Sales & channels

Channels (SMS, WhatsApp, Phone, Email)

In the "Channels & Integrations" section you define the ways your customers can reach the agent: by phone (voice call), by SMS and WhatsApp, and by email. You'll find it in the dashboard on the relevant agent under the "Channels" tab. Here you provision a dedicated phone number, link WhatsApp and set up the reply address for emails.

Simple vs. Advanced view: At the top of the agent there is a toggle "Simple" / "Advanced". In the default "Simple" setting you only see the essentials: the phone number card and the most important fields under "Channels & Integrations". Only in "Advanced" do the sections Phone lines, Call forwarding targets, the "Reply from (outbound)" field, the Vapi assistant ID and the "Webhooks & Notifications" block appear. If a field described in this guide is missing on your screen, first switch to "Advanced".

15.1 Provision a phone number (Phone, SMS & WhatsApp)

The "Phone number" card is the starting point. A single provisioned number (via the provider Twilio) serves the agent simultaneously for voice calls, SMS and WhatsApp — so you don't need three separate numbers.

Step 1: Select country. - Country — From the list, select the country in which the phone number should be based (e.g. 🇩🇪 Germany, 🇦🇹 Austria, 🇨🇭 Switzerland and others). - What it does: Determines the dialling code/origin of the number. - Default: DE (Germany). - Recommendation: The country of your main location — customers are more likely to trust a local number. - Note on the fallback: If no number is currently available in the desired country, the system automatically falls back to a US number and lets you know (yellow notice: "No numbers available in … — we provisioned a number in … instead").

Step 2: Click "Provision number". - The system buys a suitable number and automatically wires it up for Voice (Vapi) and — where possible — WhatsApp. On success the message "Number … provisioned" appears. - Important note on costs: With the purchase, the monthly rental of the phone number begins immediately. This rental is recorded automatically and appears in your cost/usage overview — the first month is charged directly when provisioning, after which billing continues monthly for as long as you keep the number. - WhatsApp note: WhatsApp registration is carried out on a "best effort" basis. If it fails or is skipped, the number still works immediately for Voice and SMS — you can then complete the WhatsApp activation later in the Twilio account (Messaging → Senders). The dashboard displays such notices as a list after provisioning.

Step 3: Check the status after provisioning. Once a number is active, the card shows the green "Connected" badge in the top right, and below it: - Number — the assigned phone number. - Country — the country of origin. - Vapi phone number ID — the technical identifier of the voice connection (which you need, among other things, for the multilingual phone lines, see 15.2).

In addition, two actions are available: - "Reconfigure webhooks" — Sets the SMS forwarding address of your existing number to the current backend address. Use this if inbound SMS aren't reaching the agent or after a technical migration of the system. A pure "refresh" button that changes nothing about your number. - "Release number" — Gives the number back. Caution, irreversible: No further costs are incurred, but the same number may not be available again afterwards. A safety dialog asks once more before the final "Release".

Tips & pitfalls (Phone number) - One number = three channels. The "WhatsApp phone number" field further down (see 15.4) is filled in automatically with this number after provisioning — you don't need to enter anything there by hand. - Inbound SMS only work if the webhook address is set correctly. If you don't receive any SMS, "Reconfigure webhooks" is the first thing to try. - "Release" saves the monthly rental — but think it over carefully, because the number is usually gone afterwards.

15.2 Phone lines (multilingual hotlines) — Advanced only

By default, the single number from 15.1 is sufficient. The "Phone lines" section is only intended for the special case of genuine multilingual hotlines: here you link several Vapi phone numbers, each with exactly one language. Every call on a line is fixed to that language — regardless of which country the caller is calling from (e.g. a German and a US number on the same agent).

How to add a line: - Step 1 — Vapi phone number ID: The technical identifier of the number (format e.g. vapi_phone_…). You must first provision this via the phone number card (15.1) or create it in the Vapi dashboard and then enter it here. Required field, at least 8 characters. - Step 2 — Phone number (E.164): The phone number in international format, e.g. +493012345678. Required field. - Step 3 — Label (optional): A plain-text name for orientation, e.g. "Germany Support" or "US Sales". - Step 4 — Language: Select the fixed language of the line from the list (Deutsch, English, Français, Español, Italiano, Nederlands, Português, Polski, Türkçe). Internally this is a 2-letter code (e.g. de, en). Default: Deutsch (de). - Step 5: Click "Add line" (only active once the ID, number and language are valid).

Each line you create appears as a card with the number, a language badge and the following controls: - a language selector for changing the language later, - an active toggle — disabled lines show the red "inactive" badge, - a trash icon for deleting.

Tips & pitfalls (Phone lines) - Rule of thumb: one line per language that you actually want to serve by phone. - The number must exist beforehand — this form does not buy new numbers, it only links ones that already exist. - Without lines, the agent detects the language automatically as usual; lines force a fixed language and only make sense for separate language hotlines.

15.3 Call forwarding targets — Advanced only

In the "Call forwarding targets" section you store people or departments to which the AI may forward a call. If a caller says, for example, "I'd like to speak to Manfred", the AI selects the appropriate target and connects them.

