Conversations have a total of four different statuses: mark as read, archive, delete and restore. You can manage the status of a conversation by opening it in the conversations area and then clicking any of the corresponding icon buttons in the top right of the conversation window.
You can search for conversations by department ID, assigned agent ID, conversation title, conversation ID, message text, message attachments name, user first name, user last name, user email
The text editor of the admin area and automated messages(example: welcome and subscribe messages) can be used to create stylized messages:
code block
, surround it with ```: ```your text```.
Merge fields are strings replaced by external values when used. Merge fields can be used in any message or automated message, including chatbot messages.
Code | Description |
---|---|
{user_name} |
Full name of the active user. |
{user_email} |
Email of the active user. |
{agent_name} |
Full name of the active agent. |
{agent_email} |
Email of the active agent. |
Rich messages are special messages with interactive features like buttons, dropdowns, or inputs. They allow an agent to request information from the user via a user input form or to diplay interactive contents. Rich messages can be inserted into a chat message using shortcodes. Shortcodes accept various parameters like title and description. The available rich messages are listed below.
Name | Shortcode | Description |
---|---|---|
Card |
[card image="URL" header="TITLE" description="Lorem ipsum dolor sit amete" link="URL" link-text="Purchase" extra="$599" target="_blank"] |
Call-to-action card with an image, title, description, link, and more. |
Slider |
[slider image-1="URL" header-1="TITLE" description-1="Lorem ipsum dolor sit amete" link-1="URL" link-text-1="Purchase" extra-1="$599" image-2="URL" header-2="TITLE" description-2="Lorem ipsum dolor sit amete" link-2="URL" link-text-2="Purchase" extra-2="$599" target="_blank"] |
Slider of call-to-action cards with an image, title, description, link, and more. You can add up to 10 slides. |
Slider images |
[slider-images images="URL,URL,URL"] |
Slider of images. |
Chips |
[chips options="A,B,C"] |
List of buttons. |
Buttons |
[buttons options="A,B,C"] |
List of buttons. |
Select |
[select options="A,B,C"] |
Dropdown list of options. |
Inputs |
[inputs values="A,B,C" button="Send now"] |
List of text inputs. |
[email name="true" last-name="true" phone="true" phone-required="false" placeholder=""] |
Form to collect the user's email and phone number. All attributes are optional. Follow up settings used as default values. Add the attribute required-messaging-apps="true" to force users to provide their email and phone on messaging apps. Merge fields are supported. | |
Registration |
[registration] |
Registration form. |
Timetable |
[timetable] |
Timetable. |
Articles |
[articles link="https://.../articles-demo"] |
Articles with search area. The link attribute is used as fallback message for Facebook Messenger, WhatsApp, Telegram messages. |
Rating |
[rating label-positive="Helpful" label-negative="Not helpful" label="Rate and review" success-negative=""] |
Agent rating form. To make the rating shortcode work on WhatsApp, Messenger, and the other channels, you need to use Dialogflow and the chatbot, create a new Intent with rating as input Context, nothing as output Context, a list of the user's most common messages for a positive rating as Training phrases(e.g. good, positive) and { "rating": 1, "force-message": true } as Custom Payload response. For the negative rating create a new intent with same context but replace the training phrases and the custom payload to { "rating": -1, "force-message": true } . The shortcode must include also a title or message. |
List |
[list values="A,B,C"] |
Text list. |
List double |
[list values="A:X,B:Y,C:Z"] |
Text list with titles. |
List image |
[list-image values="URL:A,URL:B,URL:C"] |
Text list with titles and images. |
Table |
[table header="A,B,C" values="A:B:C,A:B:C,A:B:C"] |
Table. |
Button |
[button link="https://..." name="Click here" target="_blank" style="link"] |
Display a link or open an article. The attribute target="_blank" is optional and open the link in a new window. The attribute style="link" is optional and change the button design. To open an article on click the link value must be #article-ID, replace ID with the article ID. |
Video |
[video type="youtube" id="0TImic4N1ko" height="350"] |
Display a YouTube or Vimeo video. The value of the attribute type can be youtube or vimeo. The attribute id is the ID of the video, get it from the URL. The attribute height is optional and sets the video height in px. |
Image |
[image url="https://.../media/admin.png"] |
Image. |
Share |
[share fb="https://.../" tw="https://.../" li="https://.../" pi="https://.../" wa="https://.../"] |
Social share buttons. |
If your texts include commas you need to replace all commas with the characters \,.
