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Set Up Web Chat

This guide takes you from an empty Daktela instance to a working chat window on your website. It builds the pieces in the order they depend on each other, so you never have to leave a screen half-finished and come back later.

If you haven't yet, read How Web Chat Works first β€” it explains what each piece does and how a chat travels through them.

The whole setup:

  1. Create the web chat queue
  2. Add agents to the queue
  3. Define your business hours
  4. Create a terminate target for offline chats
  5. Create the time condition
  6. Create the connector
  7. Embed the chat in your website
  8. Apply the configuration and test

1. Create the Web Chat Queue

The queue is where chats wait and from where they are distributed to your agents.

  1. Go to Settings β†’ Routings β†’ Queues and click Add new, then select Web chat.
  2. Fill out the Unique queue number (Daktela suggests the next available number automatically), the Title (e.g. "Web chat – Support") and optionally an Alias and Description.
  3. Click Save.

The default settings are fine for a first working chat β€” you can tune waiting times, agent ring times and the distribution strategy later. Every field is described in the Web Chat Queue reference.

2. Add Agents to the Queue

Info

Agents get queues only through their user rights: this dialog and the Queues tab of a set of rights are two views of the same setting β€” see How Users & Rights Work. If you have already given the queue a log-in type in your rights, this step is done. Setting up Daktela for the first time? Set Up Your Contact Centre shows where queues, rights and users fit in.

A queue without agents rings nobody, so give the users who will answer chats access to the queue.

  1. In the queue list (Settings β†’ Routings β†’ Queues), find your new queue and click Change in the Agents column.
  2. Check (tick) the user rights that should have access to the queue β€” this is how agents are assigned, via their rights group.
  3. Select a Priority for each set of rights: 0 is the highest, 10 the lowest. Agents with priority 0 ring first; higher numbers only get chats when the more competent group is unavailable.
  4. Select the Login type β€” Automatic is a good default (agents are activated in the queue when they go ready).

See Queue Basics – Assign Agents to a Queue for all the options (call pickup, missed activities, login types), and Distribution Strategies for how priorities drive who rings when.

Info

With the Manual login type, agents must also log in to the queue in their application to receive chats. See Get Started – Select Queues.

3. Define Your Business Hours

Business hours live in a time group β€” a reusable definition of when you are open that you'll plug into the routing in step 5.

  1. Go to Settings β†’ Workflows β†’ Time groups and click Add new.
  2. Fill out the Title (e.g. "Business hours").
  3. Under Definitions, add an Open interval for each working period β€” e.g. Type: Open, time 9:00–17:00, days Monday–Friday.
  4. Click Save.

Time groups can also handle bank holidays and can be linked together (e.g. a shared "Bank Holidays" group linked from each department's group). See Time Groups for the details and for common pitfalls when mixing Open and Closed definitions.

4. Create a Terminate Target for Offline Chats

A terminate target defines what happens when a chat ends without an agent β€” outside business hours or when nobody answers. Creating it now means you can plug it straight into the time condition in the next step.

  1. Go to Settings β†’ Routings β†’ Web chats β†’ Terminate and click Add new.
  2. Fill out the Title (e.g. "Offline – outside business hours").
  3. Select the Disconnection cause β€” for this guide, Outside working hours. This is internal only; the customer never sees it.

  4. In Queue, select the web chat queue from step 1.

    Tip

    Selecting a queue here is what makes missed chat notifications work β€” chats terminated with this target show up in the queue's missed activities, and the queue's Notification email is only sent when the chat ends in a terminate target with Disconnection cause set to Not available or Outside working hours.

  5. Optionally select an Auto response template to send to the customer, and set Answered to control whether these chats are logged as answered or missed.

  6. Click Save.

The full field reference is in Terminate.

5. Create the Time Condition

The time condition connects your business hours to real routing: during open hours the chat goes to the queue, outside them to the terminate target.

  1. Go to Settings β†’ Routings β†’ Web chats β†’ Time conditions and click Add new.
  2. Fill out the Title (e.g. "Business hours check").
  3. In Time group, select the time group from step 3.
  4. In If time matches, select Queue and choose your web chat queue from step 1.
  5. In If time does not match, select Terminate and choose the terminate target from step 4.
  6. Click Save.

See Time Conditions for the other routing targets you can use here.

6. Create the Connector

The connector is the chat window itself β€” one connector per web chat on your site.

