Guide
Inbox
Every conversation — live chat and email — lands in one inbox. Here's how to work through it quickly and keep nothing from slipping through.
Three statuses
Every conversation is in one of three states. Change the status from the conversation sidebar.
Open
Needs attention. New conversations start here, and replies from customers reopen closed ones.
Pending
You're waiting on something — usually a reply from the customer or info from your team.
Closed
Done and dusted. If the customer writes again, the conversation comes back automatically.
Four priorities
Set a priority so the team knows what to grab first.
Your toolkit
Everything you can do with a conversation.
Start a new conversation
Reach out first — click "New conversation" above the conversation list, pick which channel to send from, type or pick the recipient, add a subject and your message, and Sonny starts a brand-new email thread. When the customer replies it lands right back in this inbox.
Reply
Write rich replies with bold, italics, lists, links, text colour, highlight, fonts, emojis 🎉, and inline images. Drop in dynamic fields like {{contact_first_name}} to personalize, and your email signature is appended automatically. Chat replies reach the visitor instantly; email replies go to their inbox. You can see when a visitor is typing, and when a teammate is already composing, so you never answer twice.
Note
Switch the composer to note mode to leave a private message for your team — the customer never sees it. Type @ to mention a teammate (the note shows their name, so everyone knows who's meant) and they get a notification.
Attachments
Agents can upload files up to 25 MB in the composer. Outbound email supports attachments up to 9 MB each, while incoming email accepts up to 25 MB. Chat visitors can send up to 5 images per message, up to 10 MB each. Select an image to preview, zoom, or download it.
Assignment
Give a conversation to a specific person or a whole team from the sidebar. Channels can also assign new conversations automatically, one by one in turn (round robin).
Tags
Add color-coded tags like "bug" or "billing" to keep things organized. Tags show up in reporting too, so you can see what customers ask about most.
Snooze
Select Set snooze, then choose Until customer replies, 1 hour, 4 hours, Tomorrow 9am, Next Monday 9am, or a custom date and time. The conversation returns when that condition is met.
Search and filters
Search across all your conversations from the inbox, and filter the list by status, priority, assignee, type (chat or email), channel, or tag to find exactly what you need.
Bulk actions
Select several conversations at once to assign them, change their status or priority, add and remove tags, or move them to Trash — all in one go.
Trash & delete
Select Move to Trash to remove a conversation from normal inbox views. Use Restore in Trash to bring it back. Only owners and admins can permanently delete; Delete forever cannot be undone.
Email transcript
From the conversation menu, choose Email to myself or Email to customer to send a full copy of the conversation.
Block visitor IP
In a chat conversation, open the ⋯ menu, select Block visitor IP, enter the address you want to block, and confirm. That address can no longer send chat messages.
Find each control
Filters
Open Filters above the conversation list, then narrow by any combination of these fields.
Conversation sidebar
Use these fields to route and organize the open conversation.
Conversation menu
Open the ⋯ menu beside the contact to find actions for the current conversation.
Bulk actions
Select multiple conversations to reveal these controls. In Trash, the bar changes to the restore and deletion controls.
Start a new conversation
Most conversations start when a customer messages you — but sometimes you need to reach out first. Click New conversation above the conversation list to open the composer.
Choose who it's from
The From field lists your email channels (e.g. Support, Sales). Pick the one you want the customer to see and reply to.
Pick or type the recipient
Start typing in the To field. Sonny matches an existing contact as you type — or, if it's someone new, just type their full email address and Sonny creates the contact for you.
Write and send
Add a subject and your message, then send. Sonny creates the conversation in your inbox and emails the customer. Their reply threads straight back into the same conversation.
Keyboard shortcuts
Open the command palette with ⌘K (Ctrl K on Windows) to search and jump to any conversation without touching the mouse.
| ⌘ K | Open the command palette |
The conversation sidebar
The sidebar shows Conversation routing, status, priority, type, channel, and snooze controls; Tags & Properties; and the Activitylog. Chat conversations can also show the visitor's current page and Recent pages, while a submitted satisfaction rating appears as CSAT. Select View profile for the full contact record.
Related docs
Trash & deleting
Move conversations to Trash, restore them, and permanently delete them when needed.
Saved replies
Create reusable message templates with categories, shortcuts, and dynamic fields.
Contacts
Learn how contacts are created, managed, tagged, and merged in Sonny.
Team & roles
Invite users, create teams, and understand owner, admin, agent, and viewer access.
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