If you’d like to expand messaging beyond the basic response configuration, and offer more complex, automated conversations, you can enable a bot to interact with customers before handing them off to an agent.
This article includes the following topics:
About bot-enabled messaging
Enabling a bot means you can use advanced automation and customization options and tools in your messaging configuration, including:
- A fully-functional, automated out-of-the-box bot flow that can be used without any modification to greet your customers. For more information, see The out-of-the-box messaging flow.
- Flow Builder, the click-to-configure tool for customizing more complex flows for your bot. For more information, see Using Flow Builder to create bot flows .
You’ll need to turn on bot-enabled messaging for each channel where you want to include the advanced functionality described above.
Messaging bots are managed through the Bots page in Admin Center.
The Bots page lists any bots you’ve added, as well as basic information about them, including a name (configured in the bot settings), status (live or draft), and the channel(s) connected to it.
From there, you can add a bot, edit an existing bot in Flow Builder, or configure the bot settings.
Upgrading to bot-enhanced messaging
When you initially turn on messaging for a Web Widget or mobile channel, the setup process includes configuring the default messaging response. You can choose to upgrade from the default messaging response to a bot during that process, or you can return to the widget’s Responses tab to enable it.
To upgrade from the default messaging response to a bot
- In Admin Center, click the Channels icon (
) in the sidebar, then select Messaging and social > Messaging.
- Click the name of the channel you want to edit. The widget’s edit page opens.
- Click the Responses tab.
- At the bottom of the page, click Add a bot.
Note that adding a bot as described above does not disable the default messaging response. You need to publish the bot to enable it. Until then, the default messaging response remains active.
Creating a new bot
Creating a bot means you’re adding the ability to use the bot in a channel’s messaging configuration. Until you add a bot to a specific messaging channel and publish it, the default messaging response remains active for that channel.
To add a messaging bot
- In Admin Center, click the Channels icon (
) in the sidebar, then select Bots and automations > Bots.
- Click Add bot at the top of the page.
- Enter a name for the bot. This name is displayed at the top of the widget where the bot is deployed.
- If you’re using multiple brands, use the drop-down to select a brand to apply to the bot.
- Click Finish at the bottom of the page.
A draft of the bot’s out-of-the-box flow opens in Flow Builder. This bot remains in draft mode until it is published and connected to a messaging channel.
Publishing a bot to a channel
Whether you are using the out-of-the-box bot, or configuring a new bot, you’ll need to publish that bot before it appears in any of your messaging channels.
Publishing a bot to a channel means that any other messaging response – either the default messaging response, or another bot messaging response – is removed from that channel, and replaced with the newly published bot.
Until you publish a bot:
- If you have not yet published a bot flow, the default messaging response remains active.
- If you have published a bot flow, the last published version of that flow remains active.
- Any unpublished changes remain in Flow Builder, until they’re published or altered.
Both out-of-the-box and customized flows are published through Flow Builder.
To publish a bot flow to a channel
- In Admin Center, click the Channels icon (
) in the sidebar, then select Bots and automations > Bots.
- Hover over the bot you want to work with and click Edit in Flow Builder.
Note: If you are adding a bot, as described above, the bot automatically opens in Flow Builder.
- Make any changes necessary to the flow, then click Publish.
- If the bot is not currently published to a channel, the channel selection screen opens. Select one or more channels to connect to your bot and click Publish to selected channels.
- If the bot is already live on a channel, it is updated in that channel with any changes made to the flow.
Updating general bot settings
You can update the following general settings for a bot:
- Name
- Brand (if multiple brands are enabled on your account)
- Channel connection
To update a bot’s name and brand settings
- In Admin Center, click the Channels icon (
) in the sidebar, then select Bots and automations > Bots.
- Hover over the bot you want to update and click Settings.
- In the General tab, update the Name and Brand as needed.
- Click Save.
The process for connecting a bot to a channel varies slightly, depending on whether the bot was is Live (already connected to a channel), or still a Draft (not connected to a channel).
A bot must be connected to one or more messaging channels before it can be published and made available to your end users, and each channel can only be connected to a single bot.
If the bot is a Draft mode, you’ll see the following:
Connecting a Draft bot to a channel is part of the publishing process. See Publishing a bot to a channel, above.
If the bot is currently Live in a channel, you’ll see the currently-connected channel(s), as well as any other channels available for connection:
To connect a Live bot to a channel
- In Admin Center, click the Channels icon (
) in the sidebar, then select Bots and automations > Bots.
- Hover over the bot you want to update and click Settings.
- In the General tab, select the additional channels you want to connect to the bot.
Note: If the selected channel already has a bot connected to it, that bot will be disconnected from the channel and replaced with this new bot.
- Click Save.
Managing bot language settings
You can select a single language for a bot, or configure it to speak in multiple languages for an improved customer experience.
For more information, see Managing languages for a bot.
40 Comments
Hey @...
Shiyu from the Zendesk product team. When you speak of localisation, are you referring to localizing the entire flow or only certain messages inside a flow. Thanks
Hey @...
Have you tried adding a transfer to agent step after article suggestions as a way to prevent end-users floating in limbo?
Thanks for your feedback around business operating hours, I have captured your use case for us to consider in the future.
@...
