A guide to using Intercom workflows to trigger webhooks for order updates

Ah, the classic "Where is my order?" ticket. If your support inbox has a greatest hits collection, this one's the chart-topper. It's a fair question, but when you're dealing with dozens (or hundreds) of them every day, it can really clog up the queue and keep your agents from tackling the trickier problems that need a human touch.

Wouldn't it be great if a system could just handle these on autopilot, giving customers instant answers anytime, day or night? That way, your team is free and your customers are happy.

In this guide, we’ll walk through how you can use Intercom’s own tools, workflows and webhooks, to build an automated answer for this. But we’ll also be honest about the hidden snags and technical headaches involved. Then, we'll look at a more modern, AI-first approach that skips the engineering drama altogether.

What are Intercom workflows and webhooks?

Before we jump into the how-to, let's quickly define the two key pieces of tech we're working with here.

What are Intercom workflows?

Think of Intercom workflows as a set of "if-then" instructions for your customer chats. They're basically automated flowcharts that you design. For example, if a customer’s message contains the word "refund," the workflow can automatically tag the conversation as a "Refund Request" and assign it to the right person on your finance team. It's a handy way to automate simple, predictable steps.

A visual builder in Intercom used to create automated workflows for customer interactions.

What are webhooks?

Webhooks sound technical, but the concept is pretty simple. The easiest way to think about it is like a doorbell for apps. When something happens in one app (like a customer asking a question in Intercom), it can "ring the doorbell" of another app (like your e-commerce platform) to let it know an event happened that it needs to act on.

So, by putting them together, an Intercom workflow can be set up to "ring the doorbell" by sending a webhook to another system, which then goes and finds the order information you need.

How to set up the workflow

Alright, let's get into building this thing. On the surface, the process seems simple enough, but you'll soon find the complexity ramps up, especially when you need to bring the order status back to the customer. Here’s a bird's-eye view of what's involved.

Defining the trigger and rules

First up, you need to tell Intercom when to actually start this automated process. This is done by setting up triggers inside the workflow builder.

You might set up triggers for things like:

• A customer’s message contains keywords like "order status," "tracking," or "shipment."

• A customer is on a specific page on your website, like their "Order History" page.

The problem? This whole system is pretty rigid. It relies on exact matches. If a customer types "wheres my order" with a typo, or asks in Spanish, the workflow will just sit there, silent. The customer gets ignored, and you've got a frustrating experience on your hands.

Configuring the webhook action

Once the workflow is triggered, it's time to send a signal out of Intercom using a webhook. This is you setting up the "doorbell" we talked about. You'll need to plug in a few technical details:

• Webhook URL: This is the specific web address of the system that needs to catch the signal. It has to be an endpoint that a developer has specifically built to listen for this type of request.

• HTTP Method: This will almost always be "POST", which is the standard way to send data to a server.

• Payload: This is the data you’re sending over, usually in a format called JSON. It would include details like the customer's email or an order number that the workflow hopefully pulled from their message.

Receiving the webhook in your external system

And here’s where things get really technical, moving way beyond the typical support manager’s toolkit. That "Webhook URL" isn't just a link you can grab from anywhere. It has to point to a server that a developer has programmed to do a few key things:

1. Listen for that incoming signal from Intercom.

2. Understand the data it received.

3. Look up the order in your database (whether that's Shopify, Magento, or something custom).

And that only gets the information out. To get the answer back to the customer, that same system has to make a different API call back to Intercom to post a reply in the chat. This isn't a plug-and-play setup. It requires a developer to build and maintain a custom piece of software, or for you to pay for another tool like Zapier to glue everything together. Either way, it's not the simple, in-house solution you might have hoped for.

Limitations of this workflow

While using a webhook in an Intercom workflow is possible, it comes with some big drawbacks that make it a clunky solution for handling real-time customer questions.

Complete dependency on developers

Unless you're using an expensive "middleware" tool, this entire process is in the hands of your engineering team. Building it, fixing it when it breaks, updating it… it all goes on their to-do list, which is probably a mile long already. It’s not something your support team can own or tweak themselves.

