> ## Content Index > Fetch the complete content index at: https://internalnote.com/llms.txt > Use this file to discover other available public pages before exploring further. # Learn how to build a full-featured Flow Builder Bot for Zendesk. - URL: https://internalnote.com/flow-builder-dinosaurs/ - Published: 2023-04-18T06:45:46.000Z - Updated: 2025-09-08T06:43:03.000Z - Description: In this article we will build a full-featured Flow Builder Bot for Zendesk. We'll use every step type, use API calls and variables and show you how to create a bot yourself in a full length video tutorial. - Author: Thomas Verschoren - Tags: AI Agents Zendesk Flow Builder has been available for over two years now, and since that time it evolved from a basic flow builder (pun intended) to a complex tool that allows for advanced logic, API calls, authentication and a lot more. I've [written](https://internalnote.com/tag/flow-builder-and-chatbot/) about how to work with Flow Builder in the past, but since the latest set of releases during the [What's New](https://internalnote.com/whats-new-march-2023/) in March most of the last remaining big ticket items are now available, which means it's time for a deep-dive into Flow Builder. This article will show you how to build a complete bot and will touch upon every available feature available in Flow Builder. You can find an overview video below, and then you can choose to either watch the full 45min tutorial later in this article, and/or read the article to learn more about the specifics steps used. # 🦖 Jurassic Park Flow Builder Bot Tutorials are only as fun as the subject it teaches, so for this how-to will build a bot for Jurassic Park. We'll start with setting up a few intents and show Help Center articles, before we dive into the really fun stuff with API calls to check on Dinosaur escapes, and use the new authentication metadata to check upon bookings for the park. Welcome to Jurassic Park. 😎 # How to build a complex Flow Builder Bot ## Customer Intents As I'll also mention in the tutorial video below, the first step to build a good Chatbot is to define the issues the bot should help the customer with. In my scenario here, I'm trying to solve four scenarios that will lower agent workload: 1. **How to buy tickets** Deflect tickets about ticket purchases so that most customers can self-serve and agent only need to handle the complex cases. 2. **Info on Dinosaurs** Although the Customer Care team should be able to give information about the animals in the park, most of these questions are generic and easily satisfied with a good [article](https://support.internalnote.com/hc/en-us/sections/10793749626514-Jurassic-Park?ref=internalnote.com) or video. 3. **Status of the park** When things break, you should inform customers in an automated way so that your agents can handle the real emergencies and focus on one to many communication. 4. **Order Information** Most people that need information on orders either want confirmation or lost their booking emails. Offering that info up front gives agents time to handle real issues with payments or erroneous bookings. ## Mapping it all out I always start with a flow chart that maps out a rough overview of the flows you expect your customers to follow. This will serve as a guideline for building your Flow Builder bot, and allows for quick iteration before you commit on building the bot. 💡 Since these are four specific flows a customer can take, it's best to build those as four separate intents. This way you can show the intents to the customer upon opening the widget, you can directly launch an intent if a customer searches for it (e.g. I want to buy a ticket), or you can use the intent for [Pro-Active Messaging](https://support.zendesk.com/hc/en-us/articles/5381304334234-About-proactive-messages?ref=internalnote.com). ## Answer Flow Step Types Flow Builder has around a dozen different Step Types you can use to build your bot. We'll use all of them to build our different flows and intents. [Understanding answer step typesWhat’s my plan? Tip: Zendesk has renamed our bot capabilities. Answer Bot is now Zendesk bots, Flow Builder is bot builder, and Article Recommendations are autoreplies. Some older features still…![](https://theme.zdassets.com/theme_assets/10557657/4b4b2fe0860351e0e1e6bcf9060550f5c7f163ea.ico)Zendesk helpAimee Spanier![](https://theme.zdassets.com/theme_assets/10557657/3cc7e6328cd4f823ed1332d774490412f0531606.svg)](https://support.zendesk.com/hc/en-us/articles/4408836323738-Understanding-bot-flow-step-types?ref=internalnote.com#topic%5Fzqr%5Fgwc%5Fk4b) # Intent #1: Ticket Info ![](https://storage.ghost.io/c/ca/c0/cac0c82b-bc4d-4404-9eb4-9cc75e8d045e/content/images/2023/03/Tickets.png) Our first Intent