Thank you for reaching out. Some default texts are English-Only (also cannot be changed in English) so these should be localized in other languages. The page itself is ok to be in English.
Regards,
Shiyu Zhu
Hi Shiya, Referring to your message here -
I am unable to configure another step after Articles suggestion, in order to transfer to an agent.
The transfer to agent step will be helpful after Articles suggestion, then I can add the form to collect ticket fields information from the end-users.
Instead of relying on the "Talk to Human" end of loop from Answer Bot which doesn't ask with the form.
Is there any reporting available around what inquiries didn't resolve the issue for the customer when using AnswerBot? We'd like to be able to capture this information so we can add it to our Help Center articles.
Hey Dave,
We released Improved reporting for answer-bot in Explore which you can find out more in the link I attached. It looks like we include a rejection rate for articles that did not resolve the issue for the user.
Let me know if that's not what you're looking for!
Thanks Brett, although clicking on your link takes me here. I tried searching as well but came up empty.
Hey Dave,
Looks like the announcement has since been archived. You can find out more about answer bot reporting here: Explore recipe: Analyzing Answer Bot activity
You can also find out more about our answer bot metrics and attributes here: Metrics and attributes for Zendesk Guide
I hope this helps!
Is there a way to change the name of the answerbot to something else?
Hey Jordan,
It doesn't look like this is possible at this time, however, our Product Managers are looking to have this functionality available in the future.
Let us know if you have any other questions!
Just to clarify, if we want to enable messaging so we can use Flow Builder capabilities with Answer Bot, do we have to use the messaging feature or can we just use Flow Builder?
We already use Answer Bot and would just like the enhanced functionality; we're not ready to use messaging with agents at this time. Thanks!
Hi Trey,
Flow Builder only works on the new Web SDK today and it does require you to enable messaging and making the upgrade to agent workspace.
Thanks for clarifying @...!
Is there a possibility to avoid answerbot to plug an external bot ? Have you some links to share about that ?
Hello @...,
In this scenario, with Flow Builder, we cannot use external bots.
You would need to use Answer Bot because the integration is built around it.
Is it possible for Answer Bot to transfer the conversation to a specific agent?
Hello, @...,
Please note that this is not possible since we do not have a mechanism on how to manage this.
We would like to provide an option to request a call back and then gather information using ticket fields. Is there a way to do this?
The flow would be Talk to a human > Request a callback > Please provide the following information: "Issue, Phone #, etc" (using fields) > Create ticket and then we could tag the ticket and create a callback view.
Mis siguientes preguntas son estas ..
quedo atenta a una pronta respuesta :
flow builder
1.-Se pueden cambiar las frases parametizadas ( Un ejemplo en ves de decir -- hablar con un humano yo quisiera poner-- hablar con un especialista)
2.- Existe manera que al cerrar el bot no quede como tikcet
3.- calificación disponible todo el tiempo en ves de al ultimo
4.- enviar encuesta de satisfacción y cerrar chat después de inactividad.
Hi Jon,
As of the moment, there is no native way to add the step "request a callback" in flow builder, but we understand your need for this functionality so I will be marking your comment as Product Feedback.
We truly value customer feedback and your voice and votes in the product feedback topics in the community help influence future Zendesk functionality.
The team and I are attempting to configure this now. The main issue we see is that where we have departments handling different business components (sales, support, billing) there's not a way to hand off to a particular department.
I may want to have a certain widget location be handled by a different agent as well (on a sales page/form for instance) .
Are there any immediate plans to allow the flow builder to send chats to particular departments, or is that handled via a different piece of functionality? Thanks!
@... When will it be possible to customize the feedbackflow? The automatic translation does not match our communication style (eg. the knowlegde is power?? line). By the way the option to transfer to an agent is missing in that automatic feedback. The only choice is to start over or rephrase the question...
Hi, Team!
Working on creating flows now and I'm a little stuck.
I only have two options for the form:
When I type in "Order ID", nothing populates to choose from. Any ideas?
Hi Ingrid,
Customizing the feedback flow with Flow Builder is on the 9 month roadmap.
Hi Tiffany,
Check to see what field type it is in your Support ticket field configuration. There is only a limited set of ticket field types supported in Flow Builder agent transfer configuration currently - text or drop-down. So if your Order ID is a numeric field type for example that would explain why it isn't appearing. Are there particular field types that you'd like to see supported with Flow Builder when capturing data as part of the agent transfer step?
Hi Marcel,
We are looking into ways to improve agent routing with Flow Builder on the 9 month roadmap. In the meantime, you may be able to achieve what you need by configuring data capture as part of the agent transfer step. For example, you could create a drop-down ticket field that has the values of your example, "sales", "support" and "billing" and then you can set up routing rules so that messaging conversations with those ticket field values go to the appropriate agent group.
I hope that helps!
@... Hi Daniel, thanks for the update. Is it possible that the 9 month roadmap for Flow Bilder is shared. So it's clear to us what's coming?
@... - Chiming in on the comment from @..., for the same reason we would be interested in using placeholders to provide the language translation in the register we are using with our end users. And so, we would be interested as well in what the 9-month roadmap will have in store for us.
Hi,
Is there a way to change the avatar for the Answer Bot?
Hi @...,
Not currently, but this is something that is in consideration for the future. Out of interest, what avatar would you like to use instead?
Thanks,
- Miranda.
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