Overview
The Automation & Flows area brings together the tools that make ConversaLabs work for you: assigning conversations, replying at the right moment, moving deals in the CRM, firing webhooks, and running entire dialogues with no manual effort. Instead of repeating tasks, you describe what should happen and the platform does it.
There are five complementary capabilities, from the simplest to the most advanced:
- Automation rules — "when X happens, do Y" (trigger → conditions → actions).
- Macros — reusable sequences of actions an agent runs with one click on a conversation.
- Flow Builder — a visual builder for conversational flows (menus, questions, integrations).
- Smart Routing — distributes conversations to agents based on a policy.
- Bots and Captain — AI-powered replies and support bots.
Prerequisites
- An active ConversaLabs account and a user with admin permission to configure automations.
- At least one connected inbox, so there are conversations to automate.
- Some capabilities are optional (enabled by plan or feature flag): Flow Builder, Smart Routing, and Captain may need to be enabled for your account. If they aren't in the menu, talk to an administrator.
Step by step
- Start with the basics: create an automation rule for your team's most frequent repetitive task (for example, assigning new conversations to a team).
- Standardize day-to-day replies and procedures with macros.
- When you need a multi-step dialogue (menu, data capture, integration), use the Flow Builder.
- Decide how conversations reach agents with Smart Routing.
- Add bots and Captain to answer common questions and qualify contacts automatically.
Settings & options
- Automation rules: live under Settings, in Automation. Each rule has a trigger, conditions, and one or more actions.
- Macros: also under Settings; they become available inside the conversation for the agent to run.
- Flow Builder: its own module, with a visual node builder (messages, options, conditions, HTTP requests, and more).
- Smart Routing: routing policies and capacity policies, bound to inboxes.
- Captain: AI assistants, a document and response knowledge base, and the agent copilot.
Use cases
- Automatically assign new conversations to the right team and add labels by keyword.
- Send an after-hours greeting and resolve a conversation after inactivity.
- Run a menu-based self-service experience on WhatsApp with the Flow Builder.
- Balance load across agents with a balanced routing policy.
- Let Captain answer frequently asked questions and only escalate to a human when needed.
Tips, limits & best practices
- Start with a few rules and watch the result before creating dozens of automations.
- Give rules and macros clear names — it keeps maintenance manageable as the operation grows.
- Watch out for overlapping rules (two rules acting on the same conversation). Test in a sandbox inbox before applying to production.
- Respect channel limits (for example, WhatsApp anti-ban best practices when sending automatic messages).
Troubleshooting
- My rule didn't fire: check the trigger and conditions — all conditions must be true. Also confirm the rule is active.
- I don't see Flow Builder / Smart Routing / Captain: the capability may not be enabled for your account or your access role. Talk to an administrator.
- The action didn't happen: confirm the agent/team/label referenced in the action still exists.