Chatbot conversations

The Chatbot section is an omnichannel inbox: conversations on the left, the full thread of the one you pick on the right. Review Website, WhatsApp, Instagram, and Email together, reply yourself, turn the AI Agent on or off per conversation, and train the bot to give better answers.

Impact: The Fanz chatbot has saved over 10,000 human hours across all organizers, generated 5,000+ extra purchases, and contributed $500K+ in net revenue. It's like having an employee working 24/7 with all your knowledge.

Who can access

Role	Access
Owner	Full access, can train bot
Administrator	Full access, can train bot
Producer	Assigned events only, can train bot
Analyst	Brand-wide inbox, read-only (no training write). Not limited to assigned events.

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Performance metrics

A thin strip of metrics sits above the inbox. Several are clickable and filter the list:

Metric	What it shows	On click
Conversations	Total chats	Clears the status filter and shows all conversations
Resolved	Chats resolved (automatically or marked by you)	Filters to resolved only
Unresolved	Open or unanswered chats	Filters to unresolved only
Revenue generated	Revenue from chatbot-attributed purchases	Filters to chats with a purchase
Purchases	Count of those purchases	Filters to chats with a purchase
Time saved	Hours and minutes saved (see calculation below)	Does not filter — informational
AI Processing	AI cost (courtesy of Fanz — no charge)	Does not filter — informational

If a filter is already on (for example Resolved), click that metric again to clear it, or click Conversations to see everything. The filter lives in the URL, so a refresh keeps you on the same view.

On small screens the strip scrolls horizontally.

How time saved is calculated

1. We estimate how long it would take you to find the answer without help
2. We subtract the time waiting for the response + time to read it
3. If the chat doesn't respond, we don't count any savings

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The omnichannel inbox

All customer conversations — regardless of where they originated — appear together in one unified view. You no longer need to switch between platforms to stay on top of your audience.

Supported channels

Channel	Description
Website	Conversations started via the chatbot on your website or event page
WhatsApp	Messages received through your connected WhatsApp number
Instagram	Direct messages from your Instagram account
Email	Conversations initiated via email

All four channels — Website, WhatsApp, Instagram, and Email — are fully available in the inbox. You can view and filter conversations from any of them in the same unified view.

Filtering by channel

Under search you'll see chips: All, Website, WhatsApp, Instagram, and Email (with the channel icon and, when relevant, the unread count). Tap one to see only that channel. From Filters you can also combine several channels at once.

Searching conversations

Use Search conversations... to find chats by text — questions, keywords, or topics. It searches the full thread, not just the last message. As you type, the list updates (a thin progress bar at the top) without reloading the page.

Additional filters

The Filters icon opens a panel. At the top is Date range (placeholder Select range). The Status dropdown uses exactly these options:

Option in the panel	What you get
All	No status filter
Unread	Unread chats
Read	Already opened
Pending	Bot draft waiting for approval
Resolved	Resolved status
Unresolved	Unresolved status
Purchased	Attributed purchase
Contact	Email or phone captured

Below, Channels (switches) to combine Website, WhatsApp, Instagram, and Email. Clear filters resets search, dates, status, and channels.

Connecting channels

If a channel is still missing, Connect channels (on mobile: Connect) shows the logos of the ones left. A Connect channels dialog opens → Go to settings, which takes you to Website → Chatbot → Channels.

Important: Disconnecting a channel does not delete or hide conversations you already had on that channel. History stays visible in the inbox (use the channel filter). What stops is new inbound messages and automatic replies until you reconnect.

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Conversation list

On the left (desktop) or full screen (mobile) is a WhatsApp-style list. Each row shows:

Field	What you see
Channel	Avatar with the logo (Website, WhatsApp, Instagram, Gmail)
Contact	Name, phone, email, or “General site chat”
Preview	Last message in the thread
Time	Today as HH:mm · yesterday · weekday · date
Status	Resolved or Unresolved pill (or Pending approval / Bot paused when those apply)
Facts	Purchase icon (purple) and/or contact-captured icon — separate from status
Messages	Message count
Unread	Blue dot and bold text

The list loads as you scroll (no page 1, 2, 3). New chats and status changes arrive in real time over the socket — no refresh needed.