Brittle and unintelligent automation

The workflow is only as smart as the exact keywords you program into it. It can't handle typos, slang, or slightly different ways of asking the same question. If a customer asks, "Any update on my last purchase?", the automation just shrugs and gives up. This leads to a lot of broken experiences where the bot fails and a human has to step in anyway.

Testing on live customers

One of the scariest parts is that there's no real way to test this setup safely. You can't run it against a thousand of your past conversations to see how it would have performed. You just have to build it, cross your fingers, and set it live. If it fails, it fails in front of real customers, which can hurt trust and, ironically, create more support tickets.

The complexity of getting information back

Sending the signal out is just one half of the journey. Getting the order status back into the Intercom chat in a timely, natural way requires a whole other, often more complicated, integration. The whole thing feels clunky and cobbled together, not the smooth experience customers are looking for.

Intercom pricing explained

To even get started with this, you need to be on one of Intercom's higher-tier plans. And on top of the price per agent, Intercom also charges for its AI agent, Fin, based on how many conversations it resolves.

Here's a quick breakdown of how the plans compare for these features:

Feature	Essential Plan	Advanced Plan	Expert Plan
Price per Seat/mo	$29	$85	$132
Fin AI Agent	$0.99 / resolution	$0.99 / resolution	$0.99 / resolution
Workflows Builder	❌ No	✅ Yes	✅ Yes
Help Center	Public only	Private & Multilingual	Multibrand

As you can see, the "Workflows automation builder" doesn't even show up until you're on the Advanced plan, starting at $85 per agent each month. And if you use their AI agent, Fin, you're looking at an extra $0.99 for every single ticket it closes. This per-resolution fee means your costs are totally unpredictable. A busy sales period could lead to a shockingly high bill, basically punishing you for helping customers efficiently.

A simpler, more powerful way: Automating order updates with eesel AI

So, what’s the alternative to wrestling with custom code and brittle workflows? Instead of building it yourself, you can use a tool designed specifically for this kind of intelligent automation. eesel AI plugs right into the tools you already use, including a smooth Intercom integration, to solve this problem without the headaches.

Go live in minutes, not months

Forget begging your engineers to build a webhook receiver. eesel AI is something you can actually set up yourself. Connect your help desk, your e-commerce store like Shopify, and your knowledge base (like Google Docs or your help center) in just a few clicks. No sales calls, no mandatory demos. You can have a working AI agent answering real questions in the time it takes to drink a coffee.

Swap clunky webhooks for simple AI actions

eesel AI ditches the complicated webhook process for something called "AI Actions." Instead of mapping out a rigid workflow and dealing with APIs, you just create an action like "Look Up Order Status" in a simple, visual editor. No code required.

The AI is smart enough to figure out when a customer is asking about their order, no matter how they word it. It then securely finds the order status from your e-commerce platform and drafts a perfect, on-brand reply right inside the Intercom chat. It's a complete, intelligent process managed in one place.

Test with confidence before you launch

Remember that scary "test-on-live-customers" problem? eesel AI fixes that with its simulation mode. You can run your new AI agent on thousands of your past Intercom tickets in a totally safe environment. It will show you exactly how it would have replied and what its resolution rate would have been. This lets you tweak its performance and launch with total confidence that it's going to work.

Get predictable, flat-rate pricing

That Intercom per-resolution pricing can give you a nasty surprise at the end of the month. eesel AI is different. Our plans are a flat, predictable subscription. There are no per-resolution fees. Your bill stays the same even if you get a huge spike in support tickets, so you're never penalized for being efficient.

Move from complex workflows to intelligent automation

Look, while you can technically rig up a system using Intercom workflows and webhooks to handle order updates, it feels like a solution from a different era. It’s complex, puts a huge burden on your developers, and comes with a price tag that can spiral out of control.

Modern AI tools offer a much smarter way. A solution like eesel AI can understand what customers are asking with near-human nuance, connects easily with tools you already use like Intercom, and gives you a risk-free way to build and launch powerful support automation.

Ready to stop tinkering with brittle workflows and start giving customers intelligent, instant answers? Give eesel AI a try for free and see for yourself how fast you can automate those repetitive questions.