Slack Integration – Avochato Help Center

What is Slack?

Slack is a communication tool designed for businesses to use internally. Lean more here.

How does the Slack Integration work?

Avochato integrates with Slack to give your team the ability to easily send and receive text messages directly from Slack without having to change tabs or switch applications.

How to Add the Avochato App to your Slack Account

First navigate to the "Integrations" tab and click "Connect Slack".

On the next page, select a channel where you would like the Slack integration to live and click "Allow" to grant Avochato access.

If you choose a Public channel, the app integration joins the channel automatically.

If you choose a private channel, you’ll need to complete the action in Step 4.

You can also choose to post into the Avochato App within Slack.

Note that Slack does not allow apps to post to Direct Messages or Group Direct Messages.

You will then see a notification in the channel you selected that the Avochato integration has been added:

If the channel is private, you will be prompted by the integration to type in /invite @avochato in the channel you chose Avochato to post in step 2 above. In the example below, let’s say we set the integration to post in #avotest. That means we’ll have to type in /invite @avochato

Once you type in and hit enter /invite @avochato. You will get a prompt that the Avochato app has been added by you.

How do I use the Slack Integration?

How to send a text message in Slack

Once the Avochato integration is configured in Slack, navigate to that channel and type in /avo phone_number:your_message where “phone_number” is the recipients’s 11 digit number (ex. +10001231234) and “your_message” is the content of your SMS. By hitting enter, you will send a message through Avochato.

In your Avochato inbox you will indicate that your message was sent via Slack.

How to respond to incoming messages

Inbound messages will appear in the Avochato Slack channel. To reply via Slack, simply reply in the thread. Please note that replying outside of the thread will not send a message.

Changing and Disconnecting the Channel

If you need to change the Slack channel go to Avochato > Integrations > Slack and click the Change button. Conversations will now appear in the new channel you assigned.

If you need to remove the Slack channel, go to Avochato > Integrations > Slack and click the Disconnect button. This will prevent Avochato conversations from the current account from syncing any inbound or outbound messages to the channel.

Slack Integration Settings

There are 2 optional settings that default to unchecked. If you want to enable these, navigate to “Settings” and make sure to click Save at the bottom.

Good to Know

New conversations appear in the channel as a header with the person's name. Open the thread to read the messages.

Messages from your team appear in the thread only. The channel option above applies to incoming messages.

Calls and assignment changes are posted in the conversation's thread.

Replies typed in a thread are sent as texts in that conversation.

Messages that fail to deliver get a note in their thread with the reason, at most once a day per thread.

Broadcasts stay out of Slack. When someone replies to a broadcast, their reply starts a thread as usual.

Muted and blocked numbers stay out of Slack.

Deleting a thread's header in Slack ends that thread, whether or not its replies are deleted too. The next message in the conversation starts a new thread.

Private channels need the Avochato app invited once. Type /invite @avochato in the channel.

Changing the channel starts new threads there. Replies typed in threads from the previous channel are no longer sent as texts.

Privacy

See how Avochato collects, uses and stores data, including messages and user details received from Slack, in our Privacy Policy.

When you connect Slack, Avochato stores your workspace and channel IDs, access tokens, and the messages, files and user names posted in Avochato threads, to deliver replies to your customers. Disconnecting Slack or uninstalling the app deletes the tokens.