Chatlio Quick Start

We recommend you bookmark this page for easy reference or add the link to channel sidebar in Slack.

If you have any questions at all, please do not hesitate to contact us using the Chatlio chat widget below. We are happy to help.

Setup and installation

Before starting to use Chatlio, make sure you have already setup and installed Chatlio.

Update Slack notification preferences for Chatlio

After you setup Chatlio, we recommend you turn on notifications for the Chatlio connected support channel.

Chatlio Slack notifications

If desired, you can also set mobile notifications for Slack to be sent as soon as possible. Go to https://slack.com/account/notifications > “customize your notification settings”, select “Send push notifications as quickly as possible when I’m not active on the desktop”.

Additionally, you can turn on alerts so that Chatlio notifies you every 30 seconds for 5 minutes if no one has answered a visitor. From Slack issue the Chatlio command /chatlio response-reminders.

Basic overview/usage

Chatlio is a way for organizations to talk directly with their customers, users, potential customers, etc, on their website(s) directly from Slack. Once you have the widget installed on your website, there are two modes that the widget operates in, “Online” or “Offline”.

Online mode	Offline mode

Online mode

The Chatlio widget is “online” when one or more Slack users in the Chatlio channel have a Slack status of “active”. When online, visitors (people viewing your website with Chatlio) can open the Chatlio chat widget and ask questions. When a new visitor asks their first question, Chatlio sends a message to the main Chatlio channel in Slack with information about the vistor and a link to a dedicated Slack channel. Eg.

To respond back to the visitor, a Slack operator simply joins the newly created channel and starts sending messages. All messages entered in the dedicated channel go directly back to the visitor. Slack operators can invite other Slack users to the channel, use emoji’s, send files/links, etc. to visitors just like any normal Slack conversation.

In addition, you can request screenshots from your users, or send chat transcripts via email or webhook.

There are many other Chatlio commands you can learn more about below.

Ending a conversation

A conversation can be ended directly from Slack by issuing the /chatlio end or simply by typing /leave command in the dedicated conversation channel. If enabled this will email the chat transcript and/or post the transcript to a webhook of your choosing. Ending the conversation archives the channel in Slack, removing it immediately from the Slack sidebar.

If the operator does not end the conversation, Chatlio will automatically archive the channel after 12 hours.

If the visitor returns later to chat, Chatlio un-archives the channel with all the previous chat history available for viewing.

Here is how to setup sending chat transcripts automatically:

Open the Chatlio dashboard.
Select the widget from which you wish to have transcripts emailed.
On the Behavior tab, find the “Webhooks and post-chat actions” section.
If you want to send the transcript to a webhook, add your webhook URL and check that you want to send the transcript to the webhook automatically.
If you want to send the transcripts to an email, add your email and check the “Enabled” checkbox below. Learn more about exporting transcripts with webhooks.

Threads in one channel

Available on request while in pilot. Contact us to try it. Once it is on for your account, the choice is under Chatlio dashboard > your widget > Channel > “Where visitor conversations go”.

Instead of a channel per visitor, each visitor can be a thread in the main Chatlio channel:

Each visitor is a thread under a card in the main channel. The card is the alert for a new visitor. It shows the visitor, the first message, who answered and whether the chat is open or closed.
Reply in the thread to answer. Everyone in the main channel can reply.
Slack notifies people of new replies in threads they follow. Replying in a thread follows it; you can also follow a thread without replying, or change your Slack notification settings for the channel. Reminders that nobody has answered also post in the channel.
End a chat with the card’s End chat button, or type @Chatlio end in the thread. The card shows Closed. If the widget’s chat end screen is on (see Conversation Ratings), the visitor sees it.
Type other commands in the thread as @Chatlio <command>, for example @Chatlio reply for saved replies. Slack does not run slash commands in threads. These commands do not work in threads yet: email, send-to-webhook and screenshot.
Not available in threads yet: files (visitors cannot upload, and files posted in the thread do not reach the visitor), chat transcripts by email or webhook, the visitor typing indicator and the automatic conversation summary.
A visitor who comes back while their conversation is open continues in its thread. After a conversation ends, the visitor’s next message starts a new thread. An ended thread stays in the channel; replies there do not reach the visitor.
Changing the choice affects new conversations only. Open conversations stay where they are.
The main channel must be a public channel in your workspace. It cannot be private or shared with another organization (Slack Connect).

