Slack alerts for new tickets

There is no ready-made Slack app for the helpdesk yet; the app directory lists Slack as not available. You can still have new tickets posted to a Slack channel in about ten minutes: Slack gives you a web address that posts to one channel, and an HTTP integration calls that address each time a ticket is created. Growth Dept's own support team gets its new-ticket alerts this way.

It takes a helpdesk admin, and someone allowed to add apps to your Slack workspace.

In Slack: get a webhook address#

1. Go to api.slack.com/apps and create a new app from scratch. Name it something your team will recognise, such as Support alerts, and pick your workspace.

2. In the app's settings, open Incoming Webhooks and switch them on.

3. Add a new webhook to the workspace and choose the channel the alerts should go to, for example #customer-support. Approve the request.

4. Copy the webhook URL Slack shows. It starts with https://hooks.slack.com/services/.

Treat that address like a password. Anyone who has it can post into the channel.

In the helpdesk: send new tickets to it#

1. Open Settings > HTTP integrations and select Add integration.

2. Name it, for example Slack: new tickets.

3. Under Send when, tick A ticket is created and nothing else.

4. Leave Method on POST and paste the Slack address into URL.

5. Leave Body format on JSON and replace the Body with:

{
  "text": "New ticket from {{ticket.customer.name}} ({{ticket.channel}}): {{ticket.subject}}\n<https://cs.growthdept.ai/app/YOUR-HELPDESK/ticket/{{ticket.id}}|Open ticket {{ticket.id}}>"
}

6. Change YOUR-HELPDESK to your helpdesk's address, the part after /app/ when you are in the helpdesk.

7. Select Send test. A message about a made-up ticket should appear in the channel within seconds, and the result should say Delivered.

8. Select Add integration.

From then on, each new ticket posts one message with the customer's name, the channel, the subject and a link that opens the ticket for anyone signed in to the helpdesk.

Change what the message says#

The body is Slack's own message format, so anything Slack accepts in text works, such as *bold* or a line break written as \n. Add more details from the variable list on the integration page, for example {{message.body_text}} for the customer's first message. Keep in mind that whatever you add is visible to everyone in the Slack channel, so think twice before posting customers' email addresses or message text there.

What this cannot do yet#

• Choose which tickets post. The integration sends every new ticket, from every channel. Alerts for only one tag, one channel or urgent tickets are not available.

• Escalations or mentions. Posting to Slack when someone is mentioned in a note, or when a ticket is escalated, is not available. Mentions reach the person through helpdesk notifications instead; see Notifications.

• Reply from Slack. The alert is one-way. Open the ticket to answer.

If you tick A message is added to a ticket as well, every customer message, reply and internal note on every ticket posts to the channel, which is usually too much.

Haylee in Slack#

Where Growth Dept runs Haylee, the AI agent, for your brand, your team can also ask her in Slack to build macros, rules, tags or ticket fields. That is separate from these alerts. See Haylee, Growth Dept's AI agent.