ManyChat Live Chat is a tool that allows you to communicate with your contacts via Instagram, WhatsApp Automation, Facebook Messenger, Telegram and SMS right in ManyChat:
- Send messages
- Join a conversation
- Answer questions
- Manage contact's data manually (add Tags, subscribe to Sequences, add Custom Field value, etc.)
- Merge contacts
- Send payment links
Please note that Meta channels (Facebook Messenger, Instagram, and WhatsApp) have a 24-hour rule, which can be the reason why your messages are not being sent. In short Live chat allows you to communicate with your Contacts during a 24-hour window and send both regular and Automated messages in Live Chat. After the 24-hour window is closed, in Messenger and Instagram, a new window is opened, the 7-days window, which allows you to send regular messages to your Contacts via Live Chat. After the 7 days period, you can use Message Tags, Messenger lists, or DM lists to reach out to these Contacts.
WhatsApp doesn’t have a 7-days window. If the interaction happened more than 24-hours ago, please, use Message Templates to reach out to your Contacts.
Live Chat Behavior
Go to Settings → Live Chat to manage the behavior. Select an option:
- If you choose Any message starts a conversation, new messages from the contact will go in the Unassigned folder.
- If you choose Conversation should be opened explicitly, new messages will go in the Closed folder.
If you select the second option, the conversation will go in the Unassigned folder only when the Marked conversation as Unassigned Action is performed, otherwise, it will be always marked as Closed.
You'll need to add Notify admin and Mark conversation as Unassigned actions in the appropriate section of the flow. You'll be notified about this action and the conversation will appear in the Unassigned folder of your Live Chat.
Overview
Live Chat Section consists of four columns: the left filters panel, the list of your conversations, omnichannel conversation, and contact panel.
Left column
Use filters to save time managing conversations.
There are 4 folders between which you can switch:
- Unassigned. All new messages from your contacts will appear in this folder, so you won’t miss new leads.
- You. As soon as you reply to a conversation, assign it manually to yourself via Live Chat or automatically within Action in flows. The thread will appear in You folder.
- Team. All conversations assigned to your team members will appear in this folder.
- All. If you want to see all the conversations in one list, go to the All folder.
In every folder you can filter conversations by Open or Done status:
- Open. Conversations waiting for your reply display in Open status.
- Closed. When you mark a conversation as Closed, the status will change to Closed.
Use filters to quickly find chats by specific channels.
Collapse the left panel if you want more space.
You can sort your conversations by Newest/Oldest.
Select the desired contact to see the conversation.
Middle column
The middle column shows the conversation. You can assign it to someone and reopen if it was closed. The automation messages are marked with the bot icon and can be hidden with the icon on the top. You'll find all the messages sent by page admins.
Right column
The right column (Contact Panel) shows all the information collected from past conversations
- See contact's information (profile picture, full name, status, gender, language, and timezone)
- See all channel's history (Instagram DM, WhatsApp, Facebook Messenger, Telegram, and SMS)
- See notes added to conversations
- Manage Tags
- Subscribe and unsubscribe from Sequences
- See how this contact opted in
- Manage Custom User Fields values
- Unsubscribe this contact, download and delete their data
Note: you will see SMS chat if you: enabled SMS channel in Settings and your particular contact has a phone number (in the system field) and enabled SMS opt-in. SMS feature is paid: 0.01$ for outgoing SMS (incoming messages are free).
Merge duplicate contacts
Use the Merge contact to link a Facebook contact who has a duplicate record in another channel. This will reduce the number of duplicate email and SMS records that a customer can have via Messenger, Instagram, or WhatsApp.
Note: you need a ManyChat PRO plan to merge contacts.
Learn more about contacts merge in this article.
Threads
By default, threads are displayed according to the time of the last message from the contact. The latest dialogues will appear on top. Older ones will appear below. Every time you reply to the contact, the conversation will be automatically moved to the top of the list.
Timestamps indicate the time the last message was manually sent by the contact. If the contact didn't send a message to the page (for example, they click buttons in the automation), there will be no timestamp. These dialogues will be displayed under conversations with manual activity from the contact.
