This article will explore the use of ‘Quick Replies’ in a chatbot journey. Quick Reply functionality is currently available in the following channels: Gnatta Chat, Facebook Messenger & Instagram DMs. Any configured Quick Replies will not display in other channels.

Chatbots vs Quick Replies: What’s the difference?

Put simply: Quick Replies are a feature of chatbots and automated conversations.

Chatbots are simple (yet effective) rule-based flows, using if-this-then-that logic to interpret what a customer is saying and offer a response. However, the open-text nature of chatbots leaves space for complexity - such as a typo you haven’t accounted for in your logic. Chatbots without quick replies are often more complex to create, and more limited in their applications.

Quick Replies can help reduce that margin for human error by offering customers a selection of buttons for their reply. These buttons have hard-coded values that you can use to make more intelligent decisions in your chatbot journey. That means you can go further, and do a lot more, before passing the conversation to a human agent.

In the example below, you can see how Quick Reply buttons can be used in combination with open text responses.

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Quick Reply Example

Getting Started

Before we set up a Quick Reply, There are a few important things to remember:

• Quick Reply flows are best used when attached to a ‘Response Received’ or ‘New Message Received’ event. Read more about events and their uses here: Events

• If you’re using the flow on a ‘New Message Received’ event, you’ll need to use the action ‘Create Interaction’ first, to ensure your Quick Reply messages and the customer’s responses are stored together in a single interaction.

• If you’re using the flow on a ‘Response Received’ event, start with a Decision action to check which step of the Quick Reply journey the customer is currently on.

• If you’re creating a chatbot journey for a Facebook or Instagram account, we also recommend using their native Get Started and Welcome Message features to help control the customer journey. These can be configured on your media account under the advanced section. A separate guide for doing that is available here: Welcome Screen Settings

Branching

Before you can send a Quick Reply, it’s important to understand which messages have been sent so far in the journey, and what the customer’s responses were. This is done with a series of Decision actions.

1. The first action in the flow should be a Decision to check which journey step the customer is on. You’ll need a new custom data field called ‘Journey Step’. Later in the flow, after sending a Quick Reply, you’ll update that field to reflect the journey step the customer is on. In your Decision action, create a numbered branch for each step of your journey.

2. Under each of those branches, you’ll need a new Decision to check what the message contained. For example, Customer A completed Step 1, selecting ‘Book a Demo’. This button click updates the data field ‘Journey Step’ to Step 1, ends the flow, and then retriggers the flow. The new message is ‘Book a demo’. The branch under Step 2 will need to check for ‘Book a demo’ before it can send the next Quick Reply message - which might be ‘Select a date’.

This is complex functionality - please do reach out for help!

Creating a Quick Reply

Quick Replies can be created in the Builder, using the action ‘Send Autoresponse’.

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Add a new ‘Send Autoresponse’ action

First, give your action a useful name. If this is the first message in your journey, you might label it ‘Intro Message’. This will help you keep your chatbot journey clean, and easy to scan through when making changes!

Next you’ll need to set your message content. As the quick reply buttons will appear directly below this, it’s important to set expectations with the customer. A good intro might be:

Finally, select ‘Add quick replies’ at the bottom of the panel to begin attaching and configuring your buttons.

The Label is the text that will be displayed on the button for the customer. The Meta Data is a hidden field, which for simple Quick Reply journeys should be exactly the same as your label, as we’ve shown in the example.

You can add multiple quick reply buttons using the ‘+ Add’ at the top of the subpanel.

Lastly, just click ‘Submit’ in the top right of the main panel and your Quick Reply message is configured. You’ll be able to see it on the Builder map, connected to the rest of your flow.

Next Steps

Once you’ve created your Quick Reply, we’d recommend doing the following:

1. Use the ‘Update Interaction’ action to change a new ‘Journey Step’ custom data field to document the sending of your Quick Reply Message, and keep track of which journey steps the customer has completed.

2. The branch should then immediately reach a ‘Stop’ action whilst you wait for the next customer response.

3. The next customer response will retrigger your flow, checking which step they’re on in the journey from the ‘Journey Step’ field you updated.

4. When you’ve reached the final step in the journey, use ‘Close Interaction’ to end the chat before reaching a Stop action.

These steps can then be repeated indefinitely to create the branching paths of your chatbot journey.