Set Up Your First Message Automation in 10 Minutes: Step by Step
You can build your first flow that auto-replies to Instagram DMs in UlakChat in about ten minutes. We walk through every step, from connecting your account to the trigger, a button menu and going live.
In this post
To set up your first message automation, you connect an Instagram account, create a new message automation and link the trigger, message and end steps in the flow editor. In this guide we build a simple flow from start to finish that answers "hello" messages with a welcome menu.
Before you start
You need two things:
- An Instagram Business or Creator account. Personal accounts can't be connected to automation. You can switch to a professional account in Instagram's settings in a few minutes.
- A UlakChat account. Once you log in to the panel, you'll see Message Automation, Comment Automation and Account Manager in the left menu.
Here's how the flow will work: the customer writes "hello" or "hi" and gets a menu with two buttons. If they tap "Shipping info", they get a message about delivery times. The "Our website" button opens your site.
1. Connect your Instagram account
Go to the Account Manager page and click Add New Account. In the window that opens, log in with your Instagram account and approve the permissions.
UlakChat connects through Meta's official API. You never share your password with us, and you can remove the connection at any time with Disconnect. Once connected, the account shows up in the Connected Accounts list.
2. Create a new message automation
Open Message Automation from the left menu and click Add Automation. The form has three fields:
- Automation Name: a name that makes sense to you, for example "Welcome".
- Select Platform: Instagram.
- Accounts: the account the flow will run on. If you have more than one, you can select all of them.
Click Create Automation and the automation is added to the list. Use Edit Flow on its row to open the flow editor.
3. Set up the trigger
Every flow starts with a Trigger step. A flow has only one trigger, but you can add several condition sets inside it.
- In the trigger, click Add Trigger and choose When a user sends a message. There's also When a user replies to your story for story replies.
- In the Message Trigger Settings window, choose Manual Trigger as the type.
- Pick Message contains as the condition and add the words: "hello", "hi", "hey".
- Click Save.
These are the condition types:
| Condition | When it matches |
|---|---|
| Message equals | The message is exactly one of your words |
| Message contains | Any of the words appears in the message |
| Message contains words together | All of the words appear in the message |
| Message begins with | The message starts with one of the words |
| Message does not contain | None of the words appear in the message |
Use Add Condition to put a second condition on a trigger and join them with AND or OR. Case doesn't matter. Accented letters do: if you add "café", a message that says "cafe" won't match, so add both spellings.
"Message contains" also matches part of a word. "hi" will match a message that says "hiya", and also "this" or "shipping". That's often useful, but very short words can catch messages you didn't expect. In this flow, "Message equals" is a safer choice for "hi".
The trigger also has an AI option: AI Intent Detector. Instead of words, it looks at what the message means. For a first flow, keywords are enough.
4. Add the welcome menu
Drag a Button Menu from the component list onto the canvas. Connect the output of your trigger condition to this step.
- In the Message field, write the text that appears above the buttons: "Hi, welcome. How can we help?"
- Use Add Button to add two buttons:
- "Shipping info", type Flow. This button moves to the next step in the flow.
- "Our website", type URL. This button takes the customer to your site and doesn't need a connection.
Instagram allows up to three buttons in a menu. Button titles can be up to 24 characters.
5. Write the reply
Add a Text Message from the component list and connect the output of the "Shipping info" button to it. Write the text:
Orders ship within 1-2 business days. We'll send you the tracking number separately.
The text can be up to 500 characters. If you like, add options such as "I have another question" under Quick Replies. Every quick reply you add has to be connected to a next step. If you don't add any, the flow moves on to the connected step after the message by itself.
What the customer sees:
Hello
Hi, welcome. How can we help?
Shipping info
Orders ship within 1-2 business days. We'll send you the tracking number separately.
6. End the conversation
Finally, add an End Conversation step and connect it to the Text Message's output.
The Retrigger Cooldown in this step is how long has to pass before the same person can start this flow again. If the customer writes "hello" again within that time, they won't get the same menu twice. A few hours is a sensible starting point for welcome flows. For campaign flows, 24 hours works well.
The skeleton of the flow:
When the flow is done, click Save. If a field is missing or an output isn't connected, the editor shows you which step has the problem. Auto Layout tidies the steps into a neat order.
7. Test it and go live
First, try the flow with Preview in the editor. You type a message and it shows each step the flow goes through, in order. You'll spot an unconnected button before a real customer does.
Then go back to the Message Automation list and turn on the Status switch on your automation's row. An automation marked Inactive becomes active and starts listening for incoming messages.
For a real test, message your account "hello" from another Instagram account. The menu should arrive within a few seconds.
Growing the flow
Once your first flow works, the next need usually shows up quickly: customers skip "hello" and write "when will my order arrive?" straight away. For this, add a second condition set to the same trigger. Click Add Trigger, choose When a user sends a message again and add "shipping" and "delivery" as keywords. Connect this trigger's output straight to the shipping message, not to the menu.
A few practical tips:
- One question, one branch. Give each common question its own trigger. If you pile everything into one trigger, it gets hard to tell which message came from where.
- Keep it short. Long paragraphs don't get read in DMs. Two or three sentences and a button are usually enough.
- Add images and PDFs. The Media step sends images, video or audio, and the File step sends PDFs. Useful for size charts or price lists. These have to be included in your plan.
- Don't forget story replies. If you announce a campaign in a story, use When a user replies to your story to send a separate message to people who reply to it.
Common mistakes
- The automation is still inactive. Saving a flow doesn't turn it on. Check that the Status switch is on in the list.
- An unconnected output. If a "Flow" button or a quick reply isn't connected to any step, nothing happens when the customer taps it.
- A keyword that's too broad. Short words like "a" or "ok" catch unrelated messages. Keep your keywords meaningful.
- No account selected. You can't activate an automation that has no account. Add one with Edit Info.
Once this first flow works, you can use the same approach to add triggers for other common questions. See what Instagram DM automation can do on our Instagram DM automation page, and how automated replies fit Meta's rules in our post on Meta's 24-hour rule.
Frequently asked questions
Do I need to know how to code to build a flow?
No. In the flow editor you drag and drop steps and connect them with lines. You write the message texts and keywords yourself.
Will a keyword match if the customer types it in capital letters?
Yes. Keywords aren't case sensitive, so "Hello" and "hello" are treated the same. Accented letters are treated as different characters, though, so if your customers type words both with and without accents, add both spellings.
Do automated replies follow Meta's rules?
Message automation only replies to people who write to you. Because the customer sends the first message, the reply goes out inside Meta's 24-hour messaging window. UlakChat uses Meta's official API and never asks for your password.
