A practical guide to Gorgias webhooks for support automation

If you're managing an e-commerce support team, you know the drill: you’re always searching for ways to get more done without burning out your agents. Your helpdesk is command central, and for a lot of brands, that’s Gorgias. It's a solid tool, but the real gains come when you automate the repetitive stuff that eats up so much time.

That’s where webhooks enter the picture.

Gorgias webhooks are a seriously powerful feature for building custom automations, though they can seem a bit technical at first glance. In this guide, we'll unpack what they are, what you can do with them, and how people usually set them up. We’ll also be honest about the hurdles you might run into and explore a more modern, AI-based way to get the same results without the usual headaches.

What are Gorgias webhooks?

Let's skip the dense technical-speak. A webhook is just an automatic message sent from one app to another when something happens. Think of it like a doorbell. When a visitor pushes the button (an event), a chime rings inside your house (another system gets a notification). You don't have to constantly check the front door; you're told the second someone's there.

Gorgias webhooks do the exact same thing for your helpdesk. When a specific event occurs in Gorgias, it sends a bundle of data (called a "payload") to a web address you provide. This lets your other tools react to what's happening in your support queue in real time.

The most common triggers for Gorgias webhooks are:

• Ticket created: A customer starts a new conversation.

• Ticket updated: An agent changes a ticket’s status, assignee, or tags.

• New message in ticket: A new reply comes in from the customer or an agent.

By firing off these little data packets, you can connect Gorgias to pretty much any other software you use, opening up all kinds of opportunities for automation.

Common use cases for Gorgias webhooks

Okay, so what can you actually do with this? The list is long, but most use cases boil down to solving a few very common problems for support teams.

Keeping all your systems in sync

Your helpdesk rarely works in a vacuum. Webhooks can make sure all your different apps are on the same page. For instance, when a new Gorgias ticket comes in, a webhook can automatically update that customer’s record in your CRM. Now your sales team sees the full support history. You could also use it to log support tickets in an analytics tool to get a clearer picture of the entire customer journey.

Streamlining team communication

Your team probably doesn't need another email notification. Webhooks can make internal updates much smoother. You could set one up to post a message in a specific Slack channel whenever a VIP customer opens a ticket. Or if a customer reports a bug, a webhook can instantly create an issue in Jira for your developers, with a link back to the Gorgias ticket included.

Giving agents more context

Agents often have to tab-hop to find the information they need to solve a ticket. A webhook can help. When a ticket is created, it can be set up to check your Shopify store for the customer's order history. It can then pull key details like their lifetime value or last order date and add it as an internal note in the Gorgias ticket. Your team gets the info they need, right where they need it.

A screenshot of the Gorgias interface showing a customer's Shopify order history alongside their support ticket.

Kicking off bigger workflows

Sometimes a support ticket is just the first step in a longer process. When an agent marks a ticket as "resolved," a webhook could tell a tool like Klaviyo to send a follow-up survey a few days later. Or if a customer asks for a return, a webhook could start the process in your returns management app, saving your team from copying and pasting all the details.

How to set up Gorgias webhooks: The challenges

While all that sounds great, getting Gorgias webhooks from idea to reality isn't always straightforward. There are two main paths people take, and both have their own trade-offs.

The manual method: Direct HTTP integrations

The most direct route is using Gorgias's own HTTP integration feature. This is where you tell Gorgias to send its webhook data straight to an API endpoint that your company controls.

This approach gives you total freedom, but it’s definitely not for everyone. It requires a developer to build and maintain a public API that can catch the data from Gorgias. You have to configure the URL, pick your triggers (like "ticket created"), and set the HTTP method in your Gorgias settings.

The main issue here is that it’s technical and needs ongoing developer attention. Your endpoint has to be reliable. As Gorgias's own documentation mentions, they’ll shut off an HTTP integration if it fails 100 times in a row. If your server has a brief hiccup, your automations could just stop working, which is a big risk for important workflows.

