Setting up your Zendesk Flow(s)
Depending on your ideal set up, you might want to forward every incoming message to Zendesk or you only want to open tickets in specific scenarios. If the former is the case, please create a new flow.
Next, right-click on the canvas and select Create Zendesk Ticket from the menu. Connect the trigger to the node and publish the flow.
In the Journeys overview, please click on your name in the top-right corner and select Settings. From there, choose your Zendesk flow from the dropdown menu under the Catch-All Trigger settings. Otherwise, you may go to
https://<your-company>.hello-charles.com/journeys/settings/triggers
and select the flow you just created from the drop down on the right.
With this setup using the Catch-all trigger, every incoming message will open a new Zendesk ticket and for customers who already have an open ticket, the message will be appended to the ticket.
In case you only want to open tickets in specific instances, add the Create Zendesk ticket node in the flows where you want to create the tickets.
Using the condition node
If you want to avoid sending customers promotional content while they have an open service ticket, you can use our condition node to filter these people out. Simply add a condition node to the canvas and select properties from the drop-down menu.
Replying via Zendesk
When a ticket is created in Zendesk, you notice it comes with helpful context. You can see the previous 5-10 messages between you and your customers and a link to the conversation in charles. This way, your customer service agents know immediately what to respond with and how to help your customer.
To reply to a ticket, you can use the native Zendesk text editor to reply to tickets. Sending attachments is also supported.
If you are outside of the 24 hour window, you can't respond using regular WhatsApp messages. In these cases, we recommend creating a few update templates in charles which are accessible in the right panel once approved. For instance, create an update template with quick reply buttons to nudge your customers to open the 24 hour window again.
To send templates, type in the template name in the input field in the charles app panel on the right. Once selected, click the "Send message" button and the template will be sent to your customer.
Automations in Zendesk
Tickets that are opened via WhatsApp are created with a "charles" tag. This can be used as an entry point to trigger all sorts of other automations in Zendesk. For instance, you can add additional tags, once a ticket with the tag "charles" was created.
✅ Workaround: Automatically Update Ticket Status to "Open" via a Zendesk Trigger
To ensure ticket statuses are updated to "Open" when a customer replies via charles, you can set up a trigger in Zendesk. Here's how:
In Zendesk, navigate to Objects and rules → Business rules → Triggers
Click Add trigger and give it a name, e.g. "Update status when charles message is received"
Assign it to a Trigger category (e.g. Automation)
Under Conditions, set up the following and Save it:
Once active, this trigger will automatically change the ticket status to "Open" whenever a message is received via the API — ensuring that customer replies coming through charles are never missed due to a stale ticket status.