Auto collect variable information in Zapier Chatbot

When the error happens, does it actually cause an error notification from the Zap step, or does it just continue executing with bad data?

If it causes an actual zap error, you can add an error handler step. Then add a filter to handle this specific failure, or a Paths step to handle different types of failures.

Whether it’s a path or a filter you choose, going down this specific failure, you’d basically duplicate the original path and place all the steps below the path/filter. But instead of filling the Chatbot field dynamically with the user ID, you could statically place/type in whatever default value you want, which would then be carried down, throughout the rest of the action steps.

Hi David,

Thank you for your reply. For now the problem isn’t the error itself. Because that is caused because someone just types the wrong User ID in the chatbot conversation when Prompted.

And as your solution sounds like a good one. I have no way of figuring what the correct user ID was/is when someone mistypes when prompted.

So i’m wondering if there is a “prefill” option or workaround which sends the User ID to the Chatbot once the page is loaded.

If the Zap doesn’t create an actual error notification, then there will be almost no way for the zap to know if it’s a valid ID or not. I’m not sure what other resources or apps you may have, but you’d almost have to validate it before it gets to that step in the Zap.

However, it’s still not clear if that notification is or is not created. So again, let’s pretend that it is because you didn’t understand the part that I already mentioned about “prefilling” the ID going down the error path. Instead of inserting the dynamic value of the ID from the previous step, where the user inputs it themselves, ** YOU ** would prefill that step with a static value you that you type in manually.

The caveat here is that you also need to come up with a plan for what the zap will do if it goes down that path and encounters your static, prefilled ID. Basically, what are the action steps going to do after that?

Sorry I misunderstood your question. It gives an error. I think it goes in way to much detail but based on the chat conversation we “realtime” develop e-learning content based on the knowledge level of the individual student (done by the chatbot).

We already made a path that puts together premade and standardized e-learning. I was just hoping to make a better solution for those handfull of people who don’t know what ctrl+C and ctrl+V is meant for ;-).

Hi there—have you tried personalizing the Chatbot with a prefilled link yet?

You can then provide the link from a user, which has the user ID embedded in the link. It is then possible to create a workflow to trigger on new closed conversations and use regex to extract the ID and log the conversation.

Hope this helps!

Lionel’s solution is absolutely more robust, but if it’s not possible for some reason, I still haven’t read or seen why the error path solution wouldn’t be possible.