Assignments
Use the drop-down menu below to assign (or unassign) a conversation to yourself or one of your teammates. Track assignments in the drop-down menu on the left of the filters panel.
Pause Automation
This option allows you to stop all automation messages while communicating with your contact. As soon as you message them back, a 30-minute pause is activated and your contact will only receive manually sent messages from an Admin or Live Chat Agent for 30 minutes. Keywords won't trigger during this period. Upon activation, the pause icon is on the profile picture in the conversation section. To increase the duration and activate it, go to the Contact panel.
If the subscribed contact was in the flow at the time, all the messages will be sent to the end of the flow or the closest interruption: for example, Delay or Smart Delay.
If the Delay is activated before or during the pause automation, messages will be sent only at the end of the pause.
Search
Search for conversations and see the details and history. You can use two symbols (but not special symbols such as &,$,$, etc.) to start your search.
Notes
Notes help you manually mark your contacts, add a description and other notes to share with your team members, or add some clarifications/reminders for yourself. Use the Notes tab to add information.
Use @ to mention and notify a team member. If you’re the only Admin, you can always mention yourself to receive a reminder in Messenger.
All notes added to the conversation are displayed in the contact’s panel. Click on the note to jump to the place in the conversation where the note was added.
Hide Messages from the Automation
This feature hides all the automation messages in the conversation so that you can focus only on the messages your contacts manually typed to your page.
Note: Hide messages from the bot feature also hides the Keywords and button clicks from your contacts. This happens because such messages are also part of the automation.
Send Flow
This feature lets you send a specific flow to the subscribed contact without having to create additional automation. It applies to Facebook Messenger, Instagram, and Telegram channels.
Click the Send Flow icon at the bottom of the conversation, select a flow and click Send This Flow:
Note: Instagram Live Chat doesn't have a paper clip icon because it's unable to add non-image files, unlike Facebook Live Chat.
After you send the flow, you will see a Flow sent system message containing the flow name in the conversation:
Note: if Pause Automation is on, it will be automatically deactivated once you send a flow:
Please note that outside the 24-hour window, during the 7-days window, sending a Flow is not available due to Meta policy.
Products
You can send products directly to your customers in Live Chat for an efficient shopping experience. When they’re ready to buy, use the Products feature to quickly close the sale for a seamless automated transaction in one view.
Note: you need a ManyChat Pro plan that connects to Stripe or Paypal.
Learn more about the product catalog in this article.
Personas
This feature allows you to personalize conversations in your bot. Go to Settings to let your contacts know who replies back. Once it's activated, your contacts will see the agent's name and their profile picture which will be auto-populated from Facebook.
This is useful for a variety of use cases, such as customer support where you collaborate with several team members. Personas will help you make the conversations more transparent and build a better customer experience.
Note: personas are only supported in the Messenger channel.
Canned Responses (Formerly Snippets)
Canned Responses are pre-populated answers sent to contacts in Live Chat with just one click. Save valuable time answering frequently asked questions with a set of prepared replies instead of typing the same information again. Choose from a selection of Canned Responses you can easily create and manage at any time.
Send a Canned Response
To send a Canned Response you already created, go to Live Chat. Click on the icon to open the search window.
Search the drop-down list. Type the name of the Canned Response (also known as Shortcut) or part of its message. Click on the desired response, and its corresponding message reply will populate the text window. Click Send or Send and Close.
Create a Canned Response
Click on + New in the upper right to create a new Canned Response. To edit or remove it, click Manage which will open in Settings.
Create in Settings
You can also create a Canned Response in Settings. Go to Settings → Live Chat. Scroll down to Canned Response. Click the blue button + New Canned Response. Type the Shortcut (name) and the entire message. You can also edit or delete the Canned Response.
Mobile support
You can download the ManyChat app for iOS. Manage Live Chat conversations, contacts' data like Tags, Sequences, Custom Field value, etc. More functionality is on the way!