Canned Responses

Canned responses are pre-written message shortcuts your agents can insert into any conversation in one click. Instead of typing the same reply over and over, agents store it once and retrieve it with a / in the composer. This keeps response times fast and messaging consistent across your whole team.

Creating a canned response #

1. Go to Settings → Canned Responses
2. Click New Canned Response
3. Enter a Name — a short label used to search for this response (e.g. refund-policy, order-delay, greeting-new). Agents never see this name in the chat; it’s only used for searching.
4. Write the Content — the full message body. You can use WhatsApp formatting and personalisation tokens (see sections below).
5. Click Save

Using a canned response in a conversation #

1. Open any conversation in the Inbox
2. Click in the message composer and type /
3. A picker appears showing all canned responses — type part of the name to filter
4. Click the response to insert it into the composer
5. Review or edit the inserted text if needed, then press Send

WhatsApp text formatting #

Canned responses support WhatsApp’s native text formatting. Use the following markdown-style syntax in the content editor:

Line breaks work normally — press Enter in the editor to create a new line, and it will appear as a line break in the WhatsApp message.

Personalisation tokens #

Use tokens to insert contact-specific values automatically when the response is sent. Baat replaces them with the actual contact data at send time.

Example:

Hi {{contact.first_name}}! 👋 I’m {{agent.name}} from Baat Support. I can see your query and I’m on it — give me a moment.

Organising canned responses — naming conventions #

As your library grows, good naming makes responses easy to find. A consistent prefix system works well:

Using canned responses with WhatsApp Flows #

A useful pattern is to send a canned response as a warm-up message before sending a Flow template. The canned response sets context so the customer knows why they’re being asked to fill in a form.

Example sequence:

1. Agent sends canned response flow-booking-intro:
   “Hi {{contact.first_name}}! To book your appointment, tap the button below — it takes less than 30 seconds. 👇”
2. Agent immediately sends the booking Flow template
3. Customer taps the button, fills in the form, and submits

After the Flow is submitted, agents can use another canned response (e.g. close-booking-confirmed) to send a personalised confirmation while the automated Journey follow-up runs in parallel.

Editing a canned response #

1. Go to Settings → Canned Responses
2. Find the response you want to change (use the search bar to filter by name)
3. Click the Edit (pencil) icon
4. Update the name or content and click Save

Changes apply immediately for all agents — there is no publish or approval step.

Deleting a canned response #

1. Go to Settings → Canned Responses
2. Click the Delete (trash) icon next to the response
3. Confirm the deletion

Best practices #

• Keep each response focused — one response, one purpose. Don’t combine an order update and a refund explanation into a single canned response.
• Use tokens for names — personalised messages (“Hi Priya!”) perform better than generic ones (“Hi there!”). Always use {{contact.first_name}} in greeting responses.
• Review quarterly — prices, policies, and product names change. Schedule a 15-minute quarterly review to keep all responses current.
• Limit to what’s truly repeated — if a message is sent fewer than once a week, it probably doesn’t need a canned response.
• Don’t replace genuine empathy — for complaints and escalations, agents should personalise their messages. Canned responses work best for factual, process-driven replies.