A guide to using a Freshdesk chatbot to route WhatsApp conversations by language

Business is booming. You’re reaching customers all over the world, which is great. The not-so-great part? Your support inbox is starting to resemble the United Nations, but without the simultaneous translation. Customers are hitting you up on WhatsApp in Spanish, French, and German, and your team is left scrambling to play a messy game of "guess the language and find the right agent."

Trying to manually sort these multilingual conversations is a recipe for a headache. It's slow, mistakes happen, and your international customers are left waiting. That's not exactly a great first impression. You know there has to be a way to automatically figure out who needs what, but it’s hard to know where to begin.

This guide will walk you through exactly how to set up a Freshdesk chatbot to route WhatsApp conversations by language. We’ll start with what you can do using Freshdesk's own tools, talk honestly about their limits, and then introduce a more flexible way to get your multilingual support running smoothly.

What is a Freshdesk chatbot to route WhatsApp conversations by language?

When we talk about this kind of setup, we're really talking about three pieces of technology working together.

First, you have the WhatsApp Business API. This is the official channel that allows businesses to connect with customers on WhatsApp in a scalable way. It’s the pipe that lets messages flow from your customers' phones into your support system.

Next is Freshdesk, which is your team's command center. It’s the helpdesk where all your customer tickets live, whether they come from email, chat, or WhatsApp.

The third piece is the chatbot layer. This is the brain of the operation. It’s an AI that sits between WhatsApp and your support agents. When a new message arrives, the bot intercepts it, figures out what the customer needs (like which language they're speaking), and takes action before a human ever has to touch it.

In this case, the chatbot’s main job is to act as a smart traffic controller. A WhatsApp message comes in, the bot instantly identifies the language, and sends it to the right person or team in Freshdesk. This means your Spanish-speaking customers get a Spanish-speaking agent, every single time, without anyone lifting a finger. Automating this one step can dramatically improve your response times, boost customer satisfaction, and just make everyone's day a little less hectic.

Setting up language-based WhatsApp routing with native tools

Freshdesk has its own tools for building chatbots and handling multiple languages, mostly through its Freshchat and Freddy AI products. If you’re already in the Freshdesk ecosystem, it’s the logical place to start. Let's look at what it can do and where you might run into some trouble.

Native features for routing WhatsApp conversations

Freshworks' AI is called "Freddy," and it powers their chatbot features. Freddy is built to understand different languages and can be trained to handle basic automation inside the Freshworks platform.

The platform offers a direct integration with the WhatsApp Business API, which is a non-negotiable first step. This gets all your WhatsApp chats into your Freshdesk Messaging inbox, right alongside your other support channels.

To set up the actual routing, you’d use Freshdesk's visual bot builder. It allows you to map out conversations and create simple workflows. You can build a bot that asks a few preliminary questions, suggests help articles, and eventually routes the conversation based on keywords or user input.

A screenshot of Freshdesk's no-code bot builder, which can be used to set up a basic Freshdesk chatbot to route WhatsApp conversations by language.

Limitations of the native approach

While using the built-in tools seems simple enough, many teams find they hit a ceiling pretty quickly as their needs grow.

• It’s a walled garden: Freddy AI works best when it's learning from data that already lives inside Freshworks, like your old Freshdesk tickets and help articles. But what about all the important info your team keeps elsewhere? If your real source of truth is a detailed guide in Confluence, a spec sheet in Google Docs, or even just tribal knowledge shared in Slack, Freddy can’t access it. This often leads to the bot giving incomplete or less-than-helpful answers.

• Things can get complicated, fast: The bot builder is fine for simple, A-to-B-to-C workflows. But if you need to build detailed rules for dozens of languages and topics, it can quickly become a tangled web of conditions that’s a pain to manage. What if you need the bot to do something custom, like check an order status in Shopify before routing the ticket? That kind of thing can require a lot of workarounds.

• The setup isn't always a breeze: Getting a truly effective multilingual bot up and running is rarely as simple as flipping a switch. It usually takes a good amount of tinkering and forces you to fit your process into Freshworks’ way of doing things, which might not be how you want to work.

• The pricing model can be a surprise: This is a big one. The advanced AI features you need for smart routing aren't typically included in the basic plans. They're often part of higher-priced tiers, and on top of that, you might have to pay extra for "bot sessions." This can make your monthly bill jump around, which is never fun.

Pricing for Freshdesk's native tools

Before you commit, it’s important to understand what this will actually cost. To get the features for language-based routing, you’ll need to be on a specific Freshdesk plan. Here’s a quick look at the plans that include the necessary AI features, based on their official pricing page.

Plan	Price (per agent/month, billed annually)	Key AI & Chatbot Features
Growth	$15	Basic ticketing. Doesn't have the AI needed for language routing.
Pro	$49	Comes with 500 Freddy AI Agent sessions per month. Freddy AI Copilot is an add-on for $29/agent/month.
Pro + AI Copilot	$78	This is the Pro plan bundled with the AI Copilot add-on.
Enterprise	$79	Comes with 500 Freddy AI Agent sessions per month. Freddy AI Copilot is an add-on for $29/agent/month.

