Customers can write to your AI employee in Telegram. To set this up, create your own bot with @BotFather and connect it to the employee. Conversations from Telegram appear in the “Inbox” section together with other conversations.
Where to find it
Open “AI employees”, choose an employee and go to the “Channels” tab. The connection is in the “Telegram” block. Only the business Owner can see this block.
How to get a bot token
A bot token is a key that gives access to your bot. It is issued by the official Telegram bot @BotFather. There is also a hint in the dashboard: expand “How to get a token”.
- Find @BotFather in Telegram and tap “Get started”.
- If you do not have a bot yet, send the “/newbot” command. Enter a name for the bot, for example “Romashka Support”.
- Enter the bot's username in Latin letters. It must not be taken and must end with “bot”, for example “romashka_support_bot”.
- @BotFather will send a message with the token. Copy the whole token.
If you already have a bot, send @BotFather the “/mybots” command, choose the bot and open the token section.
The token looks like this: digits, a colon and a long string of letters, digits, hyphens and underscores. Copy it together with the digits before the colon.
How to connect the bot
- In the “Telegram” block, paste the token into the “Bot token” field.
- Click “Connect a bot”.
- Wait for the “Bot connected” message. Your bot's name appears under the block title.
- Click “Open in Telegram” and send the bot a question to check the reply.
The address for receiving messages is set up automatically; you do not need to do anything else in Telegram.
Connection states
- “Bot connected” — customers can write to the bot.
- “The connection is not confirmed yet. Check again.” — click “Repeat check”.
- “Telegram has not confirmed the change yet” — click “Repeat check”. The conversation history is kept.
- “Receiving messages is disabled. Confirm disconnection in Telegram.” — click “Repeat check” to finish disconnecting.
- “Telegram disconnected. Conversation history is saved.” — the bot no longer receives messages.
How to replace the token or disconnect the bot
If the token has been revoked or has fallen into the wrong hands:
- Get a new token for the same bot from @BotFather.
- In the “Telegram” block, click “Replace token”.
- Paste the new token and click “Refresh token”.
Replacing the token keeps your conversations with customers.
To disconnect the bot, click “Disable Telegram”. The conversation history is kept. You can connect the bot again the same way, by pasting a token of the same bot.
How to connect a different bot
Click “Replace token”, paste the new bot's token and click “Refresh token”. The previous bot stops answering customers, and its conversations stay in the “Inbox” section. New messages arrive through the new bot.
If the bot is disconnected and the employee no longer needs it, click “Unlink bot”.
Where to find Telegram conversations
All Telegram conversations appear in the “Inbox” section. If the “Support requests” module is connected, open the “All conversations” tab. To see only Telegram, leave the “Telegram” channel button above the list turned on and turn off “Website chat”. Each conversation in the list is labelled with its channel.
Good to know
- Only the business Owner can connect Telegram, replace the token and disconnect Telegram.
- One bot works with one AI employee. For another employee, create a separate bot with @BotFather.
- Provide the token only through the “Bot token” field. If the token ended up in a chat or a screenshot, send @BotFather the “/revoke” command and connect a new token.
- The bot replies in the same mode as the employee's other channels. The mode is chosen in the “Who responds to clients” block on the “Communication” tab.
- If “First get a test reply from the assistant, then connect Telegram” appears when you connect, ask the employee a question in the test chat and connect again.