Freshchat Integration

Freshchat is a modern messaging app for sales and customer engagement teams.

This section provides information on how to integrate DRUID chatbots with Freshchat tool. It does not cover Live Chat specific configuration within the conversational flow design but it provides configuration information related to troubleshooting and sending conversation transcript to Freshchat.

If you’re using DRUID on premise deployment, the Freshchat integration is scalable for high loads.

For technical details about the integration solution between DRUID and Freshchat, see the specific Freshchat documentation.

How the integration works

1. The users chat with the DRUID ChatBot.
2. If the chatbot determines that the user wants to talk to a human, it transfers the chat session to Freshchat.
3. Freshchat routes the user request to the group associated to that user request-specific topic.
4. An agent in the group to which the live call is routed, accepts the live chat request and provides support to the user. The agents are not using DRUID native live agent.
5. When the live chat session ends, the chat session returns to the DRUID chatbot.

Prerequisites

• You should have a Freshchat administrator account.
• You should have at least one group and one topic assigned to that group. Whenever a message is received under the topic, it is automatically assigned to the group. The Freshchat web messenger displayed on the organization’s web pages can be customized to display the topics created in the Freshchat system.
• In the DRUID Portal, from Solutions Library download the Freshchat Integration solution template. This template has been designed to provide you with a smooth way to connect users to Freshchat agents.

To integrate a DRUID chatbot with Freshchat, follow these steps:

Step 1. Get Freshchat API details

1. Log in Freshchat using your admin account.
2. On the menu, click Admin Settings.



3. In the Admin Settings page, scroll down to section Website Tracking, Integrations, and APIs and click on API Settings. You will be prompted to confirm that you are not a bot.



4. Confirm that you are not a bot to view your API key by checking the check box and passing the verification.



5. Click Generate token. The Account API key is generated.
6. Copy the value from the Account API key field and save the value as you will it to configure your DRUID chatbot.

Step 2. Set up Freshchat Webhook

1. In the DRUID Portal, go to the bot settings and click the LiveChat section header.
2. From the LiveChatProvider field, select Freshchat and save the bot.
3. The Druid url (webhook) field is automatically filled in. Copy its value as you will need it to set up the Freshchat webhook.



4. Log in to the Freshchat portal as an administrator and on the menu, click Admin Settings.



5. In the Admin Settings page, scroll down to section Website Tracking, Integrations, and APIs and click on Webhook for Chat.



6. The Webhooks are disabled by default. Tap on to enable them.
7. In the Webhook field, enter the value of the Druid url (webhook) you copied from the DRUID Portal.
8. Click the Save button. The authentication key that will be included in the header of all calls to your webhook is automatically generated.
9. Copy the authentication key as you will need it to configure your DRUID bot.

You can now configure your DRUID chat bot.

Step 3. Configure the DRUID chat bot

In the DRUID Portal, go to the bot settings, click the LiveChat section header and follow the instructions provided in subsequent section.

3.1. Configure the connection strings

In the Webhook key field, enter the authentication key you copied from Freshchat, Webhooks section.

In the API Key field, enter the Account API key you copied from Freshchat, API Settings section.

3.2. Set Timeouts

If similar configurations in Freshchat application are intended to be used, then set the DRUID Live Chat timeouts to values higher than those in Freshchat.

Make sure that the two timeout

3.3. Set Special Flows

3.4. Set Special Messages

You can set up specific responses triggered by special Live Chat special flows and events in which a bot might reach out. You can either set the list of responses via the Bot Designer or set the flows to provide customized responses via the Flow Designer.

The table below provides you with the list of Live Chat messages you can customize for Freshchat integration:

Save the chatbot.

Step 4. Configure the Freshchat Integration solution

The Freshchat Integration solution template provides you with a flow that gets the channels (topics) from Freshchat and provides the user with the possibility to choose a preferred channel, than the bot will try placing the call under the selected channel (topic). If you want the bot to route the call to a specific chat group or agent, you can adjust the flow and use the integrations already defined in the solution template to get the list of groups assigned to a topic or the list of agents within a chat group.

To authenticate the requests DRUID sends to Freshchat to get the channels, chat groups and agents, you need to configure your authentication details.

1. In Freshchat, on the menu, click Admin Settings.



2. In the Admin Settings page, scroll down to section Website Tracking, Integrations, and APIs and click on API Settings. You will be prompted to confirm that you are not a bot.



