Fin AI Agent is a key part of your whole automation solution. It can be powered by AI-generated answers and your own Custom Answers to work seamlessly with your human and automated support.
Using Fin AI Agent with Custom Answers
It’s best to use Custom Answers where you want highly structured responses. These allow you to control the answers for some questions with more specific wording, formatting, or follow-up actions. They don’t rely on information being held in a public knowledge base and can be very specific to the target audience.
Custom Answers are disabled by default, and need to be enabled from the Fin step within your Workflow by selecting Use Custom Answers under "Control content sources".
Example
A customer wants to remove the watermark from their project before exporting it. However this is only possible on a paid plan. A Custom Answer could be set up to answer and support customers on different plans.
Using Branches, Fin would check if the customer was on a Paid Plan and then take them down a path which uses a Product Tour to show them how to remove watermarks.
If the customer was on a Free Plan, the answer could take them down a different path which gives them a link to their Plans & Pricing article. This applies a rule where if they viewed the article it tags the conversation with ‘Upgrade’ to flag that this customer is interested in upgrading their plan.
And if Fin can’t find out if their plan is free or paid, it’ll use the fallback option ELSE to show the customer an article using the Article Inserter app which explains how to remove watermarks.
Priority of answers
Fin AI Agent will prioritize Custom Answers over its AI Answers, so they will trigger at the start of a conversation if:
The Workflow has Custom Answers enabled and the customer matches the audience rules for this Workflow,
The customer’s question is a strong match for the Custom Answer you’ve created, and
The customer matches the rules for that Custom Answer.
When enabled, Custom Answers always take precedence over AI Answers for the same question. If Fin AI Agent doesn't find a Custom Answer for a question, only then will it search your support content to provide an AI Answer to the customer.
Because Custom Answers offer a chance to ‘Get more help’ and talk to the team, they will likely drive more conversations to the Inbox without allowing Fin to use AI-generated answers (even if these are enabled in the Workflow).
Suggesting relevant answers
Custom Answers can also be used to suggest relevant answers either before or while a customer starts typing in the Messenger (only on Web, iOS, and Android).
When these are enabled, Fin AI Agent will begin to suggest answers until the question doesn’t match any Custom Answers you’ve set up, or the customer doesn’t match the audience rules for those answers.
If you only have Custom Answers enabled (and not AI Answers) and none of your Custom Answers match the customer's question, Fin AI Agent will send article suggestions from your Intercom Help Center instead.
If you have a Workflow that starts from new conversations, and a customer matches its filters, suggested answers will not be shown. The first message in the Workflow will be shown, and reply buttons will display for a customer to choose from.
If the customer doesn’t choose a path, and begins typing a question, suggested answers will appear based on the content of their message. If the customer clears their input, the Workflow reply buttons will be shown again.
This suggesting relevant answers feature is not available on our new plans for customers who joined Intercom from November 15, 2023.
Using Fin AI Agent with Workflows
Fin AI Agent can work in harmony with all your Workflows by either passing to them, or you can set them up to pass to Fin.
Customers on the Starter or Essential plans who don't have access to Workflows can learn how to set up passing guidelines for Fin here.
Hand over to Fin AI Agent from a Workflow
Include Fin AI Agent in your Workflows by adding a step to your path building and selecting Let Fin answer.
This inserts a new Fin step which can then be configured to control the behavior and handover of Fin.
The Let Fin answer step will trigger an answer after a customer has sent a message in the conversation. If you would like a reply button selection to lead to a Let Fin answer step, you can add a message action prompting your customer to ask a question.
Hand over to a Workflow from Fin AI Agent
Efficiently triage, collect data, and route conversations by allowing Fin AI Agent to pass to a reusable Workflow.
Simply select Pass to reusable workflow following the Get more help button in the Workflow builder.
The reusable Workflow must be created before you can set this up.
Conflicts with existing Workflows
If you are using other Workflows alongside Fin AI Agent, there are 2 triggers where they could conflict with each other.
Pro tip 👉 Use this Fin step in Workflows to avoid the 2 conflicts listed below.
Customer sends their first message
Fin AI Agent always takes priority and Workflows won't trigger. However, Fin can still be set up to pass to this Workflow.
Customer opens a new conversation in the Messenger
Workflow will be shown with reply buttons. Clicking on a reply button means entering the Workflow and Fin AI Agent will not fire.
If you leave the composer open, customers can still type in their question and Fin AI Agent will take over (Workflow will be skipped). However, if you disable the composer at the start of the Workflow, Fin will be blocked.
If this happens, here are some troubleshooting tips to try:
Remove the Disable customer reply option from the start of the Workflow, to ensure customers have the option of typing a message (and Fin will respond).
Use the Fin step later in the Workflow, preferably after a button says ‘Ask question’.
Ensure the audience targeting for the Workflow and Fin do not overlap.
Messenger CTA
When you've set Fin AI Agent live for customers, the call-to-action (CTA) button which allows customers to start a conversation in your Messenger may change.
This depends on whether you've configured your Messenger settings to:
Set bot expectations, or
Match teammate expectations.
💡Tip
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