The no-code method: Using platforms like Zapier or Pipedream

To avoid the coding route, many teams use no-code tools like Zapier, Pipedream, or Mesa. These platforms act as a go-between. They give you a special URL to use in Gorgias and then let you build workflows with a visual, drag-and-drop editor.

This is a great option for simple, A-to-B workflows. For example: "When a Gorgias ticket is made, add a row to a Google Sheet." It makes automation accessible to team members who aren't developers.

But this approach can get messy. As you build more complex workflows, you might end up with a tangled web of "Zaps" or "Pipes" that becomes a headache to manage. The pricing is also usually based on how many tasks you run. As your ticket volume grows, the costs can get surprisingly high. You’re also relying on multiple systems to work together perfectly, which introduces more places where things can break.

Why traditional webhook setups fall short

Whether you code it yourself or use a no-code tool, older webhook setups have a few shared weaknesses:

• Complexity and upkeep: You either need a developer on call, or you have to wrestle with complex flows in another tool. Both need attention and can fail when you least expect it.

• No real understanding: A basic webhook knows that something happened, but it has no idea why. It can't understand the nuance in a customer's message or learn from how similar tickets were resolved in the past.

• No good way to test: This is a big one. You can't safely see how your new automation will behave on old tickets. You just have to build it, switch it on, and cross your fingers. That's a stressful way to launch something that directly affects your customers.

A simpler, AI-powered alternative to manual webhooks

The automations you can build with webhooks are incredibly valuable, but the process doesn't have to be so clunky. Instead of just connecting apps together, a modern AI platform can work as an intelligent brain for your helpdesk, giving you all the power of automation without the technical mess.

This is exactly what eesel AI does. It's built to deliver the benefits you want from webhooks, but in a way that’s smarter and much easier to manage.

Go live in minutes, not weeks

You can forget about waiting for a developer to build an endpoint or spending a day clicking around in a no-code builder. eesel AI has a one-click Gorgias integration that gets you up and running fast. You can connect your helpdesk and other knowledge sources all by yourself.

Total control with AI actions

Instead of setting up a webhook to ping an external API, you can set up an "AI Action" right inside the eesel AI platform. The AI doesn’t just respond to a simple trigger; it actually understands the conversation and can be taught when to perform certain tasks, like:

• Looking up order information in Shopify.

• Tagging tickets based on what the customer is asking for.

• Escalating a bug report to the right team by creating a Jira issue.

Test it out with confidence

This is where an AI-first approach really changes the game. Before you turn your AI agent on, you can run it in a simulation mode. eesel AI will test its logic against thousands of your past Gorgias tickets and show you exactly how it would have handled them. This gives you a clear forecast of its impact and lets you fine-tune its behavior before it ever interacts with a live customer, something you just can't do with a classic webhook.

eesel AI's simulation mode testing its logic against past Gorgias tickets to forecast its impact before activation.

Feature	Traditional Gorgias Webhooks	eesel AI for Gorgias
Setup Time	Hours to weeks (needs developers)	Minutes (self-serve, one-click)
Technical Skill	High (coding/API knowledge needed)	Low (no-code dashboard)
Context-Awareness	Low (simple event triggers)	High (learns from past tickets & docs)
Testing	Difficult (live testing only)	Easy (simulates on historical tickets)
Pricing Model	Unpredictable (per-task fees, dev costs)	Transparent & predictable (flat monthly fee)

Automate smarter, not harder

Gorgias webhooks are a great tool for building a more efficient support operation. They let you bridge the gap between your helpdesk and the other tools you rely on every day.

But the old ways of setting them up, either with custom code or no-code platforms, often create more work than they save. They can be complex, costly, and fragile. The next step in support automation is already here, and it's driven by AI. A tool like eesel AI doesn't just link your apps; it adds an intelligent layer on top of them, helping you build powerful automations that understand context and just work.

Take the next step

Ready to bring powerful, AI-driven automation to your Gorgias helpdesk without the pain of manual webhooks? Start your free eesel AI trial and see for yourself how quickly you can automate your support.