In this article, we’ll describe how to use Flow Builder to build automated, custom conversation flows for your customers.
This section includes the following topics:
Creating a new flow
Each brand has a complete, working default flow that you can leave as-is. You can also edit some steps or insert new message steps to better meet your needs.
However, you may want to create a new flow from the ground up. Your flow can be as simple as a single step offering a customized greeting, or include multiple branches based on customer responses. To create a new flow from scratch, you’ll need to first delete the brand’s default flow.
By default, a flow’s static text elements – those Answer Bot messages that cannot be customized, such as the feedback and fallback flows – are created and displayed in your account's default Support language. You can also select one of Answer Bot's supported languages for these elements, as well as the default, out-of-the-box flow. See Selecting a flow's language for more information.
To create a new flow
- In Admin Center, click the Channels icon (
), then click Flow Builder in the left column.
- Locate the brand you want to create a flow for, and click Configure.
- If needed, select a language for your flow.
- In the Flow, click Add the first step.
- In the Configuration panel, use the Select action drop-down to choose the type of step you want to begin the flow and configure the step as needed
- Add the next step by clicking the Add a step icon (
), then follow the instructions in step 4, above.
- Repeat until you've added all of the required steps, then click Publish in the footer.
As you are building your flow, don't forget to use the Previewer to test how the conversation will be seen by your end users.
Editing steps in a flow
You may need to change your flow by editing or deleting steps. You cannot edit a step's type. However, you can edit some of the details in a step's configuration.
To edit a step in a flow
- Click the step you want to edit. Its details appear in the Configuration panel.
- Edit the elements you want to change:
- Displayed message (all step types): Update the text in the Bot says box.
- Options (Present options step): Update the options in the text box. To delete an option, click the trash can icon. To add an option, click Add an option.
- Suggested articles (Show Help Center articles step): To delete a suggested article, click … and select Delete. Use the Select article search box to add additional articles.
- Information collecting fields (Handoff steps): To delete a field, click … and select Delete. Use the Fields drop-down to add additional fields.
- Click Publish when you've finished making your changes.
Inserting messages into a flow
In some instances, you can add a message into the middle of an existing flow if needed.
To add a message step into a flow
- Hover over the connecting line between a message step and its subsequent step.
- Click the Add new icon (
).
- In the Configuration panel, use the drop-down menu to select Send message, then enter the message text.
- Repeat as needed, then Publish your updated flow.
Selecting a flow's language
By default, the static text elements in a flow appear to your end users in your account's default language. You can, however, choose to display those text elements in any of the languages supported in Answer Bot.
You can change the language applied to a flow at any time; however, you should ensure that the selected language matches the language used to create your custom flow. If you have multiple brands, each brand's flow can have a different applied language.
The language selected here affects all static text elements displayed through Answer Bot, including:
- Default flow (the out-of-the-box experience)
- Feedback flow
- Fallback flow ("Sorry, I didn't understand your question," for example)
To select a language for a flow
- In Admin Center, click the Channels icon (
), then click Flow Builder.
- Locate the brand for the flow you want to update, and click Edit flow.
- At the bottom of the page, click Settings.
- On the Settings page, use the dropdown to select your language.
- Click the brand name in the breadcrumbs at the top of the page to return to the Flow Builder and continue building or editing your flow. When your flow is ready to be deployed, make sure you click Publish at the bottom of the page.
Deleting steps and flows
Deleting a step removes all subsequent steps from the flow as well.
To delete a step in a flow
- Click the step you want to delete. It appears in the Configuration panel.
- At the top of the Configuration panel, click the Trash can icon (
). If there are subsequent steps, click Delete steps in the warning box.
- Click Publish when you've finished making your changes.
33 Comments
Can I only use it when activating the answer bot?
And, can't it be activated in the sandbox?
Hello,
You don't need to have an active Answer Bot subscription to use the Flow Builder. As long as you have signed up to the messaging beta, you will be able to access it through Admin Center.
It can't be activated in a sandbox environment today but if you would like to test a flow, you can use the previewer feature in the Flow builder.