All of the rich messages support the following parameters:
Parameters | Description |
---|---|
id="123" |
The ID of the rich message (used also to save the JSON data). |
title="ABC" |
The rich message title. |
message="ABC" |
The rich message description that appears underneath the title. |
success="ABC" |
The message that appears when the user completes and sends the rich message. The user input is appended to this message. |
settings="ABC" |
Extra field for optional extra values. |
You have to create a Dialogflow chatbot, then simply enter the rich message shortcode into the text response of the Intent.
When a user completes a rich message, the response data is saved in JSON format in the database under table sb_messages and column payload. Example:
{"rich-messages":{"4Voyu":{"type":"email","result":{"email":["example@gmail.com","Your email..."]}}}}
To translate a rich message string, the original rich message text must be in english, add the exact english text and its translations in Setting > Translations > Front End.
To display a rich message, such as a list of buttons, when a user initiates a chat for the first time, insert the rich message shortcode into the welcome message.
You can create custom rich messages with your own custom content by going to Settings > Miscellaneous. Currently, custom rich messages are static and there are no interactive options available as there are with shortcodes. However, you can insert custom HTML codes.
When creating a custom rich message, you can use the following codes:
Code | Description |
---|---|
<a href="https://www.google.com" target="_blank" class="sb-rich-btn sb-btn">Click here</a> |
Link with button design. |
<a href="https://www.google.com" target="_blank" class="sb-rich-btn sb-btn-text">Click here</a> |
Link. |
<div class="sb-image"><img src="https://via.placeholder.com/1500x600" class="sb-image" /></div> |
Image that zoom on click. |
The built-in messages are pre-programmed messages sent automatically by Support Board. You can find them by going to Settings > Messages.
Notify the user when their message is sent outside of the scheduled office hours or all agents are offline.
Present a privacy message accompanied by Accept and Decline buttons. The user's approval by clicking on the Accept button is required to start using the chat. This feature ensures privacy policy enforcement and GDPR compliance.
Show a pop-up notification to all users.
Send a message to new users when they visit the website for the first time.
If no agents respond within the specified time interval, a message will be sent to request the user's details, such as their email.
If no agents respond within the specified time interval, a message will be sent to request the user's details, such as their email.
The allowed file attachments extensions are set in the supportboard/include/upload.php file. The following image formats are displayed automatically:.jpg,.jpeg,.png.
Add new allowed file extensions by adding the code define("SB_FILE_EXTENSIONS", ["exe", "abc",...]) to the config.php file of your Support Board installation folder. Replace ["exe", "abc",...] with an array containing the extensions you want to allow.
For instructions on sending attachments with a chatbot, click here.
Here, you can access information regarding a variety of features associated with conversations.
Tags enable more efficient organization and grouping of conversations. Please refer to the information below for further details.
Notes allow users to add comments to conversations that are only visible to agents and admins.
The full conversation can be sent to the user by the agent or admin as a transcript file.
Manage users from the Users area in the left menu of the admin area.
You can search users by name, surname, email, and custom fields.
You can delete a user by opening the User edit box and then clicking Delete user. To delete multiple users at once, select the users you want to delete from the Users table and then click the top right Delete icon.
To display additional columns in the user table go to Settings > Admin > Users table additional columns and add the new columns. The value of each column is the slug of the user detail or extra user detail you want to display. The slug is lowercase and with spaces replaced by the char -. For example, the slug of the extra user detail "Date of birth" is "date-of-birth".
Type | Description |
---|---|
user |
A "user" is any user with an email. |
lead |
A "lead" is any user with no user details, who is automatically registered, and with at least one conversation. |
visitor |
A "visitor" is any user who has not started a conversation. Note: Visitors are automatically deleted every 24 hours. |
Manage, create, and delete agents and admins from the Users area.
The registration form is a pre-chat form that requires the user to enter specific information before starting the chat.
The login verification URL feature can be found under Settings > Users > Login verification URL in Support Board. This feature allows Support Board to authenticate an external login from an external source and automatically register and log in the user. The expected response from the URL should be a JSON object like below:
{ "first_name": "John", "last_name": "Doe", "email": "johon@example.com", "profile_image": "https://.../user.svg", "department": null, "password": "", "details": [ { "slug": "location", "name": "Location", "value": "New York, United States" }, { "slug": "country_code", "name": "Country code", "value": "America/New_York" } ... ] }
The value first_name is required.