Set Up a WhatsApp Auto-Reply Chatbot

The InstaMessage chatbot answers common WhatsApp questions for you — prices, opening hours, your address, delivery times — using keywords you choose. When a customer's message contains one of your keywords, they get your answer within seconds. Everything else is left for you to answer yourself.

You set it up from your dashboard. No code is needed.

How it works

1. A customer sends a WhatsApp message to your connected number.
2. The chatbot looks for your keywords in the message.
3. If it finds one, it sends that entry's answer automatically. The reply appears on your Messages page with a Bot label.
4. If no keyword matches, the chatbot does nothing and the message waits for you, as usual.

Step 1: Add your questions and answers

Open Chatbot in your dashboard. If you have more than one WhatsApp number, pick it from the Instance list at the top — each number has its own chatbot. Then add an entry for each question customers often ask:

• Question — a label for you, like "What are your prices?". Customers never see it.
• Keywords — the words that trigger this answer, separated by commas.
• Answer — the message the customer receives.

For example, a shoe shop might add:

Send a file with an answer

An entry can include one file: a menu photo, a product video, or a PDF price list. Choose it under Attach a file when you add or edit the entry. The customer gets the file, with your answer as its caption.

• Photos (JPG, PNG, WEBP) up to 5 MB are sent as an image.
• Videos (MP4, 3GP) up to 16 MB are sent as a video.
• Anything else — PDF, Excel, Word — up to 100 MB is sent as a document, with its own file name.
• To change the file, choose a new one. Tick Remove to go back to a text-only answer.

Switch one entry off

Every entry has its own on/off button. An entry that's switched off keeps its keywords, file and stats, but the chatbot skips it — handy for an offer that has ended. It shows an OFF badge until you switch it back on.

How keywords are matched

• Capital letters don't matter. price matches "PRICE" and "Price".
• Whole words only. hi matches "hi there" but not "this" or "ship".
• Singular and plural count as the same word. shoe matches "shoes", sneakers matches "sneaker", box matches "boxes".
• Phrases work too. opening time matches "what is your opening time?" and "opening times".
• Photos and videos count. The chatbot also reads the caption of a photo or video.

Plural matching follows simple English rules. Numbers, prices like R499 and words in other languages must match exactly, so add every spelling customers might use.

When more than one entry matches

Only one answer is ever sent. The entry with the most matching keywords wins. If two entries match equally, the one higher in your list wins. New entries go to the bottom, and you can move any entry up or down with the arrow buttons. For example, with these two entries:

• Shoes — keywords shoes, shoe, boot
• Prices — keywords shoe, sneakers, price, cost

Step 2: Test it before going live

Use the Test bot box on the Chatbot page. Type a message as if you were a customer and it shows which entry would answer and which keywords it found — or that the bot would stay silent. If an entry that's switched off would have matched, it tells you that too. Nothing is sent on WhatsApp, so you can try as many messages as you like.

Step 3: Switch it on

Click Switch on in the Auto-reply card. The chatbot starts answering straight away, as long as the instance is connected. Click Switch off any time to stop all automatic replies.

Optional: business hours

Turn on Business hours to tell people when you're closed. Choose your open days, opening and closing times and your timezone, and write a "we're closed" message. Outside those hours:

• Messages that match a keyword still get their answer — the chatbot works around the clock.
• Messages that match nothing get your "we're closed" message, at most once every 12 hours per person.
• Closing earlier than opening means overnight: open 20:00, close 02:00 covers the evening and past midnight.

Inside your hours, messages that match nothing get no reply at all, so you can answer them yourself.

Optional: a numbered menu

Turn on the Numbered menu to let customers pick an answer by number. When someone sends a menu word (menu or start by default — you can change them), they get a list like this:

• The options are your own entries: tick Show in the numbered menu on the ones you want listed. They appear in your list order, using each entry's question as the label.
• Replying with a number within 30 minutes sends that entry's answer (and its file). A number that isn't on the list gets the menu again.
• 0. Talk to a person (optional) replies "someone will reply soon", pauses the bot in that chat and sends you an email with the customer's number, so you can answer them yourself.
• Keywords keep working as usual — customers can still just type "price".

When you reply yourself, the bot steps back

If you answer a customer from your own phone (or WhatsApp Web), the chatbot goes quiet in that chat, so it never talks over you. Every customer you haven't replied to still gets automatic answers.

• The pause lasts 30 minutes by default. You can choose 15 minutes, 30 minutes, 1 hour, 2 hours, 4 hours or 24 hours — or switch pausing off.
• Each time you reply again, the pause starts over.
• Paused chats are listed on the Chatbot page, each with a Resume now button.

Built-in protections

The chatbot is careful not to annoy your customers or put your number at risk:

• It only replies to one-to-one chats — never in groups, never to status updates, and never to your own messages.
• It won't send the same answer to the same person twice within 2 minutes.
• One person gets at most 10 automatic replies an hour, so two bots can never get stuck answering each other.
• It only replies when it knows the sender's real phone number. In the rare case WhatsApp hides it, the message is left for you.

See what it's doing

The Chatbot page shows how many answers and "closed" messages were sent in the last 7 days, and every entry shows how often it has replied. An entry marked Not used yet may need better keywords.

Unanswered questions

At the bottom of the Chatbot page, Unanswered questions lists recent messages (last 7 days) that none of your entries would answer — the same question asked several times is shown once, with a count. Click Add as entry to turn one into a new entry: the question is filled in for you, so you only add the keywords and the answer. Once an entry matches it, the question disappears from the list.

Import and export with Excel

The Import / export card saves you typing when you have many entries. Export downloads your entries as a CSV file you can open in Excel; with no entries yet it downloads an empty template. Edit the file, then Import it — into the same number or another one.

• The first row must name the columns. status is optional: on or off.
• A row with the same question as an existing entry updates that entry; other rows are added at the bottom.
• It's all or nothing: if any row has a problem, nothing is imported and you see which rows to fix.
• Files saved by any version of Excel work. Attached files aren't part of the CSV — add those on the Chatbot page.

Limits and plans

• Automatic replies are messages you send, so they count toward your monthly message limit. If the limit is reached, the chatbot stops replying until you upgrade or the new month starts.
• Each entry can have up to 20 keywords of up to 50 characters, and each WhatsApp number up to 100 entries.
• How many entries you can have in total depends on your plan:

Compare all plans

Tips for a helpful chatbot

• Add the words customers really use. Look at your recent chats: "rate", "charges" and "how much" may all mean price.
• Avoid very common words like "ok", "yes" or "thanks" as keywords — they'd trigger answers nobody asked for.
• Keep answers short and end with what to do next: a link, a phone number, or "reply here and we'll help".
• Check the stats every few weeks and improve entries that are never used.

Next steps

• See every field, error and limit in the API documentation.
• Receive incoming messages with a webhook, and get delivery updates on your server.
• Compare plans and message limits.

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