Suggested messages

What it is

Suggested messages are the clickable starter questions a visitor sees above the message box before they have typed anything. Tapping one sends that exact text into the chat as if the visitor had written it, so the chatbot answers it like any other message. They give a hesitant visitor a first move and steer the conversation toward the things your chatbot is actually good at.

Two kinds of message exist:

• Basic — one question. Tapping it sends the text. "How do I reset my password?"
• Nested — a group label that opens a short list of up to six options, each of which is a basic message. "Explore our services" → "Do you ship abroad?", "What are your opening hours?", …

The same messages appear, in the same order, in the website widget, on the hosted chatbot page, in Test Chatbot and the Playground tab, and in the live preview beside the editor. You write them once, in your chatbot's primary language.

When you would use it

• Your welcome message explains what the chatbot can do, but visitors still open the chat and leave without asking anything.
• The same three or four questions make up most of your conversations and you want to answer them in one tap.
• You have a broad chatbot (products, billing, account) and want a nested group per topic so the row stays short.
• You are about to go live and want the first thing visitors see to be a question you know the chatbot answers well.

Where to find it

Open Dashboard → Chatbots → your chatbot → Settings → Suggested messages (?tab=suggested-messages). It sits right after Messages & language.

Steps

1. Open the chatbot → Settings → Suggested messages.
2. Turn on Show suggested messages. Nothing is shown to visitors while this is off, even if the list below has messages in it — so you can draft in peace.
3. Decide on Keep showing suggested messages. Off (the default) hides the row as soon as the visitor sends their first message. On keeps the row visible for the whole conversation, which suits a menu-style chatbot.
4. Select Add message. Pick a Type — Basic or Nested — and write the Message (or the Group label for a nested one). Up to 120 characters; the counter beside the field shows how much room is left.
5. For a nested message, add between one and six Options. Each option is a full question the visitor can send, also up to 120 characters.
6. Reorder with the grip handle — drag with a mouse or finger, or focus the handle and use Space, the arrow keys and Space again from the keyboard. The order you see is the order visitors get.
7. Optionally select Generate with AI to draft a starter set from your chatbot's knowledge (see below). Edit or delete what it produced like any other row.
8. Try the result in the preview beside the editor — tap a chip and watch the simulated exchange, toggle Keep showing and see the row stay or go.
9. Select Save changes. Visitors see the new set on their next page load; nothing changes for anyone until you save.

Generate with AI

Generate with AI asks Agentency's model for a starter set grounded in your chatbot's trained knowledge and its description and instructions. It reads the main pages of your knowledge first — the homepage and top-level pages before deep articles, and the opening of each rather than the fine print — so the questions describe what your business is about, are ones the chatbot can actually answer, and never repeat anything already in your list.

What to expect:

• Every click adds the same three rows: two Basic questions plus one Nested group with three more questions. Each is short — three to six words, like "How does Agentency learn?" or "Which channels can I connect?" — and generic on purpose: the main offering, not a product name, price or policy detail. The group label is an invitation such as "Explore Agentency".
• Because a set is three rows, the button is available only while three of the eight slots are free; the hint under the buttons tells you when to remove a message to make room. Nothing is saved until you press Save changes, so you can generate, prune, generate again.
• It writes in your chatbot's primary language. If your knowledge is mostly in another language, it may write a question in that language when it cannot be put faithfully in the chatbot's.
• A chatbot with no trained knowledge yet still gets suggestions, but only from its description and instructions, so they will be broader. The editor tells you this; train the chatbot first for sharper questions. See Chatbot readiness.
• Each click is a real model call. It is available while your account has message credits and the chatbot is within its monthly budget, but it does not spend a credit. If credits are exhausted you see a notice with a Manage billing link instead of suggestions — see Message credits.
• It is rate-limited to a handful of calls per minute. If you see a "try again in a moment" notice, wait a little and retry.

Generation is optional. Many owners write their suggested messages by hand from their own analytics — the questions under Analytics → Needs attention are a good source.

What visitors see

The row of pill-shaped chips sits directly above the message box, in your chatbot's chat font, aligned to the same side as the visitor's own bubbles. Tapping a basic chip sends it immediately. Tapping a nested chip swaps the row for the group's title, a Back button and its options; picking an option sends it, and Back (or the Escape key) returns to the row.

A few behaviours are worth knowing:

• While the chatbot is composing a reply the chips are greyed out, not hidden, so the row does not jump around.
• If your chatbot asks for the visitor's details before it replies (Lead capture fields), a tapped chip waits behind that form exactly as a typed message would — it is sent once the visitor completes or skips the form. The chips themselves are hidden while the form is showing.
• A returning visitor whose conversation already has messages in it does not see the row (unless Keep showing is on). New conversation in the chat menu brings it back.
• Screen readers announce the row as "Suggested messages" and each nested chip as one that opens options, in the chatbot's language.

Writing suggested messages that work

Write them in the visitor's voice, as the question they would type: "Can I change my order after paying?", not "Order changes". Keep each one to a single question the chatbot answers confidently — a suggested message that leads to the fallback reply is worse than no suggestion. Prefer concrete over generic: "What are the delivery times to Germany?" earns a tap; "Tell me more" does not.

Three to five basic messages is the sweet spot on a phone-sized widget. If you need more, group them: two or three nested groups with three or four options each cover a lot of ground without a wall of chips.

Limits and plan notes

• Up to 8 messages in the row (basic or nested); each nested group holds 1–6 options.
• Each message and each option is capped at 120 characters. Shorter reads better — the widget wraps long chips rather than cutting them off.
• One set per chatbot, written once in the chatbot's primary language. The same chips are shown as-is on every page that hosts the chatbot — including a widget or hosted page whose language has been switched by the site (the widget's data-language attribute or the hosted page's ?lang= link parameter). Those switches change the chatbot's built-in copy and text direction, not your chips, so a visitor who opens an Arabic-forced page still sees the questions exactly as you wrote them. Write them in the language most visitors open with, keep them short, and remember the chatbot replies in whatever language the visitor taps or types — see Messages & language.
• Suggested messages do not count as Call Actions and are available on every plan. Only Generate with AI depends on message credits.
• You need permission to edit that chatbot. See Roles and permissions.
• The developer API does not accept this setting; edit it in the dashboard.

Common problems

The chips do not appear on my website or hosted page.

Check, in order: Show suggested messages is on and you pressed Save changes; the list has at least one complete message (a nested group with no options is skipped); the visitor has not already sent a message in that conversation (turn on Keep showing if you want them regardless). The widget picks up saved changes on its next page load. If a site pinned to an older copy of the widget script still shows nothing after a reload, recopy the embed snippet — see Embed the website widget.

Save is disabled.

A row has a problem: an empty message, one over 120 characters, or a nested group without any option. The row shows exactly which field to fix.

Generate with AI is missing or says it is not available.

Your workspace has AI generation switched off. You can still write suggested messages by hand.

The generated questions do not sound like my business.

Generated questions are deliberately short and broad — they introduce what you do rather than quote a detail. If they miss the mark entirely, the chatbot has little or no trained knowledge, so the model only had your description to work from. Add and train knowledge — your homepage and main pages carry the most weight — then generate again. See Knowledge overview.

Tapping a chip in Test Chatbot showed the lead form instead of a reply.

That is the pre-reply lead gate doing its job: a chip is treated exactly like a typed message, so it waits until the form is completed or skipped. Visitors see the same thing on your site. See Try Test Chatbot.