Build your first chatbot workflow

What a workflow is

A chatbot workflow is a conversation script you draw. You place steps on a canvas, join them with arrows, and the bot walks the path exactly as you designed it. Once it is running, nothing is decided by an AI unless you add a Send to VEX AI step on purpose, so the same visitor input always produces the same result.

A workflow belongs to one brand and runs for that brand wherever the brand talks to people — in the chat widget, in Facebook and Instagram messages, in email conversations, and on phone calls — as long as the steps you used are allowed there. You find them at Brand → Workflows.

Step 1 — Create the workflow

1. Open Brand → Workflows.
2. Click New workflow. A picker opens with a few templates and a Start from scratch card.
3. Pick a template — Ignore sales pitches and spam (the AI stays silent when someone is trying to sell you something) or Talk to a human (hands the chat to your team when someone asks for a person) — or Start from scratch for an empty canvas. Either way the builder opens straight away on a workflow that is switched off; a template arrives with its trigger and steps already filled in, so read the trigger text before you publish.

Would you rather describe what you want in a sentence? Create with AI at the top of the same page has the Copilot build the workflow for you. It is created switched off, so you can review it before you publish — see Build a workflow with AI.

The workflow page has two views in the top bar: Editor, where you draw the workflow and choose what starts it, and Runs, where you see what happened each time it ran. To rename the workflow, click its name in the top bar. The name is internal — visitors never see it.

Step 2 — Understand the canvas

On the left of the canvas is the Starts when card. It shows what starts the workflow, and clicking it lets you change that (Step 6). It cannot be deleted, and its line always leads into the first card, where the conversation begins. Each card holds two kinds of step:

• Steps — run one after another, top to bottom. You can add as many as you like: Write a message, Ask a question, Collect data, Start a form, Request agent, Show expected reply time.
• Ends with — one last step that ends the card and decides where the conversation goes next: Buttons, Conditions, Call an API, Start a workflow, Send to VEX AI, Open link, or Stop — don't reply.

Click Add a step on a card to open the step picker. It has a search box and two groups, Steps and Ends the card. Click any step already on the card to open its settings.

Step 3 — Add your first message

1. On the first card, click Add a step.
2. Pick Write a message.
3. Type the greeting your visitors read first, for example "Hi! What brings you here today?", and close the panel.

Step 4 — Offer buttons

1. Add a Buttons step to the same card. It ends the card, so it appears under Ends with.
2. Type your button labels — "Pricing", "Technical support", "Return a product", "Something else" — clicking Add a button for each new one. You can add up to ten.
3. Each button gets its own exit row on the card. Click the + at the end of a button's row to add the card for that branch.

Step 5 — Build out each branch

For each branch, add the steps that make sense on that path:

• A Write a message step with the answer or the next prompt.
• A Collect data step to take an email address before you route the person to a human.
• A Request agent step to hand the conversation to your team.
• Or another Buttons step to go one level deeper.

A card with no exits ends the conversation — it reads The workflow ends here. Make sure every ending is deliberate, with a closing message before it rather than silence. Save refuses a card that nothing leads into, and a card without steps.

Step 6 — Choose what starts it

1. Click the Starts when card. The How this workflow starts panel opens.
2. Under Starts when, choose what starts the workflow. A new workflow starts on User says: the AI starts it when a visitor asks for what you describe under What the visitor is asking for — left empty, it never starts, so fill it in before you publish. The other choices are No automatic start, Chat open, Nobody picked up, Custom event, Online since, Visit, Rating given and Chat closed — the panel explains each one.
3. Most triggers also have How often: Send once for a unique visitor, Send once per 24 hours, or Unlimited (send on each click). Left alone, Chat open, Visit and Online since run once per visitor.
4. Optionally fill in Only start if — conditions on the visitor (country, email, current page, device, language, number of sessions and more), on whether your team is online, or on the conversation's channel. Leave it empty to start for everybody.
5. Priority matters when two workflows of this brand match the same moment: only the one with the higher number runs, and with equal numbers the older workflow wins.

The top bar also shows which brand this workflow belongs to, next to its name. That is shown, not chosen: a workflow lives with one brand, and to use the same script elsewhere you copy it.

Step 7 — Switch it on and test it

1. Click Save, then Publish in the top right. Publish is the on switch; the button turns into Unpublish once it is live. You can also flip the same switch from the Active column on the Workflows list. Both are refused while a Call an API step has no address yet — fill it in first.
2. There is no preview inside the builder. Open your site — or a staging page with the chat widget on it — and trigger the workflow the way a visitor would.
3. Walk every button path yourself and check that no branch is a dead end.
4. Open Runs to see each run step by step. Starts held back lists the times the trigger matched but a rule kept the workflow quiet, with the reason.

One thing worth knowing while you test: while one of your team is in the conversation, a workflow does not start by itself (Rating given has a switch to allow it). Home buttons, conversation starters and links don't start it either — what the visitor tapped goes to your colleague as a message instead. In such a conversation only your team can start a workflow, from the inbox.

Design for the channel from the start

The Workflows list has a Channels column with five icons — chat, Facebook, Instagram, email and phone. A grayed-out icon means this script cannot run there, and hovering it says why. A Start a form step rules out Facebook and Instagram. An Ask a question, Buttons, Start a form or Send to VEX AI step — or a Collect data step for anything other than the email address — rules out email. A Start a form, Open link, Buttons, Show expected reply time, Request agent, Collect data, Ask a question or Stop step rules out phone calls. The builder marks the offending step with a small warning icon too, so you can see it while you draw.

Two things that surprise people

• The builder kept its old web address. Old bookmarks into a workflow still open it. The back arrow now takes you to that brand's Workflows page.
• Deleting the brand deletes its workflows. They are the brand's, not the organization's.

The permission that controls all of this is called Workflows in the team permission list.

Next steps

Learn what every step does: Workflow nodes explained. Then check where your script is allowed to run: Where a workflow can run.