I tried setting this up with social channels, but I think it's really only useful if you can create a separate flow that applies to social. I also don't understand if it can be used without answerbot, even if I delete the steps it still returns article suggestions and that might not make sense on Facebook messenger where it's more of a chat experience
Hi Team,
It would be nice if I could direct a customer to a ticket form, as well as connect them with an agent. i.e Give them the option to go to form, or live chat. sometimes customers don't have time to chat and i feel if there's no option to submit a request via a form somewhere in the flow, then the customer technically hits a wall and results in a bad experience.
(Correct me if I'm wrong and missing something here with functionality)?
Best,
Amie
Hi Andrew, support for social and having a flow for each brand (and mapping brands to flows) is something we're working to address. You'll still have a single flow for a brand but at least then you'll have a consistent experience across channels for that brand, right now social channels will always use the default brand and associated flows.
Hey Amie! With messaging, the idea of forced channel switching goes away, as an end-user I should be empowered to choose the right channel to switch to when I need to switch, e.g. if I'm told that that expected response time may take a few hours and I can't stay on the computer or come back to it later, then I should be able to provide my email address (and/or switch to a social channel in the future) to continue the conversation there. Re-engagement via email is coming soon, with social channel linking to follow shortly after
Is it possible to make filling in Name / Email / etc mandatory?
Is there a way to build a flow for the answer bot to create a support ticket if no chat users are currently online? I've noticed that chats still get forwarded to agents when they are set as invisible. I'd hate to have users sitting there waiting for an agent reply when none are available or online.
Hi Matt Nade (MOVUS)
If you configure your transfer to agent step with name and email, they will be mandatory fields before an end-user can be transferred to an agent.
Hi Shiyu Zhu - that's not working in all cases unfortunately.
See the ZD support ticket number 6081159
I'm looking for a way to make it mandatory at all times, as it seems they can be transferred to an agent without selecting the flow builder step......
If I am incorrect, please let me know, as I'd love to solve this.
Hello,
I decided to introduce Zendesk Messaging to help a limited number of agents. I found two problems while creating and testing chatbots through Flow builder.
The first problem is that if I press the 'talk to a human' button on the feedback flow provided, the agent will be connected, but it will work the same after working hours. I'd like to print out an information message if it's not working hours. Is there a way?
The second problem is that when an agent is connected by pressing the 'talk to a human' button, a user is considered an anonymous user. So the customer has to tell the agent who they are every time. I would like to provide this chatbot in the app I created and create a ticket based on the information logged in from the app when users are connected to the agent through the chatbot. Is it possible?
I can not enable Flow Builder for my trial version. Is that only business account can enable Flow Builder?
Are we able to have more than one Flow per brand, segmented by language?
with the flow initiation being controlled by whatever we pass the web sdk client from our product?
Hi Nabia,
Currently, Flow Builder doesn't allow you to modify "Talk to a human" step in the system generated feedback flow. This is something we are planning to make configurable in the future.
For your business hour use case, you can set up a chat trigger to communicate information when your agents are offline for messaging. Here is an article to explain how to create this https://support.zendesk.com/hc/en-us/articles/1260801553730-Creating-an-out-of-office-message-in-Flow-Builder.
Hey Yen,
Is it a Zendesk Suite trial that you've signed up to?
Hi Dan Ross, no this is not possible today. Could you help me understand why you would like to have different language flows for the same brand?
Are you imagining each language flow they would contain different content or will you be using it as a way to localize your flow content? Thanks
Hi Shiyu Zhu
Thanks for replying! I would like different language flows for the same brand because Brands are tied to Guides and Guides support content in multiple languages.
We have several products that span multiple regions and languages, we currently have one brand per product and leverage Guide Enterprise to host our self-serve content. Thus, we have one Brand per product. We rely heavily on Articles and their translations.
We also provide chat services in different languages for these products and really need to be able to author Flows that will allow us to serve these different customers.
For example, I'd love to have our Answerbot for our Retail product provide different options to English users than we would perhaps display to French or Dutch users of the product. Sometimes features or common issues are regional. The other issue becomes when we attempt to transfer to a human, we need to be able to pass some kind of language identifier so we make sure the correct group of agents that speak that language are online.
In the current state, it seems the current flow builder isn't able to be used in a multilingual support environment. If you'd like to dig deeper into a use case for Enterprise, I'd be happy to connect with you to discuss in detail!
Is it a Zendesk Suite trial that you've signed up to?
I've just subcribe for a Suite trial, if Zendesk work well and suiteble for my case, I will suggest my client to upgrade.
