for. Everyone can read it; admins can change it.
Innovations
Innovations lists new ways we can build learning, grouped by how ready each one is. Only offer Ready ones as available today.
Edit a contact, plus clearer LinkedIn affordancesMay 2026Fix a contact’s email or LinkedIn URL in place, and tell the two LinkedIn chips apart
Edit a contact, plus clearer LinkedIn affordances
Edit a contact’s email or LinkedIn URL
New edit pencil on every contact. Hover a row in the Contacts table, or a card in a company brief, and a small pencil appears next to the LinkedIn icon. Click it to open Edit contact.
The modal has two inputs: Email and LinkedIn URL. Both come prefilled with the current values. Correct whichever is wrong, leave a field blank to clear it, or change both at once.
Saving an email marks it as Unverified so you can re-run a ZeroBounce check on the new address. The LinkedIn URL has no equivalent check, so what you save is what you get.
This replaces the only previous fix for a bad contact, which was to delete and re-search.
Telling the two LinkedIn chips apart
Open LinkedIn profile on contact cards is now a blue, branded chip with the LinkedIn glyph. It clearly looks like a link.
Open LinkedIn profile from the contacts table is now possible too: a small LinkedIn icon sits next to the contact’s name, right-aligned in the name cell so it lines up with the verified tick in the email column.
The contacted via toggle next to it is now a green checkbox pill, so you can’t mistake the state marker for the link.
Confirm before unmarking
Clicking an already-marked Contacted via pill now asks you to confirm before it clears the date.
This protects the original contact date from accidental clicks. Marking on stays a single click.
Contacts table layout
The column order is now Name, Email, Title, Company, Date found, Contacted via. Email sits next to the name, the most-used identifier, instead of two columns away.
Behind the scenes
The contact search now copies LinkedIn URLs character for character from search results, rather than reconstructing the slug from a name. That cuts down on profile URLs that look right but lead to a missing page on LinkedIn.
Verify emails on demand and filter the contacts listMay 2026Click the marker to verify a single email, filter the contacts list by email status
Verify emails on demand and filter the contacts list
Filter the contacts list
New dropdown above the table: All contacts, With email, or Verified email only.
The list opens with With email selected by default, so the rows you see are the people you can actually contact. Your choice is remembered between visits.
Email status at a glance
Every email in the contacts table now carries a small status marker on the right of the cell. The markers line up so you can scan the column straight down.
Green tick. ZeroBounce checked the inbox and confirmed it.
Amber warning. ZeroBounce checked the inbox and could not confirm it. The email may bounce.
Company contact cards
The same states show on the company contact card view as the larger Verified and Unverified pills you already know.
Hover any pill for an explanation of what that state means.
Layout
The contacts table is wider on big screens so the Contacted via column fits without horizontal scrolling.
Long email addresses wrap to a second line on narrow columns rather than pushing the right edge off the page.
Track who you’ve contactedMay 2026Contacted via toggles on contact cards and the contacts table
Track who you’ve contacted
Contacts
Mark each contact as contacted on LinkedIn, by email, or both. Two toggle pills sit under every contact card and on every row of the Contacts table, under a small Contacted via label. Tap a pill to mark the channel: it fills green with a tick and shows when you marked it (today, 3d, 2w, then a short date for older marks). Hover for the exact date and time.
Click a green pill again to unmark it. The timestamp clears.
State persists across refreshes, across the Contacts screen and company detail, and through Check again for contacts. Running Find email on a marked contact keeps the mark intact.
Contacts table
New Contacted via column on the right of the table, with the same pills as the card view.
The Date column is now Date found, so it isn’t confused with the date you contacted someone. Sorting on that column is unchanged.
The table has a touch more horizontal room on big screens so the new column sits cleanly without crowding the others.
Procurement results are saved. After you check procurement for a company, the contracts, notes, and source links stay on the brief. Reopening the company shows the same result with a “Last checked” date instead of starting from scratch.
Refresh button replaces Check procurement once a result is on file, so you can re-run when you want a fresh look.
Procurement searches that hit a transient error now retry quietly instead of failing on the first attempt.
Reliability
Fixed an issue where the loading spinner on outline buttons (including Check procurement) was invisible against the white background.
Honest empty states and stickier searchApril 2026Truthful Quick-scout placeholders, Scout-again confirm, search state preserved across navigation
Honest empty states and stickier search
Briefs
Quick-scouted briefs read truthfully. Talking points and Contacts on a Quick scout no longer show “did not complete” or “no contacts found”. Those are reserved for actual failures.
The Talking points placeholder on a Quick scout names what’s missing and offers a Run Full scout button. Contacts shows Find contacts until you’ve searched.
Scouting
Scout again confirms first. A short prompt explains the brief will be replaced. Contacts and follow-ups stay either way.
Scout another company is now the primary action at the end of a brief, in place of Download .docx.
Search
Fixed an issue where searching on Companies or Contacts, opening a result, and returning reset the list back to all results while leaving the search box populated.
Briefs for UK charities now pull authoritative figures from the Charity Commission register: five years of income and expenditure, registration date, and activities.
A green “Verified data from Charity Commission” banner shows on the stream whenever Scout matches a charity.
Scout spots charities automatically. You don’t need to flag them yourself.
Companies and Prospects
Mine / Everyone toggle on both screens, inline with the search bar. Server-side filtering keeps pagination accurate.
Click-to-edit names on the company-detail and list-detail headings. Enter saves, Escape cancels. Renaming a company rejects names that already exist.
Scout again button on the company-detail action bar, so you can re-run straight from the brief.
Scouting and briefs
Talking points reliability. Per-section token budgets, with an instruction to prioritise Talking points when space runs short.
Helper notes under each scout button explain what each one fetches.
Quick-scout banner on the company-detail screen when the brief is a Quick scout, with a primary Run Full scout button.
Contacts
Source badges. “Departmental” and “via Force 24”. AI-default contacts no longer carry a redundant “via AI” badge.
Force 24 verification. Emailed contacts pick up subscribed, unsubscribed, and last-activity status from Force 24.
Searched-sources note above the contacts list shows which providers Scout checked on this run.
Confidence pills with three trust tiers: Verified (green), Catch-all (green, no pill, labelled “probable”), and Unverified (dashed amber, labelled “guess”).
Email button hover stays in the verified-green palette in light and dark mode.
Reliability
Out-of-credits prompt in place of generic “API error” messages. When Anthropic credits run out, Scout shows a clear message instead of a confusing failure.
Fixed an issue where streamed content from later sections briefly appeared in the wrong card.
Removed
Removed the Fresh run button on contacts. It produced lower-quality results than Check again, which now also uses the stored website domain when one isn’t supplied.