Setup
Add knowledge
To set Fin up for Zendesk Messaging, the first thing you need to do is add knowledge. Go to Channels > Zendesk messaging and select Add knowledge.
You can import knowledge by:
Syncing your existing Zendesk knowledge base.
Syncing any public URL such as your knowledge base or marketing site.
Uploading PDFs.
Writing or copy/pasting snippets of text directly into Intercom.
Configure greeting and hand-off
Next, configure the greeting your customers will see when they open the Zendesk Messenger by clicking on Greeting and hand-off.
Here, you can define when Fin should respond, and what should happen when the customer asks to talk to the team. At the end of all paths (except That helped ), Fin will unassign itself and apply the “routed-to-the-team” tag.
You can tailor the experience further by:
Creating different branches based on your conditions.
Choosing when Fin answers.
Having Fin send a message.
Providing reply buttons.
Collecting data.
Collecting the customer reply.
Adding internal notes.
Adding an AI generated summary of the conversation.
Auto-classifying ticket attributes based on what the customer said.
Once you’ve finished customizing the greeting and hand-off to your team, click Save.
Connect to Zendesk
Next, connect to Zendesk from the “Integration” section and enter your:
Zendesk subdomain
Email address for the person who generated the API token
Your API token
You can generate a new API token from Zendesk Admin Center › Apps & Integrations › Zendesk API.
Then select Connect to the Zendesk API. This will only enable Fin for testing without affecting your live environment.
If you've already integrated with the Zendesk tickets channel this will already be filled.
Connect to Zendesk Conversations API
Now connect to the Zendesk Conversations API to allow Fin to respond on Zendesk Messaging. You’ll need to enter your:
App ID
Key ID
Secret key
You can generate these API keys from Zendesk Admin Center › Apps & Integrations › Conversations API.
Then select Connect to the Conversations API. This will only enable Fin for testing without affecting your live environment.
Choose messaging channels
Once you’ve connected to Zendesk and the Conversations API, enable the messaging channels Fin should respond on and click Save. You can configure these channels in Zendesk Admin Center > Channels > Messenger.
Test Fin
After adding knowledge, connecting to Zendesk and the Conversations API, and selecting your messaging channels, you’ll be able to test Fin.
Enter a URL where your Zendesk Messenger is installed and click Preview.
If the URL is not publicly accessible we won't be able to show the test window. In this case you can manually start test mode with your Zendesk Messaging Key. You can find this in the Channels section of your Zendesk Admin:
Choose the channel you want to test Fin on.
Open the "installation" settings.
In the snippet code given to you, your Zendesk Messaging Key can be found after the key= mark, e.g. "https://static.zdassets.com/ekr/snippet.js?key=YOUR_KEY_IS_HERE"
Copy the key and paste it into Intercom then click Preview.
Turn Fin on
Now you’re ready to set Fin live for your customers. Go to Channels > Zendesk messaging and select Turn Fin on.
Learn how to set up Fin for Zendesk tickets or for Intercom Messenger with hand-off to Zendesk.
Customer experience
When a customer opens the Zendesk Messenger they'll see a greeting from Fin (this can be customized via the simplified Intercom workspace).
After the customer asks a question:
Fin will attempt to answer, citing sources from the knowledge you’ve given Fin access to.
If the question is ambiguous, Fin will ask clarifying questions.
If Fin is unable to resolve the conversation, it'll hand-off the ticket to the team.
This conversation won't be visible to agents in Zendesk until the customer asks to talk to the team.
After the customer asks to talk to the team, a new messaging ticket will be created in Zendesk and show up in the queue. When an agent takes the conversation, they’ll see the entire conversation history in the thread and can continue the conversation from there.
Note: If the customer is offline and their email is known, an email notification will be sent allowing them to continue the conversation over email.
How it works
Fin connects to Zendesk Messaging via Zendesk’s Sunshine Messaging API, allowing compatibility with Zendesk Messenger—not the classic Chat widget.
When connected, Fin mirrors conversations from Zendesk to Intercom, along with user data such as name, email, page URL, and geolocation. Fin works on all channels that are available to you in Zendesk Messaging (e.g. Zendesk Messenger, WhatsApp, mobile SDKs, etc.).
Fin will replace the Zendesk Answerbot, only handling new conversations and avoiding intervention in ongoing ones. Conversations with Fin follow Zendesk's standard rules, remaining hidden from the agent workspace unless explicitly handed over or if the workflow ends.
This is the same behavior as Zendesk’s Answerbot flow:
When a conversation is handed over, it will appear in your support team’s queue. Once opened it will create a ticket. Fin will no longer interact in the conversation after it has been handed over.
If the ticket is closed by the support agent, control will be passed back to Fin. If the user asks more questions, the messaging workflow powering Fin will run again.
Fin can also collect name and email data and pass this to Zendesk.
Note: Fin does not control authentication or identity verification – this should be handled through your installation of the Zendesk Messenger.
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