Status vs. facts (they don't overwrite each other)

A chat's status is only Resolved or Unresolved. Purchase, contact, and approval are facts that can sit next to it.

Pill / icon	Type	Meaning
Resolved	Status	The bot answered everything, or you marked it resolved
Unresolved	Status	Something was left unanswered, or you marked it that way
Pending approval	List priority	A bot draft is waiting for you to send or discard
Bot paused	List priority	The agent is off on that thread
Bag icon	Fact	A purchase was attributed to the chat
Person icon	Fact	Email or phone was captured

A chat can be Resolved and have a purchase, or Unresolved and have a purchase. A purchase no longer hides the resolution, and an old unanswered question no longer keeps a handled chat “red” if you (or the system) mark it resolved.

Change the status yourself

In the chat header (on mobile, under the name) the Resolved / Unresolved pill is a menu. You can:

• Mark as resolved
• Mark as unresolved
• Back to automatic status (uses “was anything left unanswered?” again)

That feeds the Resolved / Unresolved metrics and the list filters.

Reading conversations

• Unread chats are bold, with a blue dot, and appear first
• Opening a chat marks it read automatically
• On desktop, hover a read row to Mark as unread
• On mobile, that action is in the chat header (envelope icon)

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Conversation panel

Click a chat in the list: on desktop it opens on the right (the list stays visible). On mobile the chat is full screen, with a back arrow to return to the list. There is no modal and no previous/next arrows — switch chats by tapping another row.

Layout

Header:

• Channel avatar, contact name, and meta (channel · email/phone, with copy)
• Resolved / Unresolved status pill (menu to change it)
• AI Agent switch (WhatsApp, Instagram, and Email): on = the bot replies; off = indefinite pause until you turn it back on
• View Purchase if a purchase is attributed
• Details (desktop, large screens)
• On mobile: Back to the list and Mark as Unread

Thread (center):

• Visitor: right side
• Bot: left side, with the chatbot avatar and name
• Your manual replies: left side, with a Manual reply badge and your brand name
• Email looks like a Gmail thread (subject + messages), not chat bubbles
• Each message has a time; bot drafts show status pills (sent, awaiting approval, discarded, low confidence, no answer)

Details panel (right, on desktop):

• Captured contact
• Unanswered questions
• Purchase, if any

New buyer or bot messages appear live in the open thread — no refresh.

Bot message indicators

• Normal reply: Give feedback and Add FAQ
• No Answer (red): the bot found nothing — Train bot
• Manual reply: badge on messages you sent (inbox or channel app), with your brand name — no train/feedback
• Pending draft: Awaiting your approval banner + Send to customer, Edit, Discard
• Delivery chips: Sent, Failed to send, Discarded, Awaiting approval
• Draft confidence: High confidence, Medium confidence, Low confidence
• Email: Subject row
• Collapsed discarded: Discarded message · View discarded content / Hide

Chip-style selections in the chat

When Fanzly needs to clarify a short list of choices — for example, to confirm which event you're asking about — it may present those options as inline chips directly in the chat thread, rather than as larger cards. This keeps the interaction compact and fast.

Selecting a chip pre-populates the chat input field with the corresponding label, so you can review and send it as your next message (or adjust the text before sending). This makes clarification flows feel natural without interrupting the conversation.

Note: For longer or more complex option sets, Fanzly may still use a card-based selector instead of chips.

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Manual replies and pausing the bot

When a human operator is handling a thread, the bot must not overlap with those replies. The inbox is built so you can mix automation and human support without stepping on each other.

When the bot pauses automatically

The bot pauses on that conversation for 30 minutes (sliding window: each new human reply renews the timer) when:

• You reply from the inbox composer (WhatsApp, Instagram, or Email)
• You reply from the WhatsApp Business, Instagram, or Gmail app (the platform detects your human reply on that thread)

While paused, new buyer messages still land in the inbox, but the bot does not generate automatic replies. If a bot draft was awaiting approval, it is discarded so it cannot send after your reply.

