This article details how you can get inbound messages in your queues and assigned to your team to reply. You will need to have a Channel added and also at least one Queue set up.
In this example we’ll be running through an email example, if you have any questions about other channels please contact Service Delivery or the Support Portal.
New Messages
First, you will need to create a Workflow Trigger Event that will be hit when new messages come in.
- Go to the Configuration icon and click on Workflow.
- Select Add Trigger.
- Then select the trigger type as Non Interaction Message Received.
- Select the Media Account.
- Select the Rule as your Inbox.
- Click Save.
Once you’ve done this the trigger will then appear in the trigger list as shown below.
Now we need to create the workflow that will perform actions when the trigger is hit.
- Click the trigger you created earlier.
- Then select the Add New Workflow button.
- You should then be presented with the below
This is where you create your new workflow and add in the actions and decisions you want to happen. You can see our Workflow tips here.
Every workflow needs to begin with a Start node and this is already added for you. In this case, the workflow starts by collecting some information first using a Regular Expression node. Find this in the dropdown at the top and click create. You can rename the node once added as shown below.
🗝️ This example is looking for a 9 digit order number with the message the customer has sent and saving it to be used later.
Next, a Find Interaction Node is added (select this from the dropdown and click create). This is a check to see if the customer has been contacted before, in which case they may have an interaction in another queue. Set up the node like below and save it.
At the bottom of each node you will see a dropdown labelled Out to select another node – this section decides what happens next. Your first three nodes should be connected as shown below.
Now we’re going to check that an interaction has been found for this customer by adding a Decision node. You can see how this is set up below.
Once saved you will see that this node (as it’s a decision) has multiple out connections, we’ll come back to these as we’ve created other nodes.
The next step is to now check if the interaction is closed and how long it’s been closed for. So again, add another decision node like before. This node is set up as below.
Once that is saved we’re going to add another decision node to see how long the interaction is closed. This will help with assumptions that if a customer is contacting over 7 days after their last query has been dealt with this may be a new query (this is configurable). The third decision node is setup like below:
Now you’ve created those three decision nodes, you can move on to naming them and linking them together.
Don’t worry about the Nodes linking to Create: Email – General or Assign to Interaction If Found, linking those will be looked at later.
Now add an Assign to Interaction node and configure this as shown below.
This is used to add the latest customer message to an existing interaction if one was found earlier in the workflow.
Now we’re going to add a Create Interaction node. This is useful for when the customer doesn’t have an existing open interaction or if they have an interaction that had been dealt with more than 7 days ago.
We’re creating the interaction in our Email – EN – General queue (you can select a queue of your choice) and adding the Data Set of Customer Service Data. You can learn more about dynamic data here.
Now the Assign to Interaction node and Create Interaction node have been added they will need to be linked to the decisions you created earlier.
Next, we’re going to add an Update Interaction node, to set the status of the interaction and set data to make it easily your advisors.
See our article on adding dynamic data to create a Status (and Status options). It also shows you how to create an Email Address and Order Number data field. Once you’ve done this, set up the node as below.
The Id set as the constant for Status shown above will be different for you. Therefore you will need to get the Id of the Option you want to select here (Usually the New status you have created).
Finally, we’re going to add a Stop node to end the workflow. Select this from the top dropdown and add this and configure the node as shown below.
Once this node is added we can now save the workflow as a draft. At the top of the workflow there will be a Save button. You may want to give your workflow a name first, this example workflow is named ‘New Email‘.
Once saved, the flow you created will be in your list but highlighted yellow. This means it is currently in draft mode. In order to use this workflow properly, you will need to open it open up and publish it.
You can find the publish button next to the save button as below
Now we can add the workflow to the trigger you created, simply drag it from the list into the trigger workflows and it should appear like the below.
Click Save.
Now when you receive a new message into your inbox, the information will be gathered and the interaction will be created into the Queue you set up.
See our pages on Queues and how to add a team to ensure that the interactions created are assigned out from the queue.