You can simply and effectively streamline your workflow by creating macros for support requests that can be solved with a single, standard response or action. This saves agents the time and effort of manually responding to multiple customers with the same issue.
A macro is a prepared response or action that an agent can manually apply when they are creating or updating tickets. Macros contain actions that can update ticket properties.
Unlike triggers and automations, macros only contain actions, not conditions. Conditions aren't used because nothing is automatically evaluating tickets to determine if a macro should be applied. Agents evaluate tickets and apply macros manually as needed.
Macros can perform tasks:
- Add comment text
- Update ticket fields
- Add or remove ticket tags
- Add CCs
- Change the assignee
- Set the ticket subject
- Add attachments to ticket comments
There are two types of macros: personal macros (created by an agent or administrator for their own use) and shared macros (created by an administrator for multiple users).
This article contains the following topics:
- Creating personal macros for tickets (agents)
- Creating personal or shared macros for tickets (administrators)
- Adding formatting and inline images to macro comments
- Adding attachments to macro comments
- Adding an alternate plain text version of a rich content macro comment
- Using placeholders in macros
Related articles:
Creating personal macros for tickets (agents)
Although only administrators can create the macros that are shared by all Zendesk Support agents, agents can create macros for their own use. A personal macro is only visible to and can only be used or modified by the creator.
You can create macros from scratch, as described here, or you can create macros based on existing tickets.
To create a personal macro for tickets
- Click the Admin icon (
) in the sidebar, then select Manage > Macros.
- Click the All shared macros drop-down menu and select Personal macros.
- Click the Add macro button.
- Enter the macro name, and add actions for your macro as described in Building macro action statements.
- Click Create.
Your personal macros are added to the list of available macros.
Creating personal or shared macros for tickets (administrators)
Administrators (and some custom roles) can create macros that are shared by all Zendesk Support agents or macros that are shared by only agents in a specific group. Administrators can also create personal macros for their own use.
A personal macro is only visible to and can only be used or modified by the creator. Administrators can create shared macros, and can modify all shared macros, regardless of who created them.
You can create macros from scratch, as described here, or you can create macros based on existing tickets.
To create a personal or shared macro for tickets
- Click the Admin icon (
) in the sidebar, then select Manage > Macros.
- Click Add macro.
- Enter a Macro name.
- (Optional) Enter a Description.
- Select an option from the Available
for
menu:
- All agents, available to all agents.
- Agents in group, available only to agents in the group specified. A drop-down menu to choose the group appears when you select this option.
- Me only, available only to you.
Note: The Agents in group option is available on Support Professional and Enterprise. - Click
Add action, then
select
an action for your macro (see
Building macro action
statements)
and complete the corresponding field that appears.
If you choose the Comment/description macro action, and you have rich text formatting enabled, you can add formatting and inline images and you can add attachments to your macro comments.
- Click Add action again to add another action and repeat as needed.
- Click Create.
Adding formatting and inline images to macro comments
If you have rich text formatting enabled, you can add styling, formatting, and inline images to the Comment/description macro action. An administrator must enable this setting. For details, see Enabling formatting options for agents.
To add formatting to your comment
- In the macro, under the comment box, click the T at the bottom of the field.
This opens the rich text editor interface:
- Select the formatting you want to apply to the text.
Toolbar button Formatting Keyboard shortcuts Increase/decrease heading style Increase: Ctrl + +
⌘ + + (Mac)Decrease: Ctrl + -
⌘ + - (Mac)
Bold Ctrl + B
⌘ + B (Mac)Italicize Ctrl + I
⌘ + I (Mac)Bulleted list Ctrl Shift + 8
⌘ + Shift + 8(Mac)Numbered list Ctrl + Shift + 7
⌘ + Shift + 7 (Mac)Decrease paragraph indentation Ctrl + [
⌘ + [ (Mac)Increase paragraph indentation Ctrl + ]
⌘ + ] (Mac)Block quote Ctrl + Shift + 9
⌘ + Shift + 9 (Mac)Code block Ctrl + Shift + 6
⌘ + Shift + 6 (Mac)Code span Ctrl + Shift + 5
⌘ + Shift + 5 (Mac)Hyperlink Ctrl + K
⌘ + K (Mac)Horizontal line Ctrl + Shift + L
⌘ + Shift + L (Mac)
If you created a macro with the Comment/description action before the addition of rich text formatting, you can update your macro by clicking the Use rich content link. This copies your existing comment action, loads in the rich content editor, and places your comment back into the editor. You can then apply formatting and images or attachments as needed.