Manual controls

In the chat header:

• The AI Agent switch pauses or resumes the bot on that thread. Turning it off is an indefinite pause: it won't speak again until you turn it on (unlike the automatic 30 minutes when you reply yourself)
• While paused you see Bot paused — you're replying and, in the list, the Bot paused pill
• Resume bot on the banner turns it back on. After a manual reply the copy is Resumes automatically at HH:mm. If you turned AI Agent off: It won’t resume on its own — tap “Resume bot” when you want it to reply again

Manual reply composer

Channel	How you reply from the inbox
WhatsApp and Instagram	Write your reply… at the bottom — Enter sends, Shift+Enter new line. Circular send button. Hint: Sending pauses the bot for 30 minutes in this conversation (or The bot is paused — your reply goes straight to the buyer)
Email	Blue Reply inside the thread. Editor expands: To, Subject, body. Send reply on the left; Discard draft icon. Not a modal

WhatsApp — 24-hour window: Meta only allows free-form messages within 24 hours of the buyer's last message. If that window closed, the inbox shows a clear error and won't send a free-form reply. Wait for a new buyer message (or use an approved template outside Fanz).

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When the bot can't answer alone

Beyond Manual review, the bot has automatic behaviors so buyers aren't left in silence and bad answers aren't forced out.

Courtesy message on escalation

If the bot can't resolve a query on an external channel (WhatsApp, Instagram, or Email) and holds the draft for human review, the buyer gets one courtesy message along the lines of “let me check and I’ll confirm” — once per conversation. The copy sounds human and does not say there is a bot or that it “escalated to an agent”.

Frustration detection

If the buyer shows clear anger (insults, chargeback threats, repeated hostile complaints), the bot:

1. Holds the reply for human review
2. Sends the courtesy message (if not already sent on that thread)
3. Notifies brand owners so they can jump in quickly

A hurried or insistent question does not count as frustration — only clearly hostile tone.

Voice notes and images

On WhatsApp and Instagram, the bot understands:

• Voice notes — transcribed so it can reply to what the buyer said
• Images — content is interpreted (for example a payment receipt or error screenshot) and can be used in the reply

If media can't be processed, the conversation continues with the text message or placeholder; the thread is never dropped.

Buyer language

On external channels the bot detects the buyer's language (Spanish, English, or Portuguese) and keeps that language for automatic messages (courtesy, contact prompts, etc.). If the buyer switches language mid-conversation, the bot follows.

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Channel settings and Autopilot controls

Each connected channel has its own reply mode setting, accessible from the chatbot channels panel in settings. This lets you control exactly how the bot behaves per channel — independently of the others.

Autopilot per channel

On each connected channel the block is labeled Autopilot (switch):

Switch	Chip	Helper text
On	Replies automatically	The bot replies instantly with no human intervention.
Off	Manual review	Messages require approval before being sent.

You can keep WhatsApp on autopilot and Email on manual review, for example.

With manual review, the draft shows Awaiting your approval. From there:

• Send to customer — sends as-is
• Edit — change the text; Save changes or Cancel
• Discard — Discard message dialog: Discard only or Discard and regenerate, with Reason for discarding

Connection health

The channels panel also surfaces connection health information so you can quickly diagnose issues with any connected channel:

Field	What it tells you
Connection state	Whether the channel is currently active and connected
History sync status	Whether past message history has been successfully synced
Disconnect reason	If the channel dropped, the reason that was recorded — useful for understanding whether it was a credential expiry, a revoked permission, or a platform-side issue

If a channel shows as disconnected or degraded, check the disconnect reason first. Common causes include expired tokens or revoked Meta permissions. You can reconnect at any time by clicking Connect again in the channels panel — the bot will resume responding on that channel as soon as the connection is restored.

Disconnecting a channel does not remove that channel's chat history from the inbox. Past conversations stay available to review, train on, or reply to manually; only new messages stop arriving until you reconnect.

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Training the chatbot

This is the most powerful feature. When you train the bot, it learns to answer similar questions automatically.

