Chat Channels

Digital chat channels are separate from their CXone Mpower counterparts. In Digital Experience, chat interactions route to the agent's digital inbox Area where cases appear in the digital interaction workspace in an agent application. and not the agent application's chat or email workspaces. Also, routing of Digital Experience chat messages happens through digital skills or routing queues Digital Experience equivalent of a skill; routes each contact to an agent assigned to handle that type of contact. and filters.

Digital Experience offers two options for chat channels: 

• Live chat allows customers and agents to interact in real time.
• Chat messaging is asynchronous. Customers can send a chat message at any time and wait for a response from an agent. The experience is much like a private direct messaging channel. Chat messaging also supports multiple threads. This means that customers can have more than one chat, potentially with more than one agent, happening simultaneously.

Chat Channel Setup

The process of setting up a chat channel differs slightly depending on which type of chat you want your channel to use.

1. Set up your live chat or chat messaging channel.

2. Configure the chat channel. You can customize the appearance of the chat widget, add a precontact survey form to the chat experience, modify common and automated chat phrases, and so on. To further fine tune the appearance and behavior of chat, you can use JavaScript customization.

3. Determine how to enable digital chat on your website:

   • Use Digital Experience: If you already enabled chat using Digital Experience, you can continue with that approach or switch to using Guide.

   • Use Guide: If you started using digital chat in the fall of 2024 or later, you must enable chat by using Guide engagement rules. Additionally, to enable a chat channel to use the redesigned chat UI that supports the entire chat process when displayed in Guide, you must enable the redesign at the channel level.

     When using Guide to display chat, the Guide settings have a higher priority for evaluation than the digital chat settings themselves. In particular:

     • Engagement Rules: Engagement rules determine how Guide appears and interacts with users, similar to how Workflow Automation can control behaviors for chat channels. Guide engagement rules override conflicting Workflow Automation triggers and jobs as well as any other conflicting chat settings.
     • Language Variants: You can modify labels for chat interface elements. If you edit these with Guide, whatever you change there may override similar settings configured for chat from the Points of Contact Digital page.
     • Precontact Survey: When you create a Guide entry point, you can select a precontact web survey to assign to that channel. This overrides any other precontact survey forms assigned to the same channel from ACD > Digital > Forms.

Key Facts about Digital Chat

• Digital live chat and chat messaging support:

  • Text preview, customizable pop-ups, customizable common phrases, and custom fields.

  • Customizable restrictions on attachment file size and type.

  • Generating links from other channels.

  • Escalation to chat from digital email.

  • An in-chat game (Snake) that customers can play while waiting for agents to respond by chat (requires script customization).

  • Helper View, where others can view and comment on chats.

  • Video calls and co-browsing (requires integration with Surfly; contact your Account Representative for more information).

  • Customer authentication using OAuth.

  • Satisfaction surveys.

  • Advanced customization using script commands.

  • Bot integration with structured content such as rich links, galleries, and quick replies.

  • Group chat, where agents as well as contacts can invite other people into a chat conversation.

• Digital live chat and chat messaging integrate with several CXone Mpower WEM products: 
  • Recording with screen recording: If your organization uses this feature, you can record agents' chats, then search for and play the recordings.
  • QM: If your organization uses this feature, you can you can evaluate chats along with other interactions.
  • Interaction Analytics: If your organization uses this feature, you can use it to analyze sentiment in digital live chat and chat messaging. The sentiment indicators in digital chat cases are also based on Interaction Analytics sentiment analysis.
• If your organization offers an app for your customers to use, you can integrate your chat channel into your app so your customers have the option to chat with your organization from within the app.

• Digital Experience chat does not use cookies. It utilizes the browser's local storage instead.