I’m looking to have a read only channel where anyone can come and look at in this instance an active incident. I’d like to use the Slack alias email to send an email to the channel and have Zapier create a thread for that initial email and when updates are provided as part of that incident, any replies/updates for that email go into a thread. Does anyone know if this is possible? I’m trying to keep all emails separate in threads to keep the channel clean.
Question
How to make Zapier create a thread for new slack email with replies in thread?
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Hey howdoesthiswork! This is a great use case for Zapier. While Zapier can't directly post threads in Slack channels, we can achieve a similar result with some clever Zapping! Here's the breakdown:
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Trigger: Set up a Zap with a trigger for "New Email" from your Slack alias.
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Filter (Optional): You can add a filter to only proceed if the email subject contains specific keywords related to incidents.
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Action 1: Post to Slack Channel: Use the Slack "Post Message" action to send the email content to your read-only channel.
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Action 2: Add Thread Comment (with future updates): Here's the key part. Use the Slack "Post Message" action again, but configure it to post as a thread.
- In the "Channel" field, enter the same channel you used in Action 1.
- In the "Thread TS" field, you'll need to dynamically add the thread ID from the initial email post (Action 1). Use the "Text" zap from the previous step to capture this ID.
This way, any subsequent Zaps triggered by new emails with the same incident thread will append updates as comments within the original thread, keeping everything organized and separate.
Note: You'll need to configure Zapier to access your Slack workspace and email account. Also, keep in mind that free Zapier plans may have limitations on monthly zaps.
Thanks. I’m not sure this will fit my case. I don’t know if I explained it. I have a channel and use that channels Slack alias to send emails part of a distrubution list. Once that email is sent from a shared mailbox, it goes to the Slack channel. This comes in as this:
Would it be possible to configure Zap to create a thread under this message with the replies to the alias? Please note I don’t have the ability to configure outlook account for this shared mailbox.
+11- Community Manager
Hello there
Do the replies also get added into Slack automatically or is it only the original email that is shared in Slack?
You mentioned that it’s a shared mailbox that you can’t configure. Is it possible to ask whoever created the shared mailbox to set up a forwarding rule in Outlook to automatically forward those emails to a different mailbox account that you have access to?
Just thinking that would allow you trigger the Zap when a new email/reply is received in an email account you have access to. Then you could use a Find Message (Slack) search action to locate the original message that is added to Slack, and obtain it’s timestamp (Ts). From there you’d use a Send Channel Message (Slack) action to create the new message - if you select that timestamp in the Thread field it’ll allow the message to be added into the relevant thread.
Do you think that could work? Looking forward to hearing from you!
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