I cannot find the icon for flow builder. Can you advise on why this is missing?
Thank you,
John
+1000 on what Dan Ross said :) While I understand the feature is "somewhat new". The current set-up doesn't allow the flow to be created for the same brand (Brand A) in multi-language. Our customers are either English or French, and we would require the ability for the system to automatically serve the user the Flow that is built for their language - and also pass to the correct department afterward to continue serving the user in their preferred language with a seamless handover. Thanks!
Is there any way to present a specific ticket form or embed the "Submit a request" link as one of the options to be chosen? I know I can simply paste the link, but this doesn't present as nicely. If one of the option types (Message, Article, Transfer etc) was Link that would be very useful.
If any of these options already exist, would someone, kindly, point me to the appropriate article?
Thank you,
Tammy
Hey Tammy,
I did some testing on my end and it doesn't look like you can present a ticket form at this time using Flow Builder. I realize that just including a link may not be the best option so another solution would be to have a designated article that informs your users how to contact your Support team. This article can include steps for submitting a request and you can hyperlink directly to your Submit a Request page if needed.
Let me know if you have any other questions!
Dear Zendesk Team,
Please advise:
1. Can I remove the option TALK TO A HUMAN ? - I do not want this option to EVER APPEAR unless I choose so. I need to be able to close some of my flows with a start over option only - they are purely informational flows, I do not want customers to be able to contact me via chat at the end of these flows. It is very inconvenient not having the power of decision on how your flow ever ends (unless you choose to connect to an agent option of the flow).
2. Nabia asked a question that remained unanswered. I have the same concern. I would like to provide this chatbot in the app I created and create a ticket based on the information logged in from the app/ particular app screen when users are connected to the agent through the chatbot. Is it possible?
If not, what integration shall I use, what app from your marketplace can do this? Can maybe Twilio be a good option?
3. We have the Enterprise plan, In Admin>Billing I see the following information about answer bot: Answer Bot / Add-on / 50 resolutions per month. Please correct me if I misunderstand. This means:
A. Answer bot supports FOR FREE only 50 customer queries per month (can be used 50 times only? True / False)
B. What happens after these 50 resolutions per month end?
4. Can the flow that I am using inside an organization (flowbuider) be copy-pasted (automatically transferred) to another one of my organizations? supposing I do not have to build everything all over again. E.g: I have 5 organizations. I need to have the same flow in all of them.
5. Can I personalize the aspect of the answer bot? If yes, how? (tried already but did not manage)
A. If yes, can I personalize the aspect of each answer bot based on the Organization? E.g: I have 5 organizations. I need to apply distinct organization branding for each of them
Hi All,
How is everyone setting up their Messaging triggers to route end users to a specific group?
I have a selection called "I want to make a purchase" and I want this to route straight to a human in our Sales group.
I believe this is possible - But how? Any help would be much appreciated! =]
I just want to add on that not having the ability to chance the experience for after business hours almost makes this unusable...I set the after hours trigger but it still gives the expectation that the customer is going to talk to a human - UNLESS they send another message which to me means at that point, the customer is frustrated.
See attached where the "customer" had to say "hello?" to get the trigger to fire with the auto reply.
Hey Thomas Crosson How'd you manage to route to an agent for your "in-office" hours workflow?
I'm on struggle street with this piece!
Hey Clik Rogan if its "in-office" hours when the customer selects "talk to a human" it should work. But I learned today after talking with Zendesk support for a few hours that at least 2 agents must be online for the notification to appear in the agent workspace.
Also your other question about routing to a specific group - check out this: https://support.zendesk.com/hc/en-us/articles/360057455393/comments/1260800262330 might be helpful to you.
Also, this could be helpful for routing to a group: https://support.zendesk.com/hc/en-us/articles/360057909933#topic_wrf_5km_jnb
Hey Thomas Crosson,
Thank you for that! I managed to work it out using unique ticket fields presented to the customer prior to the expected transfer to agent. This way I was able to define exactly which group will be presented with the chat.
Any ideas on how to populate the Customers name? All of my chats are coming through as "Web User 74358734957934"?
Clik Rogan I think if you get the customers info at the beginning then it will change? I am not sure but that is what I read as a suggestion somewhere online.
I actually switched back to old school chat and answer bot cause messaging was not going to work for my needs at this stage in it's development. Long term, I think it will be awesome!
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