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. 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, 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.
3. The builder opens straight away on a workflow called "New Workflow", switched off. There is no naming dialog — you rename it in a moment.

The builder has three tabs across the top: Editor, Settings and Analytics. You draw in Editor and configure in Settings.

Step 2 — Understand the canvas

The canvas starts with one card marked Start. Every workflow begins there and you cannot delete it. Each card on the canvas is a step in the conversation, and each card holds two kinds of action:

• Regular Actions — run one after another inside the card. You can add as many as you like. Write a message, collect data, ask a question, start a form, call your own API, request an agent, show the expected reply time.
• Final Actions — end the card and decide where the conversation goes next. Only one per card: Buttons, Conditions, Send to VEX AI, Start Workflow, or Open link.

Click Add new action on a card to open the action picker, and click any action already on the card to open its settings.

Step 3 — Add your first message

1. On the Start card, click Add new action.
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 action to the same card. It is a final action, so it goes at the bottom.
2. Type your button labels, one per line — "Pricing", "Technical support", "Return a product", "Something else". You can add up to ten.
3. Each button gets its own outgoing branch. Click the plus beside a button to start 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 action with the answer or the next prompt.
• A Collect data action to take an email address before you route the person to a human.
• A Request agent action to hand the conversation to your team.
• Or another Buttons action to go one level deeper.

A card with no outgoing connection ends the conversation — the canvas marks it END. Make sure every ending is deliberate, with a closing message before it rather than silence.

Step 6 — Choose what starts it

1. Switch to the Settings tab.
2. Give the workflow a Name. It is internal — visitors never see it.
3. Under Select trigger, choose what starts the script. The most common choice is Chat open, which fires when a visitor opens the chat.
4. Most triggers then offer a frequency: Send once for a unique visitor, Send once per 24 hours, or Unlimited (send on each click).
5. Optionally add a Trigger query — extra conditions on the visitor's country, email, first visit or number of sessions, or on whether anyone from your team is online.

The Settings tab also shows which Brand this workflow belongs to. 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.
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.

One thing worth knowing while you test: a workflow whose trigger is Start manually now runs even when one of your team is already handling the conversation. Every other trigger stays suppressed while a human is on the chat, so it does not interrupt them.

Design for the channel from the start

The Workflows list has a Channels column with four icons — chat, Facebook, Instagram and phone. A greyed-out icon means this script cannot run there, and hovering it says why. A Start Form step rules out Facebook and Instagram. A Start Form, Open link, Buttons, Show expected reply time, Request agent, Collect data or Ask a Question step rules out phone calls. The builder marks the offending action 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 organisation'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.