As you can see, the cost is calculated per agent, so it grows as your team does. The most useful AI features, like the AI Copilot, are often pricey add-ons. You also need to pay close attention to the "bot sessions." If you have a busy month, you could easily burn through your allowance and end up with extra charges, making your costs hard to predict.

A better way to route WhatsApp conversations with Freshdesk

Instead of locking yourself into a single platform's ecosystem, there's a more flexible option: using a dedicated AI layer that plugs right into the Freshdesk setup you already have.

This is where a tool like eesel AI comes into play. It doesn't replace your helpdesk; it makes it smarter. eesel AI connects to Freshdesk and all your other knowledge sources to give you more accurate, flexible, and controllable automation.

Get your chatbot running in minutes

One of the biggest drags of enterprise software is the setup. You have to sit through long sales calls and demos, and then wait weeks for onboarding. eesel AI is built differently. You can sign up, connect Freshdesk in a couple of clicks, and start building your language routing rules right away. It's designed so you can get it working yourself, this afternoon, not next quarter.

Unify knowledge for more accurate routing

A chatbot is only as smart as the information it can learn from. While Freshdesk's bot is mostly stuck with its own data, eesel AI connects to pretty much everything. It learns from your old Freshdesk tickets, sure, but it also learns from the external knowledge bases your team actually uses every day, like Confluence, Google Docs, and Notion. This gives the AI a complete picture of how your business works, letting it handle more nuanced questions with much better accuracy, regardless of the language.

An infographic showing how eesel AI connects to various knowledge sources like Confluence, Google Docs, and Notion to create a more effective Freshdesk chatbot to route WhatsApp conversations by language.

Control your routing workflows

With eesel AI's workflow engine, you aren't stuck with clunky templates. You can build precise rules that match exactly how your business operates.

For instance, you could create rules like:

• "If a WhatsApp message comes in and is identified as Spanish AND it contains the word 'facturación' (billing), route it straight to the 'Spanish Billing' group in Freshdesk."

• "If a message is detected as German, automatically create a ticket, add the 'German Support' tag, and set the priority to 'High'."

This level of control means the automation adapts to you, not the other way around. The logic is straightforward: an incoming WhatsApp message is analyzed by eesel AI, which detects its language. From there, it's automatically sent to the right team in Freshdesk, whether that’s your Spanish team, French team, or general support queue, so the right agent can jump on it immediately.

A screenshot of the eesel AI workflow builder, demonstrating how to create custom rules for a Freshdesk chatbot to route WhatsApp conversations by language.

Why a unified AI layer is a better approach

Using a dedicated AI layer like eesel AI isn't just about getting more features; it’s a fundamentally different approach. Here’s why it usually comes out on top.

Test your chatbot with risk-free simulation

Launching a new bot can be stressful. What if it misunderstands a customer or sends a VIP ticket to the wrong queue? eesel AI has a clever solution for this: a simulation mode. Before you ever turn the bot on for live customers, you can run it against thousands of your past tickets. This shows you exactly how it would have behaved, giving you a real forecast of its performance. You can tweak your rules with zero risk and go live feeling confident that it will work as expected.

eesel AI's simulation mode, which allows you to test how your Freshdesk chatbot to route WhatsApp conversations by language will perform using historical data.

Transparent pricing

Let's talk about cost again. Many AI tools, including some of the Freshdesk add-ons, charge you per resolution or per bot session. This model basically penalizes you for growing. The more customers you help, the more you pay.

eesel AI takes a different approach. Our pricing is based on a predictable number of monthly interactions, not resolutions. There are no hidden fees or surprise charges. You can start with a flexible month-to-month plan and cancel anytime, making it easy to prove its value without getting locked into a long-term contract.

A view of eesel AI's transparent pricing page, an alternative to per-session models for a Freshdesk chatbot to route WhatsApp conversations by language.

Bundled vs. unified AI

Feature	Bundled AI (e.g., Freshdesk Native)	Unified AI Layer (eesel AI)
Setup Time	Can be complex, may require higher-tier plans	Self-serve, you can go live in minutes
Knowledge Sources	Limited to the helpdesk's ecosystem	Connects to all sources (Freshdesk, Confluence, etc.)
Workflow Control	Based on predefined templates	Fully customizable engine for precise rules and actions
Pre-Launch Testing	Limited or no real-world simulation	Powerful simulation on past tickets for a confident rollout
Pricing Model	Often per-agent + add-ons or per-session fees	Predictable, transparent plans with no per-resolution fees

The right choice for your multilingual support strategy

Managing multilingual WhatsApp support in Freshdesk doesn't have to be a mess. Using a Freshdesk chatbot to route WhatsApp conversations by language is a must for any company looking to grow internationally.

While Freshdesk's native tools offer a place to start, they often come with limitations in flexibility, data sources, and pricing that can slow you down. A dedicated AI layer like eesel AI offers a smarter, more powerful, and more cost-effective solution.

It works with the tools you already have, making them better instead of forcing you to start from scratch. By bringing together all your knowledge and giving you full control over your workflows, eesel AI helps you build a truly intelligent support system that can scale with you.

Ready to stop manually sorting WhatsApp messages? Try eesel AI for free and see how fast you can set up smart, language-based routing for Freshdesk.