  1. Go to Settings β†’ Routings β†’ Web chats and click Add new.
  2. Fill out the Title (e.g. "Web chat – example.com").
  3. In Next destination, select Time condition and choose the time condition from step 5.
  4. Under Client settings, review the three welcome messages β€” online, offline and busy β€” and adjust the texts to your liking. The Preview on the right updates as you type.
  5. Under Client settings, check Behaviour in overload β€” what the chat shows when no agent is available. The default is Online: the chat keeps showing the online message and visitors can start chats nobody picks up. Select Offline (the offline message; a chat started anyway ends as not available) or Busy (the busy message), or use Hide in overload to hide the chat. If the connector leads to the queue through a decision tree or an automessage, also set Deep overload detection.

  6. Under Default inputs, choose what the customer can or must fill in before starting a chat, separately for online and offline.

    Tip

    If the chat stays visible while you are offline, make the email input mandatory for offline β€” otherwise you have no way to get back to the customer who left a message.

  7. Click Save.

This is the minimum. The connector has many more options β€” agent name display, file uploads, GDPR agreement, greetings, custom inputs, window design and a JavaScript API β€” all described in the Web Chat Connector reference.

7. Embed the Chat in Your Website

  1. Open your connector's details and click the blue Get code button at the top of the Preview section.
  2. Copy the code and paste it into your web page. For further customisation, use the toggle switches under Default values and Events to insert script templates into the code.

Get code button in the connector details

Embedding via Google Tag Manager

If your website uses Google Tag Manager, you can deploy the chat without touching the site's code. You must already have the GTM code installed on your website β€” if you don't, follow the Google documentation first.

  1. Log in to your Google Tag Manager, open Workspace and click Add a new tag.

    Add a new tag in Google Tag Manager

  2. Enter a tag name, then click Tag Configuration.

    Tag configuration

  3. Select Custom HTML.

  4. Paste the web chat code from Daktela into the HTML field.

    Paste the code into the HTML field

  5. Open Triggering.

    Open triggering

  6. Select All pages if you want to display the chat everywhere on your website.

    Select All pages

  7. Click Save.

    Save the tag

  8. Click Submit.

    Submit the workspace changes

  9. Select Publish and Create Version, enter a Version Name and click Publish.

    Publish the new version

8. Apply the Configuration and Test

  1. Back in Settings β†’ Routings β†’ Web chats, click the Apply configuration changes button in the top right corner.

    Apply configuration changes button

    It takes a few minutes for the changes to reach your website. To see them immediately, open your website in a new incognito/private window.

  2. Test the online path: with an agent logged in to the queue and in the Ready state during business hours, start a chat from your website and check that it rings the agent.

  3. Test the offline path: outside business hours, check that the offline welcome message appears (unless Hide in offline hides the chat) and that a left message shows up as a missed activity in the queue.
  4. Test the no-agent path: during business hours with nobody Ready in the queue, check the chat behaves as you chose in Behaviour in overload.

Warning

Every later change to connectors, time conditions, automessages, decision trees, chatbots or terminate targets needs Apply configuration changes again before it reaches your website.

Go Further

Your chat is live. From here you can add:

  • Automessages β€” keep waiting customers informed, or offer them a switch to click-to-call.
  • Decision trees β€” let Daktela's built-in chatbot answer common questions, call your APIs and create tickets before an agent joins.
  • Third-party chatbots β€” connect an external bot to the chat.
  • Window design and greetings β€” colours, position, greeting bubbles per page: see the Web Chat Connector reference.
  • Missed chat follow-up β€” turn on Missed activities in the queue settings and pick the call/SMS/email queues used to contact customers back.
  • NPS surveys β€” select a survey template in the connector's general settings.
  • Click-to-call β€” offer customers a callback instead of chatting: see Web Click to Call.
  • Blacklisting β€” let agents block abusive visitors: see Web Chat Queue – How to Blacklist in Webchat.

Not Working?

  1. The chat doesn't appear on your website? Click Apply configuration changes, wait a few minutes and test in a private window. With Google Tag Manager, check the tag is published.
  2. The chat is hidden? Check the connector's Hide in offline, Hide in overload and Hide on mobile device settings.
  3. The chat shows online when nobody is there? See Behaviour in overload in step 6.
  4. Chats don't ring? Check an agent is logged in to the queue, Ready and not on a pause, during business hours.
  5. No missed chats? The terminate target must have your queue selected, and Missed activities must be on in the queue.

More checks, by symptom, are in Troubleshooting.