is the *Buy a Ticket* intent. It's a pretty basic flow that offers the customers a set of preselected Guide articles, ask if the issue is resolved and if not, escalates to an Agent. ![](https://storage.ghost.io/c/ca/c0/cac0c82b-bc4d-4404-9eb4-9cc75e8d045e/content/images/2023/04/Artboard.png) ## Show Help Center Articles This [step](https://support.zendesk.com/hc/en-us/articles/4408836323738-Understanding-answer-flow-step-types?ref=internalnote.com#topic%5Fgrj%5Fgwc%5Fk4b) allows you to show up to six public articles to your customers. Articles will be shown in the locale the Widget is loaded in and articles are always shown in a carousel in the same order. Once a customer clicks an article, they'll be redirected to your Help Center. But no worry, if they open the Widget again it'll remember their actions. Any read article will show up in the Context Panel in Agent Workspace [if you've enabled](https://support.zendesk.com/hc/en-us/articles/4408829170458?ref=internalnote.com#topic%5Fnq1%5Fqnm%5Fxsb) those events. ## Ask if question is resolved Once we've shown the articles we'll ask the customer if the question is now resolved. The answers to this question will be stored in [Explore](https://support.zendesk.com/hc/en-us/articles/4408829761690-Analyzing-your-Flow-Builder-activity?ref=internalnote.com) so you can measure your success-rate. If the customers answers negatively, we'll escalate to an Agent. ## Business Hours Zendesk Messaging can take your Support schedule into account and can show a different reply inside or outside of Business Hours. ## Authentication Info 🆕 If you allow your users to [login](https://internalnote.com/jwt-messaging/) to your Messaging Widget you can use that information to pre-fill their name and email and make escalation to an Agent easier. You could even have different experiences for VIP users vs regular users, or assign logged in users to a separate support tier. [Announcing Flow Builder - Messaging Authentication MetadataRollout start Rollout end March 17, 2023 March 20, 2023 We’re excited to announce that you can now build more personalized experiences for authenticated users by using Messaging Authentication…![](https://theme.zdassets.com/theme_assets/10557657/4b4b2fe0860351e0e1e6bcf9060550f5c7f163ea.ico)Zendesk helpLisa Tam![](https://theme.zdassets.com/theme_assets/10557657/3cc7e6328cd4f823ed1332d774490412f0531606.svg)](https://support.zendesk.com/hc/en-us/articles/5492040520474-Announcing-Flow-Builder-Authentication-Metadata?ref=internalnote.com) ## Transfer to Agent Once we've offered a few Self Service solutions in attempt to deflect the question, and got confirmation that, yes, the customer does need help, we can transfer the conversation to an Agent in Support. For unauthenticated users we can use the Ask for Details step (see below) to ask for their name and email, before we attempt to find an available agent. [Zendesk help![](https://theme.zdassets.com/theme_assets/10557657/4b4b2fe0860351e0e1e6bcf9060550f5c7f163ea.ico)Logo![](https://theme.zdassets.com/theme_assets/10557657/3cc7e6328cd4f823ed1332d774490412f0531606.svg)](https://support.zendesk.com/hc/en-us/articles/5378287266586-Announcing-updates-to-Flow-Builder-Transfer-to-Agent-step-?ref=internalnote.com) # Intent #2: Dinosaur Info ![](https://storage.ghost.io/c/ca/c0/cac0c82b-bc4d-4404-9eb4-9cc75e8d045e/content/images/2023/03/Info-1.png) Similar to the basic deflect or escalate flow in our first Intent, this second Intent will follow a similar path. ![](https://storage.ghost.io/c/ca/c0/cac0c82b-bc4d-4404-9eb4-9cc75e8d045e/content/images/2023/04/Artboard-Copy.png) ## Carousel When the customer chooses the *Dinosaur Info* option we'll use the Carousel step to show them information on three Dinosaurs. Each carousel element included an image (loads an externally hosted photo), a short description, and a button that links to a Help Center (or external) article with information about the Dinosaur. ## Escalate to Agent Here also, when the customer lets the bot know that they need more information, we escalate to an Agent. 