Start an automation when a client sends a message

The trigger A message arrives starts the automation with every message a client sends on a channel you choose, and you can limit it to text the message contains.

Steps

What triggers it?

Incoming messages from clients only. Your messages and your team’s messages don’t trigger it.

Messages in WhatsApp groups never trigger the automation, so the automation never replies inside a group.

Each different message triggers the automation once. The same message doesn’t trigger it twice, even if the provider sends it again.

The linked record

The automation runs on the record linked to the chat. A new chat may not have a record yet. See How a chat becomes a client record.

An action that reads or writes the record needs a channel linked to a unit. Conditions on the message text and the sender’s name, number and language don’t need a link.

Variables

{{message_body}} is the message text, {{sender_name}} is the sender’s name, and {{sender_phone}} is their number.

Reply in the same chat

In Send a message, choose The chat it came in on under Send from, so the reply goes to the chat the message came from.

If something goes wrong

A real example

Good to know