MenuStart a projectStart

Customer service

Follow up low Intercom ratings with Slack alerts

Low rating follow-up watches Intercom for conversation ratings that show a customer was unhappy. It alerts a team lead in Slack with the remark and conversation, assigns a follow-up with a due time and reports any low rating left without one.

An example of how the studio would build it. No live services are connected.

From a low rating to a person picking up the phone.

  1. Step 01

    Rating received

    Intercom reports a new conversation rating through a webhook, with the score, any remark and the conversation it belongs to.

  2. Step 02

    Rating checked

    Pass on the lowest ratings, and middling ones that include a remark, while counting the rest for reporting.

  3. Step 03

    Lead alerted

    Post the rating, remark and a link to the conversation in Slack, tagging the lead on shift.

  4. Step 04

    Follow-up assigned

    Tag the conversation in Intercom and assign it to the lead, with a due time based on your opening hours.

  5. Step 05

    Loop closed

    List any low ratings without a recorded follow-up in a short weekly summary for the owner.

The result

Disappointed customers hear from a person while the problem is still fixable.

The automation never contacts the customer: it makes sure a named person owns each low rating. Each conversation is alerted once, even if the customer changes their rating later.

Before we connect it.

Where this is useful

Useful for online retailers, subscription businesses and software companies that collect ratings in Intercom but rarely act on the poor ones. A sensible first version alerts on the lowest ratings only, then adds middling ratings with remarks once the team has a rhythm for following up.

What we need to connect

  1. 01Intercom access to receive conversation rating webhooks and to tag and assign conversations, with ratings switched on for your inbox.
  2. 02A Slack channel for alerts, plus a record of who leads each shift so the right person is tagged.
  3. 03Your follow-up standard: how quickly someone should respond, whether by phone or message, and what a lead can offer to put things right.

What needs careful handling

Some low ratings are about a policy rather than the service, such as a refund refused outside the returns window, and the lead can mark these so they are reported separately. Ratings that arrive outside working hours wait for the next shift, with the due time set from when the team is back. Customers who have asked not to be contacted again are marked as such, and the lead records the rating as reviewed without reaching out.

Questions people ask.

Can’t Intercom show us ratings already?

Yes. Intercom’s reports show conversation ratings and remarks, so the information is already there. What this adds is an immediate alert, a named owner and a check that every poor rating was followed up, rather than a report someone has to remember to read.

Should we reply to every low rating?

In most cases, yes, even if only to acknowledge the feedback. The lead decides whether a call, a message or no further contact is right, and that choice is recorded.

Email received → Person sends it
Automation 64

AI support inbox triage and reply drafts

Reviews gathered → Unanswered listed
Automation 74

Weekly Google, Tripadvisor and Yelp review summary

All automation examples