3. Confirm that you are not a bot to view your Chat - API authentication details by checking the check box and passing the verification.



4. Copy the Account API key and Your Freshchat URL and save the values as you will need them in DRUID.



5. In the DRUID Portal, select the Freshchat Integration solution.
6. On the main menu, click Apps, then click on FreshchatAPI. In the FreshchatAPI app configuration page, scroll-down to the Variables table.
7. Edit the values of the two variables as follows:
• FreshChatURL - Enter the Freshchat URL you copied from Freshchat adding "https://": https://<Your Freschat URL>.
Note:  The value of Your Freshchat URL you copied from the Freshchat environment does not contain "https://". Make sure that you add it; otherwise, the calls authentication might fail.
• FreshChatToken - The Account API key you copied from Freshchat environment.

Send the conversation transcript to Freshchat Agents

Most contact centers want their helpdesk agents to get the transcript of the conversation the client had with the bot prior to being engaged in a live chat session.

In order to save the conversation transcript and make it available for Freshchat agents, on the flow that connects the client with the agent, make the following settings:

1. On the step where you call the internal action ConnectToHelpdeskAgent(Post Actions section), in the Pre Actions section, call the internal action GetConversationTranscript.
Important!   When calling the GetConversationTranscript internal action on the same step where you call ConnectToHelpdeskAgent, make sure to call it in the PreActions section. Calling it in the PostActions section will not send the conversation transcript to agents.
Hint:   You can call the GetConversationTranscript internal action on a previous step.
2. On the ConnectToHelpdeskAgent internal action add the following:
Copy

{
    ”SendConversationTranscript” : true
}



Hint:  You can send additional client information (like Custom Fields) to Freshchat agents together with the conversation transcript. For more information, see Send Contact Center Parameters.
3. Save the step.

Send Contact Center Parameters

The table below lists the Contact Center Parameters bot authors can send to Freshchat.

How to send Freshchat parameters

On the ConnectToHelpdeskAgent internal action, provide the desired parameters inside the ContactCenterParameters object in JSON format.

{
    "SendConversationTranscript": true,
    "ContactCenterParameters": {
        "channelId": "[[FreshChatChannel]].Id",
        "groupId": null,
        "agentId": null,
        "freshchatUserId": null,
        "lastName": "[[ChatUser]].LastName",
        "firstName": "[[ChatUser]].FirstName",
        "userPhone": null,
        "userEmail": "[[ChatUser]].Email"
    }
}

Freshchat Troubleshooting

DRUID Freshchat integration enables chatbots to place clients in the Freshchat waiting queue. As there might be situations when DRUID fails placing the client in an Freshchat waiting queue or an error occurs during an ongoing conversation, you might want to show friendly messages to the user and easily troubleshoot and handle such cases.

This section provides information on how to handle DRUID and Freshchat errors.

Friendly handling errors when connecting clients to Freshchat waiting queues

When issues occur while placing a client in the Freshchat queue, DRUID offers you a mechanism to handle errors directly in the connect client to helpdesk agent flow, either by displaying a friendly error message or by trying to reconnect.

On your flow that places clients in the Freshchat waiting queue, you can add two child steps to the step that calls the internal action ConnectToHelpdeskAgent, as follows:

• A step for cases when the client is successfully placed in the Freshchat waiting queue. Show a message to inform the clients that they've been successfully placed in the waiting queue.
• To avoid interrupting the flow in case connection errors occur between DRUID and Freshchat , add a step with the following condition: @InternalActionResult==false.toString(). This internal action verifies if the client was successfully placed in the Freshchat waiting queue.

For troubleshooting purposes, you might want to register the error details provided by Freshchat when placing the client in the Freshchat waiting queue fails. As the error message and the error code exist in the conversation context, you can save [[HelpdeskClient]].ExceptionMessage and [[HelpdeskClient]].ExceptionCode in the ChatActivityData entity. To do so, in the SetVariables section, add the following two variables:

• [[ChatActivityData]].LiveChatErrorMessage -> [[HelpdeskClient]].ExceptionMessage
• [[ChatActivityData]].LiveChatErrorCode -> [[HelpdeskClient]].ExceptionCode

You can see these errors in ChatActivity History.

Related Topics

• Internal Actions
• Post Actions
• Pre Actions