💡 Did you know a right click on any step allows you to copy the step and all steps below? You can then paste that logic anywhere else in your bot and reuse it, instead of recreating a flow from scratch. # Intent #3: Fence Status ![](https://storage.ghost.io/c/ca/c0/cac0c82b-bc4d-4404-9eb4-9cc75e8d045e/content/images/2023/03/Status.png) Our third intent introduces some more logic based on API calls and handling the returned data. ![](https://storage.ghost.io/c/ca/c0/cac0c82b-bc4d-4404-9eb4-9cc75e8d045e/content/images/2023/04/Artboard-Copy-2.png) ## API Call When a customer chooses the *Status of the Fences* intent we immediately fire an API call. This API call checks an external API resource `https://jurassic-park-bot.internalnote.com/status` and gets a payload back. ```json { "status": ["all_good","unlocked_raptor","unlocked_trex","evacuate"] } ``` We make use of the recently announced [Custom Webhook Headers](https://internalnote.com/custom-authentication-for-webhooks-update/) to reach a protected API resource, and store the returned `payload.status` in to a variable `status` If the API call fails we'll try to reach an agent for the user by once again copying those steps from the previous Intent. [GitHub - verschoren/jurassic-park-bot: Cloudflare Worker with API Endpoints for the Jurassic Park Widget IntentCloudflare Worker with API Endpoints for the Jurassic Park Widget Intent - GitHub - verschoren/jurassic-park-bot: Cloudflare Worker with API Endpoints for the Jurassic Park Widget Intent![](https://github.githubassets.com/pinned-octocat.svg)GitHubverschoren![](https://repository-images.githubusercontent.com/628238792/1fc746bf-b6a3-4c19-a0ec-e18503f25d8f)](https://github.com/verschoren/jurassic-park-bot?ref=internalnote.com) ## Branch By Condition 🆕 If we do get a valid payload back we use the new Conditional Flows step to show different results based on the `status` value. For each status we show a Bot Message step that includes an externally linked image and a button that links to a Help Center article. And since this Intent often ends with disasters and escaped Dinosaurs, we do not escalate to an Agent for this flow. [Zendesk help![](https://theme.zdassets.com/theme_assets/10557657/4b4b2fe0860351e0e1e6bcf9060550f5c7f163ea.ico)Logo![](https://theme.zdassets.com/theme_assets/10557657/3cc7e6328cd4f823ed1332d774490412f0531606.svg)](https://support.zendesk.com/hc/en-us/articles/5378419926426-Announcing-Flow-Builder-Conditional-Flows?ref=internalnote.com) 💡 You'll notice we use a nested branch condition for this step. We could have used only one, but since this step only supports up to 5 conditions, it's useful to showcase this nested scenario. It's a simple hack that allows you to circumvent the five conditions limitation. # Intent #4: Order Info ![](https://storage.ghost.io/c/ca/c0/cac0c82b-bc4d-4404-9eb4-9cc75e8d045e/content/images/2023/03/Order.png) Our final intent is a variation on the previous one. We once again make an API call to an external service, but instead of a hardcoded URL with results that are the same for all visitors, we'll make an API call that contains unique information provided by the customer and returns personalised responses. ![](https://storage.ghost.io/c/ca/c0/cac0c82b-bc4d-4404-9eb4-9cc75e8d045e/content/images/2023/04/Artboard-Copy-3.png) ## Ask For Details We use the *Ask For Details* step to ask for an Order Number. This value is stored in a custom field for easier retrieval by an Agent if escalation is needed, and is also automatically stored in a variable `Order Number` we can use anywhere in our Bot Logic. ## API Call with POST/Details Where the previous Intent did a GET request, we will now make a POST request to `https://jurassic-park-bot.internalnote.com/order` with a JSON Payload: ```json { "order_id":"{{Order Number}}" } ``` The API call either fails, or successfully returns our order data. We store all returned data in variables, and use the *Send a Message* step to return the data in a nicely formatted way. ```json { "items": [ { "name": "Jurassic Park Adventure Park", "quantity": 2, "ticket_price": 150, "ticket_type": "1-Day Park Hopper", "type": "attraction" }, { "name": "Jurassic Park Hotel", "nights": 3, "room_price": 350, "room_type": "Deluxe Room", "type": "hotel" } ], "order_date": "June 2nd", "order_id": "ORD1002", "order_status": "confirmed" } ``` 💡 Sadly, Flow Builder does not support looping through arrays to store API call responses into variables. So in a scenario like this one where we get an array of items we need to manually store each `items[i]` as a unique array and the API call will fail if we store e.g. a variable `items[3]` and the next API call only responds with 1 element. # Conclusion What started as a fairly simple Flow Chart to handle four clearly defined intents, ended up in a complex tree of over a hundred steps, including links to Help Center articles, external APIs and hosted images. I really hope the video above, and the documentation in this article helps you to build your own Flow Builder Bot. ![](https://storage.ghost.io/c/ca/c0/cac0c82b-bc4d-4404-9eb4-9cc75e8d045e/content/images/2023/04/Screenshot-2023-04-12-at-21.19.27.png) ## A small ask Building this bot and tutorial took a lot of preparation. If this **free** **article** was useful to you, share it with a friend or colleague and ask them to subscribe. 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