Update agent attributes in Zendesk

Hi Zapier Community

After spending sometime with Zapier Support (they were fantastic btw!), we were able to come up with a solution to automatically set an alias in Zendesk when a new user is created. The process was slightly complicated but I am going to outline the steps here. Once you know how to set one attribute on new user creation in Zendesk, you can find many other use cases for this method.

Pre-Requisite

Before you start the process of creating a new Zap, you will need a few things.

• URL of your Zendesk Instance
• Administrative Privileges in your Zendesk Instance (admin role in Zendesk)
• Zendesk API Token (Zendesk Help Resource)

Base64 encode your API Token

• Once you have the Zendesk API token, you need to base64 encode it. (You can read more about why we use Base64 here).
• Open Terminal/Command Prompt on your Mac/Windows machine.
• Type the following in the prompt echo -n ‘zendesk_email_address/token:api_token’ | base64
  • In the command above
    • Where it’s red, replace with the email address associated with your Zendesk account when you login.
    • Where it’s blue, replace the api token you got from following the Zendesk Help Resource linked earlier.
• You should get a long string of letters and characters that don’t make any sense. Copy this down somewhere because you will need it later to connect Zapier to your Zendesk Instance.

Creating a Zap

1. Start by creating a new Zap
2. First step for the Trigger
   • Search for the app Zendesk and select it.
   • Under Trigger Event select New User and click Continue
   • Under Zendesk account, select your Zendesk Instance.
     • If you have not connected your instance to Zapier yet, select +Connect a new account.
     • You will see a dialogue prompt pop up. Under Account, enter the URL of your Zendesk instance. https://insertyourinstancenamehere.zendesk.com/
     • Under Agent Email, enter your Zendesk Email
     • Under API Token, enter the base64 encoded API Token from earlier that you wrote down.
   • Next you should be under the Test trigger section. If everything worked out properly, it should tell you that it found a user. Click Continue.
3. Next step is the Action
   • Choose the Filter option on the right hand side. If you don’t see it, in the Search apps… box type filter and pick the one that says Filter by Zapier

     

      

   • Copy these settings:

     

      

   • Click Continue when done. 
   • You might see the following error message but you can ignore it and click Close.

     

      

4. Next click the + sign below Step 2 to setup a new Action.
   • Search for Webhook by Zapier and select this option.

     

      

   • Under Action Event, select Custom Request and click Continue.
   • Under the Method, set it to PUT
   • Under the URL box, enter the following:
     • https://yourZendeskURL/api/v2/users/map_user_id.json
     • Where it says yourZendeskURL, replace with your Zendesk Instance
     • Where it says map_user_id, click on that portion of the URL and you should see a drop down in Zapier, choose 1. New User in Zendesk > 1. ID

       

        

     • Under the Data box, enter the following:
       { "user": { "user": "map_user_id", "alias": "YourCompany Support" } }
       • Where it says map_user_id, follow similar steps before, choose 1. New User in Zendesk > 1. ID
       • End result should look something like this.

         

          

     • Next under headers set it to the following:

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         Under the box to the right of Authorization, enter Basic followed by the base64 encoded API key from earlier.
     • When your done click Continue to proceed to the next step.
     • Click Test & Review. If everything was setup properly you should get a message that says Test was successful. If you don’t see this message, review the steps again to see where you went wrong.
     • Click Turn on Zap.
   • Now when a new user is created in Zendesk, their alias should be set to your company’s name. 
   • You can review the run job by clicking on the 3 dots > History. 

     

      

   • From what I can tell, the job can take a few minutes to run. If you are on-boarding a new set of users and need this to execute faster, you can manually run the Zap to set the alias.

Hope this helps with your use case. Let me know if you have any questions or feedback on the guide.

Richard