Now you can add a plain text version of you rich content macro comment, if you want. The plain text version will be intelligently applied in channels that don't support rich text formatting.
To add inline images to your comment
- Drag and drop an image from your computer into the comment window, or paste a copied image into the window by right-clicking and selecting Paste or by pressing Ctrl or ⌘ + V.
Adding attachments to macro comments
Comments in your macros can also contain up to five file attachments.
The maximum file size for a single linked attachment is 50 MB. For more information, see Attachment size limitations.
To attach one or more files to a comment
- Click the paperclip icon in the at the bottom of the field.
- Browse to the file you want to attach.
- Select the file, and click Choose.
The file is added to the ticket.
Adding an alternate plain text version of a rich content macro comment
If you added styling, formatting, or inline images to the Comment/description macro action, you can add an alternate plain text version, if you want.
The plain text version will be intelligently applied in channels that don't support rich text formatting. These include the Zendesk mobile app, Zendesk SMS, the Zendesk Facebook or Twitter integrations, and any of the Zendesk channel apps.
- In the macro, under the rich content version of the comment, select Include plain
text fallback.
- In the pre-populated version that appears, make any modifications needed to create the
plain text version of the macro comment.
Using placeholders in macros
- When you apply a macro with placeholders to a Problem ticket, the placeholder is rendered when the macro is applied, not when the ticket is submitted. This can produce some unexpected results. For example, if you send an email response to Problem ticket using a macro that contains the {{ticket.requester.name}} placeholder, the ticket’s requester name is sent to all linked tickets, not just the ticket associated with the requester.
- To prevent this from happening, add an escape character (\) in front of the placeholder. For example, \ {{ticket.requester.name}}. In this case, the placeholder is not rendered until the ticket is submitted, which will show the correct name to each user who submitted a ticket linked to the problem.
56 Comments
Please add if liquid markup is supported or not in the rich macro editor, we make use of it in the old macro editor.
Hi Joel! Liquid markup is not supported with the rich text macro editor. If you would like to continue using liquid markup in macros, you would need to switch your account over to markdown formatting.
EDIT: Liquid markup IS supported with the rich text macro editor. Some formatting may need to be adjusted when going between rich text editor and markdown.
Hi Brad
Actually, it seems to work just fine, both inline, and if you include it using dynamic content. Just converted and tested a couple of macros where I use liquid markdown to pull out the first name of any ticket CCs, after refreshing the editor and Zendesk to exclude cache issues. We are using Rich formatting inbound and outbound, no markdown.
In what way is it not supported, or what has changed between using liquid markup in the plain and rich version of the marco editor?
EDIT: and it's very good news to me that liquid seems to work in rich mode too :P
Hi Joel! Welp, turns out the liquid markup I used in my test did not render properly for other reasons. Sorry for the confusion! Liquid markup IS indeed supported by the rich text macro editor. There may be some need for formatting adjustments when going between markdown and rich text. While we are not able to troubleshoot liquid markup here in Zendesk Customer Advocacy (similar to custom code), if you are having any issues with a particular string, feel free to submit a ticket and we can take a glance at it and see if anything stands out.
Again, sorry for the confusion. *doh*
For some reason in my existing Macro's I've got a function "Convert to formatted text".
When a new Macro is created this function does not appear. Any clue?
Laurens, its just a security measure from Zendesk. The new editor should convert old content without any issues, but there might be slight variations and you never know, so this feature is so you can choose yourself when to convert your old macro formatted in markdown to the new rich text editor for macros. Once converted, you cannot switch back.
For new macros, the new editor is the always the default if you rich text editing enabled in your account (which it is, or you wouldn't see this option).
Hey Joel,
Thanx for the reply. I understand it's an old feature. The trouble for me is I'm using the Dynamic Content inside the Macro's
Dynamic Content doesn't contain the new editor. Is this something which will be available in the future?
I've found a work around for now: If I clone an existing Macro it still consist of the feature. I'm just editing the new one ;)
I have had not trouble so far using dynamic content in the new editor, though I haven't migrated all my macros. It should work though. Just type it into the editor as usual.
There are probably some edge cases here where the rich editor behaves in another way compared to markdown editor, but I can't think of them right now.
