Outbound conversations

Setup

To enable outbound conversations, first create a conversation template for them:

Create a template with the initial engagement type Chat invite.

You have to create a different template for each channel through which you want to initiate outbound conversations.
Set the configuration property com.unblu.conversation.outbound.enableOutboundConversation to true on the new conversation template.
If your organization uses external messengers, you have to specify the channel to use for outbound conversations based on this template with the configuration property com.unblu.conversation.outbound.outboundChannel. The default channel is Unblu Spark.

Configuring outbound conversations for agents

Next, you need to configure how agents should be able to launch outbound conversations. There are two places agents can launch outbound conversations:

The plus icon menu. If you’ve kept the default value for com.unblu.conversation.template.newConversationTemplateIds, the conversation template is added automatically. Refer to the note in the UI customization guide if you changed the configuration of the plus menu.
The Participant details panel of an ongoing conversation.
- If you have a conversation template for outbound conversations with Unblu Spark, agents can start a conversation with the button at the top of the panel. The label of the button is the same as the name of the conversation template (or the translation thereof).
- For outbound conversations using external messengers, the templates you can use appear in the Connected messengers section of the participant details panel.
  
  External messengers only appear in the Connected messengers section if the participant in question has contact information for that type of external messenger. For example, if the participant doesn’t have contact with a phone number stored in Unblu, no SMS external messenger you may have set up for your organization will be listed as a connected messenger—even if the participant themselves have a phone number. It’s the connection that needs a phone number for Unblu to suggest contacting them through an SMS external messenger, not the user.
Agents can only start outbound conversations from the participant details panel if the configuration property com.unblu.conversation.outbound.allowCreateOutboundConversation is true.

Depending on your use cases for outbound conversations, there are two additional permissions you may need to review:

To enable agents to create anonymous customers—to start a conversation with a prospect, for example—set com.unblu.permission.roleAllowed.createAnonymousVisitorPersons to true.

Unblu may not have the necessary information to launch the desired type of outbound conversation with an authenticated visitor. This may be due to how you sync client data between Unblu and your CRM, or because the visitor hasn’t logged in to Unblu before.

In such cases, an agent can create an authenticated customer, provided com.unblu.permission.roleAllowed.createAuthenticatedVisitorPersons is true.

When the visitor logs in to Unblu, the customer information the agent entered is linked to them, provided the username you used for the connection is the same as the one in your organization’s CRM. If it isn’t you can always link them later on by manually transferring the connection.

Working with outbound conversations

This section describes some possible use cases for outbound conversations. How agents can launch outbound conversations is described in more detail in the Agent Desk guide.

Starting a conversation with a prospect

If an agent wants to reach out to someone who hasn’t yet used Unblu with your organization—a prospective client, say—they do so by selecting a template for an outbound conversation from the plus icon menu .

In the modal dialog that appears, there’s little point searching for the customer. Instead, they can click the New customer action and create a new anonymous customer.

You can transfer the details of an anonymous customer to an authenticated visitor at a later point; refer to Transferring connection to other users below for more information.

For more information on the various modal dialogs mentioned in this section, refer to Outbound conversations in the Agent Desk Guide.

Starting a conversation with an existing client

There can be any number of reasons why an agent might want to contact an existing client. To do so, the agent must first select a template for an outbound conversation from the plus icon menu .

When they search for a visitor in the modal dialog that appears, Unblu only shows them the visitors they’re authorized to see according to the person labels and visibility rules in place. If the visitor isn’t yet available in Unblu, the agent can create a new authenticated customer with the New customer action on the search dialog, provided they have the necessary permissions.

Once the agent chooses a visitor to converse with and starts the conversation, the visitor is informed of the new conversation through the notification channels you’ve enabled.

For more information on the various modal dialogs mentioned in this section, refer to Outbound conversations in the Agent Desk Guide.

Breaking out of an ongoing conversation

There may be cases where you want to start a new conversation with a client you’re already in a conversation with.

Suppose your organization’s relationship managers have long-running conversations with each of their clients. Now, a relationship manager wants a specialist to provide additional advice on a particular topic. If the relationship manager invites the specialist to join the long-running conversation, they have access to the entire history of the conversation.

In these circumstances, it makes sense for the relationship manager to create a new conversation with the client. This is sometimes referred to as a breakout conversation.

The relationship manager can create a breakout conversation from the client’s participant details panel in the ongoing conversation. The specialist can then be invited to join the breakout conversation. When they join the conversation, the specialist has no access to the original, long-running conversation.

Transferring connections to other users

There are situations where it makes sense to transfer a customer’s outbound connections to a different user:

An agent created an anonymous customer for a prospect who then becomes a client.
An agent misspelt a visitor’s name when searching for them and subsequently created a new customer that wasn’t linked to the visitor.

In these cases, agents can transfer a customer’s external messenger connection to another person on the participant details panel. How to do so is described in the Participant details panel section of the Agent Desk guide.

Note that you can’t transfer the connection from an authenticated visitor to an anonymous visitor.

Limitations of outbound conversations

It isn’t possible to link conversations to one another or to send messages from one conversation to another. For example, you can’t launch a new conversation from a particular message in an ongoing conversation, using that message as the starting point of the new conversation.
If you want to delete a customer that you created for an anonymous visitor, delete their external messenger contacts by calling /externalmessengercontacts/{externalMessengerContactId}/delete. The customer is removed in accordance with the record retention policy for person presences.