đ What Are Intents?
Intents are powerful conversation triggers that detect when a customer expresses a specific need or interest â such as wanting a discount, asking about a product, or being ready to purchase. When an intent is caught, it can automatically trigger a flow, helping you guide the customer towards conversion.
đŻ Goal of This Playbook
Use Human Escalation Intents to improve your customer satisfaction by:
Detecting escalation signals (e.g., requests for human help or expressions of frustration)
Triggering an automated handoff flow that acknowledges the request and alerts your support team
Ensuring seamless transition to human agents with full conversation context
Boosting both customer trust and support team efficiency
đĄ Use Case: Escalate to a Human Agent
Customers often ask:
"Can I speak to a real human"
"This doesnât quite solve my problem yet"
"No, this wouldnât work for me"
These are signals where weâd need to break out of the AI conversation and have a human agent take over.
With Intents, you can catch these questions and respond in a way that escalates the requests accurately and timely.
đ§ Step-by-Step Setup
Creating Intents
Start by setting up the intent. For this, navigate to the âIntentsâ page and click create new.
Next up, define a generic sentence that represents your intent, e.g. âCan I speak to a humanâ, âThis doesnât work for meâ.
Use the âGenerate samplesâ button to let our AI help you create more example phrases, such as:
Could you connect me with a human representative?
I need actual human help
I want to reach customer service directly
This doesnât solve my problem
This is not helpful at all
Edit them as you like, the more phrases, the more complete the intent
Click Save if you are happy with your intent
Creating the flow
Use the intent you just created as the trigger for your flow
Send a message that indicates the support team will take over
Set âhide flow messages in feedâ to false, so that the feed will be marked as unread in the conversations screen, for the customersâ human agents to find the conversation and reply.
đ Benefits
Better customer satisfaction: Customers feel heard when their requests for human help are recognized and acted upon promptly
Reduced customer frustration: Instead of customers getting stuck in automated loops, they're quickly routed to human support when needed
Prevents conversation abandonment: Catching escalation signals early prevents customers from leaving the conversation frustrated
Timely intervention: Automated detection ensures no escalation requests are missed or delayed
Seamless handoff experience: Customers get immediate acknowledgment that their request for human help has been understood and will be addressed
Improved agent efficiency: Support teams can easily identify conversations that need human intervention through unread feed notifications
Maintains conversation context: The entire conversation history is preserved for human agents to understand the customer's journey
â Best Practices
Capture comprehensive escalation language: Use AI-enhanced generation to include formal, informal, frustrated, and polite ways customers request human help
Include negative sentiment indicators: Add phrases expressing dissatisfaction or indicating automated solutions aren't working for their specific needs
Monitor and optimize regularly: Track escalation patterns to identify automation gaps and test the handoff process for smooth agent takeover
đ Wrap-Up
By setting up human escalation intents, you're building trust with customers who know they can always reach a real person when needed, while streamlining your support workflow. It's a balance between automation efficiency and human touch that keeps customers happy and your team focused on high-value interactions.