Bots in threads

Bots and users listed under Configure bots and users are added to the main channel. Their replies in a visitor’s thread reach the visitor, as in a visitor channel. Messages from bots that are not on the list stay in Slack. For a bot to answer visitors in threads:

It replies in the visitor’s thread (thread_ts set to the card’s ts), not in the channel.
It responds to messages posted by Chatlio’s bot: the visitor’s messages are posted in the thread by Chatlio, so a bot that ignores other bots’ messages never sees them.
It can tell which widget and visitor a thread belongs to from Slack message metadata. The card carries the event type chatlio_conversation_started and each visitor message in the thread carries chatlio_visitor_message. Both have this event_payload:

{
  "widget_id": "the widget's ID",
  "visitor_id": "the visitor's ID",
  "conversation_id": "the conversation's ID"
}

To read metadata, ask Slack for it, for example with include_all_metadata=true on conversations.history or conversations.replies.

Conversation Ratings

When the “Chat end screen” is enabled and a conversation has been ended, the visitor will be presented with a feedback form allowing for the chat to be rated. They will also allowed to submit a transcript of the conversation to themselves. This feedback will be posted directly to the widget’s main channel and available to view from the Reports Dashboard

Feedback form	Submit Feedback/Transcript

Here is how to enable Chat End:

Open the Chatlio dashboard.
Select the widget for which you would like to enable Chat End.
On the Appearance tab find the Chat End section.
Under “Show chat end screen” select the “Yes (recommended)” radio to enable.
If you want to allow the visitor to rate the conversation, select the “Yes” radio under the “Allow visitor to rate conversations” setting.
Feel free to adjust any of the other settings here.

Offline mode

Chatlio switches to offline mode for one of the following reasons:

There is no Slack user who is “active” in the Chatlio connected Slack Channel. Chatlio will check status approximately every 30 seconds.
You manually turn off Chatlio by issuing the /chatlio off command in Slack. Type /chatlio on to turn Chatlio back in to automatic status mode.
You set the operating hours you wish to have Chatlio on at Chatlio Dashboard > Select your widget > Operating Hours tab.

When Chatlio is in offline mode you can choose whether to show an email form or hide the widget altogether.

Here is how to enable the offline form:

Open the Chatlio Dashboard.
Select the widget for which you would like to enable the offline form.
On the Behavior tab find the “Presence and widget behavior” section at the top.
Select “Show a contact form asking for visitors email”.
If you want to forward form submissions to an email, enter the email and then save your changes.
If you want to forward form submissions to a webhook, enter the webhook URL.
Select “Post offline messages to Slack” if you would like offline messages to show in Slack.

Chatlio commands for operators

There are several Chatlio commands available in Slack for operators to control Chatlio. You can consult the full list of commands here but here are some useful examples:

/chatlio help to see a full list of the most current commands
/chatlio end for ending the current conversation
/chatlio email <email address> to email the current chat transcript
/chatlio request-screenshot to request a screenshot of visitor screen
/chatlio on and /chatlio off to manually turn on/off Chatlio

Customize

Customizing Chatlio Appearance

To modify the look and feel of Chatlio, follow our guide here.

If you need to configure multiple language support with Chatlio, check out configure() in our Widget API.

Customizing Chatlio Behavior

To modify the behavior of Chatlio, follow our guide here. Examples of behavior that can be changed:

Whether to show Slack name/avatar to visitors or not
Where to send transcripts
On/Offline state
Ask visitors to enter email/name prior to chatting
What pages to show Chatlio

APIs

Chatlio Widget API

We offer a full featured JavaScript API to give you the ultimate control over your Chatlio widget. It allows you to open/close widget programatically, send in your own visitor/customer data, eg. email, name, dynamicaly set text for multi language support, etc. And much, much more.

Chatlio Server API

We offer a server API for making requests directly to our servers.