Build a Data Bot for your small business: let your team ask your numbers in plain English (unofficial guide)

The short answer

Create one Bot whose only job is answering questions about your numbers. Give it read-only access to the places your data lives, plus a short data dictionary that says what each column means and which source wins when two disagree.

If you're on a Cursor team, share it so teammates can ask it questions in their own private chats or in Slack. If you work alone, the same Bot works as your personal analyst. Either way, have it cite the file and filter behind every answer, and check one number by hand before you trust it.

This guide is independent and unofficial. It isn't affiliated with or endorsed by xAI, Grok, X, or Cursor. Features change often, so check the linked docs.

What is the Grok Bot "Data Bot"?

It's an internal Bot the Grok Bot team described on X on Nov 2, 2026: "PMs use Data Bot to investigate product usage, marketers use it to measure campaign results, and teams across the company use it to build dashboards and track key metrics."

It isn't a product feature or a template you can install. It's an example of a shared Bot set up for one job. A Cursor engineer (@poteto) replied that if you want one like it, you can tag @bot, ask it to read the post, and have it guide you through the setup.

We don't know how the team's own Data Bot is wired up, which data it reads, or how much time it saves them, so this guide doesn't guess. What follows is a small-business version built from the official Shared Bots docs.

Can my whole team use one Bot?

Yes, if you're on a Cursor team. Per the Shared Bots docs, shared Bots are for members of a Cursor team who have Grok Bot, and they always run in the cloud. A Bot that runs on your own computer can't be shared. If Browse shared Bots isn't under + in the sidebar, you aren't on a Cursor team or your app needs an update.

To share: click the Bot's name at the top of the chat and choose Share. Pick your whole team or only people you invite. Add people as Collaborator to let them chat with it, or Manager to let them also change its instructions, skills, memory, and apps. Keep Managers to one or two people.

Each person's chat with a shared Bot is private. The owner and Managers can't read anyone else's chats. The Bot can save what it learns for the whole team and tells you when it does.

Each reply uses the Grok Bot usage of the person it's answering, not the owner's. A teammate who asks fifty questions a day spends their own allowance.

The owner or a Manager can also connect it to Slack (Bring to your team's Slack), so people can DM it or mention it in a channel. Each teammate links their Slack account first under Settings > General > Shared Bots.

Step 1: connect your data read-only

List where your numbers live: a sales or bookings spreadsheet, store or payment exports, an ad-platform report, a CRM view. Start with two or three sources, not ten.

Connect them as apps from the Bot's setup. A shared Bot uses the apps and secrets its owner added, and those work the same for everyone who chats with it. The docs say to add only keys and files you're happy for everyone you share it with to use.

Prefer view-only access. Share a sheet with the connected Google account as Viewer, or use a read-only API key where the tool offers one. The weekly-report guide notes that files shared as Viewer stay view-only, which is exactly what you want here.

A connected account always acts as the person the Bot is answering. When a teammate's question needs one of their own accounts, the Bot asks them first. It never uses one teammate's connection for someone else.

Step 2: write a one-page data dictionary

Add a file to the Bot (Files in Bot settings) that answers the questions a new hire would ask: what each important column means, whether revenue is gross or net of refunds, which time zone dates use, and which source is the truth for each number.

Add the known traps: refunds that land a week late, a test product in the export, an ad account billed monthly. These are what make an analyst's answers trustworthy, human or Bot.

The docs say memory isn't a source of truth, so keep this in a file the Bot reopens, not in chat. When a definition changes, update the file, not a teammate's conversation.

Step 3: give it answer rules

Put these in the Bot's instructions so every teammate gets the same behavior:

Cite the source for every number: the file or report name, the date range, and any filter used.

If two sources disagree, show both numbers and say which one the data dictionary treats as the truth. Don't pick one quietly.

If data is missing or out of date, say so instead of estimating.

Answer questions; don't change data. No edits to sheets, no refunds, no messages to customers, no ad changes.

When a question is vague ("how are sales?"), ask which period and which measure before answering.

Step 4: check it before your team relies on it

Ask it the five questions people ask you every week (last week's revenue, top products, which campaign brought leads, and so on) and check each answer against the source by hand.

A tool saying it succeeded isn't proof. The habit that helps is to read the number back from the system that owns it. Do this the first week and again whenever a sheet's columns or a report's format change.

Once the common questions come out right, save the method for each one as a skill so every teammate gets the same steps. For a recurring summary, pair it with a Monday-numbers routine (see our weekly business report guide) that returns a draft for you to check.