When to train

• Click "Give feedback" to refine an existing answer
• Click "Train bot" when the bot had no answer

Training dialog (from the thread)

Add FAQ or Train bot opens "Train Chatbot - Create Frequent Answer" with:

1. Question: Pre-filled with visitor's question (editable)
2. Answer: Pre-filled with bot's response (editable, or empty if no answer)
3. Scope:
   • Entire site
   • This event only (only if question was on event page)
4. Publish in FAQ page: Checkbox to also add to public FAQs

Where FAQs are published:

• If "Entire site" + Publish in FAQ page → Goes to Website FAQs
• If "This event only" + Publish in FAQ page → Goes to Event FAQs

Click Create Frequent Answer to save. From the Training Hub, Add FAQ opens a different dialog: title Create FAQ for Chatbot, button Create FAQ.

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Training Hub — Managing FAQs

As your chatbot is trained over time, the knowledge base grows. The Training Hub gives you a central place to see, edit, and clean up all training data.

Accessing the Training Hub

Click the "Training Hub" button (or "Train" on mobile) at the top of the Chatbot view. It opens a tabbed view: FAQs, Knowledge, Objectives, and Playground.

The FAQ table

Every FAQ the chatbot has been trained on is listed here — both event-specific and site-wide.

Column	Description
Question	The question the bot knows how to answer
Answer	The response the bot provides
Scope	Event-specific (blue chip) or site-wide (purple chip)
Visible	Whether it's published on the public FAQ page — Yes (green) or No (grey)
Last Updated	When the FAQ was last edited
Actions	Edit and Delete buttons

Filters

Filter	Options
Search	Find by question or answer text
Scope	All scopes, Event-specific, Site-wide
Event	Filter by a specific event (available when Scope = Event-specific)

Creating a new FAQ

Click "Add FAQ" to open the creation form:

Field	Notes
Question	What the chatbot should recognize
Answer	What the chatbot should respond
Apply to	"This event only" or "Entire site"
Event	Select the event (shown when "This event only" is chosen)
Publish in FAQ page	Check to also show on the public FAQ page

Editing an existing FAQ

Click Edit on any row to update the question, answer, scope, event, or visibility. Changes apply immediately to chatbot training.

Deleting an FAQ

Click Delete on any row. A confirmation dialog is shown before the FAQ is permanently removed from chatbot training.

Note: Deleting a training FAQ does not delete the conversation that originally created it.

Mobile layout

On small screens, FAQs display as cards (question, answer, chips, date, action buttons) instead of a full table — no horizontal scrolling required.

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Efficient review workflow

When you have many unread chats:

1. Filter by unread (Filters, or the blue dots in the list)
2. Open the first chat — it marks as read on its own
3. Train, approve a draft, or reply yourself
4. Tap the next chat in the left list (on mobile: back, then the next one)
5. New chats keep arriving live in the list

Tip: The Chatbot menu shows a badge when there are unread chats. On desktop, Training Hub and Connect channels sit at the top right. On mobile the “Chatbot” title is not repeated (it’s already in the app bar): you only see Connect and Train on one line.

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Why train the chatbot?

Save time

Every question you train is a question you'll never answer manually again. The bot handles it 24/7.

Increase sales

A well-trained bot:

• Answers purchase questions instantly
• Removes buying friction
• Captures leads when it can't answer
• Never sleeps, never takes breaks

Build knowledge

Your bot accumulates your entire team's knowledge. New staff? The bot already knows everything.

Delegate repetitive work

Stop answering "What time does the event start?" for the hundredth time. Train it once, forget about it forever.

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Best practices

Review conversations weekly

Set a routine to check conversations. Even 10 minutes weekly makes a huge difference over time.

Train for no-answer situations first

These are your biggest opportunities. Every "no answer" is a lost potential sale.

Be specific in answers

Write answers as if you're talking to a customer. Include relevant details, links if needed.

Use event-specific training

For recurring events with unique details, use "This event only" to avoid confusion.

Match reply mode to channel urgency

WhatsApp and Instagram users expect fast responses — leave Autopilot on (Replies automatically). On Email, Manual review is often a better fit.

Pause the bot when you jump in

If you're going to reply yourself, do it from the inbox or the channel app: the bot pauses for 30 minutes and any pending drafts on that thread are discarded. If you want it silent until you decide, turn off the AI Agent switch — that pause is indefinite; turning it back on resumes the bot.

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