How to create a target: - Step 1 — Name: The name of the person/department, e.g. "Manfred Müller". Required field (1–120 characters). - Step 2 — Phone number (E.164): Target phone number in international format, e.g. +493012345678. Spaces and hyphens are removed automatically, so you may enter "+49 30 1234567". Required field; must begin with + and have 4–15 digits. - Step 3 — Aliases: Other names by which callers might refer to the person ("Herr Müller", "the boss" …). Type and confirm with Enter or comma, or with the "Add" button; clicking an alias badge removes it again. Maximum 20 aliases, duplicates are ignored. - Step 4 — Description (when to forward here): Context for the AI on when this target is appropriate, e.g. "Sales — for prices, demos and contract questions". Optional, up to 2000 characters. - Step 5 — Forwarding message (optional): A sentence the AI says before connecting, e.g. "One moment please, I'm connecting you to Manfred." Up to 200 characters.

Under "Advanced" within this card there are also: - Forwarding mode — "Warm (AI announces caller)" or "Blind (direct transfer)". Default: Warm. Recommendation: "Warm" feels more personal; "Blind" is faster when no announcement is needed. - Ring timeout (seconds) — How long the target rings before it's cancelled. Default: 30; allowed values 5–120 seconds. - Fallback message (optional) — Said if no one answers, e.g. "Manfred is not available right now. Would you like to leave a message?" Up to 400 characters. - Opening hours (optional) — A toggle activates weekday-based hours. By default the target is reachable around the clock; only after switching it on do you restrict it per weekday (Mon–Sun) to a start/end time (default Mon–Fri 09:00–17:00, weekend closed). Outside these hours the target is automatically filtered out. - Time zone (IANA) — e.g. Europe/Berlin. Leave blank to use the agent's default.

Click "Add target" (active as soon as Name and Number are filled in). Each target appears as a card with name, number, mode (warm/blind), ring duration and, where applicable, opening hours; an active toggle and a trash icon are available for toggling/deleting.

Tips & pitfalls (Forwarding targets) - The number must be in E.164 format (with country code and +), otherwise the target is rejected. - The more precise the description and the aliases, the more accurately the AI forwards. - Opening hours are a good safeguard against calls going nowhere — combined with a fallback message this feels professional.

15.4 Email, WhatsApp & voice assistant ("Channels & Integrations" card)

This card bundles the remaining channel fields. It is saved via the agent's normal Save mechanism.

WhatsApp: - WhatsApp phone number — The number through which WhatsApp runs (format +49…). Optional. If the number was provisioned via 15.1, this field is already filled in automatically; only for a separate, externally managed WhatsApp number do you enter it here by hand.

Email (inbound): - email_alias (inbound) — The address to which customer emails for this agent are sent. You only enter the part before the @ (e.g. support); the fixed domain of your system is shown to the right (e.g. @support.yourdomain.de). Below the field, the full address is displayed for verification. Only a–z, 0–9, dots, hyphens and underscores are allowed. Optional. - Special case: If no system domain has been set yet, or an old alias comes from a different domain, a simple free-text field for the whole address appears instead.

Email (outbound): - Reply from (outbound) — (Advanced only) The sender address (From:) under which outbound replies are sent. Must be a verified SES identity (see below). Default: If the field is empty, the inbound alias is used as the sender. Optional. - Reply display name — The friendly name shown next to the sender address, e.g. "Acme Support". Optional, recommended — feels more personal than just the bare email address.

SES verification (enable email sending): As soon as an email address has been set (inbound alias or "Reply from"), the "SES verification" widget appears. It shows the current status ("Verified", "Pending" or an error status) and a "Verify identity" or "Re-verify" button: - For a single email address: A confirmation email is sent to the address — click the link in it to complete verification. - For an entire domain: The widget shows three CNAME records (DKIM) that you must publish with your DNS provider. Only after that is the domain considered verified. - Important: Without a verified identity, the agent cannot send any outbound emails.

Voice assistant: - Vapi assistant ID — (Advanced only) The identifier of the voice assistant (format xxxxxxxx-xxxx-xxxx-xxxx-xxxxxxxxxxxx). Optional. As a rule this is linked automatically when provisioning the number — only for a manual Vapi setup do you enter it yourself here.

Tips & pitfalls (Email/WhatsApp/Voice) - Inbound ≠ Outbound: "email_alias (inbound)" is the receiving address, "Reply from (outbound)" the sending address. If you leave "Reply from" empty, the agent automatically replies from the inbound address — for most people this is the simplest way. - Email sending fails silently if the SES identity is not verified. After saving, always check for the green "Verified" badge. - DNS records (DKIM CNAMEs) often take anywhere from a few minutes to several hours after publishing before the status switches from "Pending" to "Verified" — "Re-verify" triggers a new check. - Don't forget the reply display name: emails from "Acme Support" make less of a spam impression than those from a bare address.

15.5 Webhooks & Notifications — Advanced only

This optional block is aimed at technically experienced users and connects the agent to external systems. - Tool webhook URL — Receives all calls to your own ("Custom") tools. Optional. - Notification webhook URL — Triggered when a conversation is escalated or closed. Optional. - Notification email — An email address (e.g. owner@example.de) to which such notifications are sent. Optional.

Tips & pitfalls (Webhooks) - These fields are purely optional — leave them blank if you don't run your own integration. - Webhook addresses must be publicly reachable (full https:// URL), otherwise the calls won't arrive.