This help file introduces eDesk's AI Agent, explains how it works and gives a quick overview of how to set it up.
Before you start
- You must have the AI Assist add-on. See here for information on pricing.
- To add an AI Agent, you’ll need an Admin or Team lead account.
- If you don't already use eDesk, our free trial includes a limited version of the AI Agent. Existing customers should contact support to trial the AI Agent.
01 The eDesk AI Agent
Every business wants customers to feel valued and supported but delivering that level of service shouldn’t come at the expense of everything else your team needs to do.
At eDesk, our mission is to help you provide exceptional customer service while giving your team the freedom to focus on other critical work. That’s where our AI Agent comes in - handling the majority of routine, email-based customer queries 24/7 and seamlessly passing complex or sensitive issues to your team when a human touch is needed.
Deeply integrated into eDesk, the AI Agent learns from your team’s past interactions, policies, and product knowledge to deliver accurate, brand-aligned responses every time. Whether it’s supporting your agents or resolving queries end-to-end, it adapts to the way your business works.
You can set up an AI Agent to answer your customer queries directly or just provide answers for your human team to send. The options are Draft, Preview or Auto reply - Drafts and Preview allow you to see the reply the AI has generated before being sent by a human agent. Messages will only ever send automatically when Auto reply is enabled.
02 Setting up your AI Agent
1. Create Training content
The AI Agent can use Training content, Policies, and Instructions in their replies. Past interactions will also be taken into account by the AI Agent.
For a detailed look at providing information for the AI Agent, see [here].
2. Create the Agent profile
Specify the channels you want this profile to work on and select all the content you want it to use when generating replies. One profile is enough but if you want the AI Agent to use different content for different brands or channels, you can create an individual profile for each channel or brand.
3. Choose how you want the AI Agent to reply
Once the profile/s have been created, you must select how the AI Agent replies - whether to Auto reply, create Previews, Drafts or only display Prompts. There are a number of exclusion rules to choose from too.
For a full overview and details on each option, see Creating a profile.
Once the profile is created with channels specified and a setting is selected, your AI Agent is ready to go!
03 Examples of use
A) An AI Agent auto replies to customer queries coming from Shopify channel
- The query arrives from a happy Shopify customer and a ticket is created with the AI classification and sentiment analysis result added to the ticket by the AI.
- The AI Agent is set to auto reply after 5 minutes. The AI Agent analyses the incoming message and checks the Training content, Policy, and Instructions to assess how well it can answer.
- If the AI Agent is confident it can answer well, the reply is sent to the customer after 5 minutes.
- If the confidence is low, the reply is created as a Draft in the ticket and a human agent must review it. They add the Draft reply to the Reply box and add in some further information, then send the reply.
B) The AI Agent replies to customer queries coming from Shopify channel but only for neutral or happy customers
- The query arrives from an angry Shopify customer and a ticket is created with the AI classification and sentiment analysis result added to the ticket. Customer sentiment is scored as negative.
- The AI Agent is set to not reply to tickets from angry customers so that a human agent can take care of it instead. The AI Agent does nothing further.
- A human agent answers the ticket using one of the prompts.
C) An AI Agent is set up to create Previews for customer queries coming from Privalia and Veepee channels
- The query arrives from Privalia and is displayed as a ticket, with the AI classification and sentiment added.
- The AI Agent is set to Preview. The AI Agent analyses the incoming message and checks the Training content, Policy, and Instructions.
- If the AI Agent is confident it can answer well , the reply is created as a Preview in the ticket.
- If the confidence is low, the answer is created as a Draft in the ticket.
- A human agent reviews the Preview/Draft. They are happy with the Preview reply, so they send it to the customer.
D) An AI Agent is set up to create Drafts for customer queries coming from a WooCommerce channel
- The query arrives from WooCommerce and is displayed as a ticket, with the AI classification and sentiment added.
- The AI Agent is set to Drafts. The AI Agent analyses the incoming message and checks the Training content, Policy, and Instructions and drafts a reply, which is then shown in the ticket.
- A human agent reviews it. They are happy with the Draft reply, so they add it to the reply box, add additional details and send it to the customer.
04 Monitoring your AI Agent
There are a number of dashboards and reports which will help you monitor exactly what your AI Agent is saying and what areas need improvement.
- AI Assist
- AI Automations
- AI Agent gap report
- AI Agent activity log
Further reading
Creating an Agent profile