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Using the Octopods Inbox App in Intercom

The Octopods Inbox App is a panel in Intercom's conversation sidebar for proactive messages, templates, merges, and new conversations.

Written by Tarek Khalil

What the Inbox App does

Once installed, the Inbox App surfaces inside every open Intercom conversation. From a single panel in the sidebar you can:

  • Send a proactive message — start an SMS or WhatsApp message to the customer on the conversation’s contact.

  • View sent messages — review your recent proactive sends.

  • Send a message template — pick an approved WhatsApp Business Account (WABA) or Viber Business Messages (VBM) template and send it directly.

  • Merge with existing user — when the conversation’s contact is a Lead, merge it into an existing User.

  • Open a new conversation — close the current thread and start a fresh Intercom conversation on the same contact.

Which buttons appear depends on the conversation. For example, the template button only shows when a matching WABA or VBM channel is connected, and “Merge with existing user” only appears when the contact is a Lead.

Setting it up

The Inbox App becomes available as soon as your Octopods account is connected to your Intercom workspace. The setup flow is:

  1. Sign in to Octopods and connect your Intercom workspace.

  2. Connect at least one channel to that workspace — for example, an SMS channel or a WhatsApp channel.

  3. Install the Octopods app inside Intercom from Intercom’s app directory, so it can render inside the inbox sidebar.

Once those three steps are done, open any Intercom conversation and the Octopods panel appears automatically in the sidebar.

Note: If the panel is empty and prompts you to “Connect your first Intercom Workspace,” the Intercom workspace hasn’t been linked to Octopods yet. Finish the connection at app.octopods.io and refresh your Intercom inbox.

If the panel tells you no channels are connected

When the Inbox App displays “Looks like you didn’t connect any SMS or WhatsApp channels yet,” the Intercom workspace is connected but no phone-based channels are in place. Head to your Octopods workspace and connect an SMS or WhatsApp channel first. See the Channels section for channel-by-channel setup guides.

Who can use it

Any Intercom teammate with access to the conversation can use the Inbox App. Some actions — for example, changing contact prioritization or enabling “Open New Conversation After Inactivity” — are configured by Octopods admins in the workspace settings, and those settings control what the Inbox App will do inside Intercom for everyone on the team.

What’s next

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