Hello
I also use dynamic content in the macros.
So unfortunately I can't use this "rich content" feature.
Would be great if I could though ;)
UPDATE: Missing it in email notifications as well.
I found a work around incase you have existing Macro's with rich content and dynamic content.
Go to an existing Macro -> clone the Macro -> change the cloned Macro to your new wishes
works like a charm.
Guys, dynamic content should work in the rich editor. If it doesn't, could you post what isn't working?
Well, check the picture below. In the function to create a new piece of Dynamic Content there is no richt text editing available.
What I meant was that you can embed dynamic content and rich content in the macro editor. For rich content in the dynamic editor itself, that is not supported, but we have this existing Product Feature Request: Rich Text in Dynamic Content.
Showing dynamic content and liquid code working in rich macro editor
We use macros constantly, and find them very useful. The biggest missing capability is assigning an incident to an existing problem ticket. Having this ability would cut agent time in half for many macros.
Is there a way for an administrator to convert a personal macro to a shared? Or, view what personal macros are in use by individuals?
Hi Kris!
There isn't any functionality for this built in to the interface, but I think you may be able to do this using the API. I'm not an API expert by any means, so I'm afraid I can't be any more help than that, but you can get more information in our developer resources!
Hi ! I'm searching for the maximum size image I can put in a macro (its width). Does one of you know where to find it please? Thank you!
Is there any way to create a one click button or text link for macros just like Zendesk did with the take it macro?
Nate, you could do this by building a Zendesk app yourself, for example in the ticket sidebar location.
Yikes. That might take a little more effort than I was hoping to spend on this.
Indeed :)
I instruct all my agents they only ever need to learn one keyboard shortcut in Zendesk: ctrl-alt-m, to open up the macro box, and then to autocomplete and invoke their macros, if that helps any.
@Clothilde -
There is not a set limit; the images typically adapt to the width of the media being viewed. However, normal ticket attachment sizes (which are determined by your plan level) do come into play.
In general, I'd recommend keeping most images to a width of 600-700px; that's about the right size for the average browser window.
@Nicole
Thank you for your answer!
You're welcome!
Hi,
I want to know if it is possible to create a macro with an URL, which is not converted to a clickable link automatically.
We have a macro with a PayPal.me payment URL. At the end of this URL string, the agent have to insert the payment amount manually.
https://www.paypal.me/onlineshop123/INSERT_AMOUNT
In the macro, the URL is just plain text as I do not want the URL converted to a link. So the agent can easily chante the "INSERT_AMOUNT" to the correct amount. And then, when pushing the space-key, the URL should be converted into a correct URL like this:
https://www.paypal.me/onlineshop123/149,99
But when using this macro in a ticket, the plain URL will be automatically converted to a link:
https://www.paypal.me/onlineshop123/INSERT_AMOUNT
The agent now changes the INSERT_AMOUNT to the correct amount and then you will have something like this:
https://www.paypal.me/onlineshop123/149,99
If the customer clicks on that link, it doesn't work.
To achieve a full link, you have to delete the automatically created link first to create a new link over the full URL. This costs time.
I wonder why the plain text URL in the rich text macro is converted to a link after using this macro in a ticket, regardless of wether the URL in the rich macro is plain text.
I have also tried to create a text-only macro (without rich content), but it is the same. The plain URL will be converted into a link.
Does anybody have an idea to solve this?
Thanks!
Hi Oliver,
If you have only a few different amounts you may want to consider simply creating a new macro for each of those - or one macro with all the variations.
Alternatively, if you have the macro insert your original url your agents could
Hi Jacob,
thanks a lot!
It is not the best solution, but our agents can work with that little workaround.
Hi, Is it possible to track clicks on a link within a macro? For example, we have referrer tracking on our Guides site, and we know some of that traffic comes from our macros. However, we can't currently tell which macros. Is there any way to get at that information? We're currently on the Pro plan.
Hi Chris,
There's no way to track the click through rate of links from Macros currently. Great idea though; I can see how it would be really handy for your tracking and reporting needs. I recommend for to you to submit a feature request in our community here for this so our product managers can see and other customers can vote as well.
Hope this helps. :)
Best,
Amie
Hello!
I want to create macro that pre fills the subject line with example "Missing Commission"
I have figured out how to enter the static subject but now I want to also pull (pipe) text from the information I already have on the ticket (example an account number/name)
Is pipe text available?
Thanks
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