A step-by-step guide to Zendesk create side conversations via email or Slack

Let’s be honest, we’ve all been there. A customer ticket comes in that looks simple on the surface, but it quickly spirals into a multi-departmental puzzle. Before you know it, you’re juggling a messy trail of internal emails, disconnected Slack DMs, and forwarded messages. Key details get lost in the shuffle, resolutions grind to a halt, and your support agents are wasting precious time just trying to connect the dots.

It’s a classic support headache. Thankfully, Zendesk’s side conversations feature was built to tackle this exact problem. It lets you kick off separate discussions with internal teams or even external partners, all from within the original ticket. No more context switching, no more lost information.

This guide will walk you through exactly how to use Zendesk to create side conversations via email or Slack. We'll cover the initial setup, the step-by-step process for both channels, and a few common pitfalls to sidestep so you can get your team collaborating smoothly.

What you'll need to create side conversations in Zendesk

Before you can jump in, there are a couple of things you need to have in place. Side conversations aren’t available on every Zendesk plan, and you’ll need the right permissions to get everything switched on.

• The right Zendesk plan: This feature is exclusive to the Suite Professional plan and higher. If you're on a lower-tier plan, you won't see the option. According to the Zendesk pricing page, these plans start at $115 per agent per month when billed annually, so it's a bit of an investment.

• Admin access: You'll need to be an administrator in your Zendesk account to enable and configure side conversations for your team. If you’re not an admin, you’ll have to ping someone who is to get this turned on.

• Slack or Microsoft Teams setup (optional): If you’re planning to use Slack or Teams for these conversations, you’ll need to have the respective app already installed and configured in your Zendesk instance.

How to create side conversations in Zendesk via email or Slack in 5 easy steps

Ready to get started? Here’s how to get side conversations up and running for your team.

Step 1: Turn on side conversations in the admin center

Side conversations are turned off by default, so your first task is to flick the switch in the Zendesk Admin Center. It's a bit tucked away, but easy to find once you know where to look.

1. Head to the Admin Center and find Workspaces in the left-hand sidebar.

2. From there, select Agent tools > Side conversations.

3. You’ll see a few toggles for the different channels. You need to activate each one you want to use.

   • Turn on emails outside the main conversation: This is the one you need for starting email-based side conversations.

   • Turn on side conversations in Slack: As the name suggests, this enables the Slack integration.

4. Don’t forget this part! Make sure you also select Turn on the side conversations view under the Context panel heading. This is what actually makes the feature visible to your agents inside a ticket.

5. Click Save, and you’re good to go.

Step 2: Create a side conversation with email

Once it’s enabled, starting a side conversation over email is pretty straightforward. This is the perfect option when you need to loop in someone who doesn't live in your company's Slack, like a third-party vendor, a shipping partner, or even a colleague in a department that isn't on Slack.

1. Open any ticket and look for the Side conversations icon (it looks like a plus sign) in the context panel on the right. Click it.

2. Select Email from the options that pop up.

3. A composer window will appear, looking a lot like a standard email client. Fill in the details:

   • To: Pop in the email addresses of your recipients. You can add up to 100 people here, though Zendesk limits you to 48 non-agents. You can also click CC/BCC if you need to.

   • Subject: Write a clear and concise subject line. This field is required.

   • Message: Write out your message. You've got a rich text editor, so you can bold text, add links, and format it to make it easy to read.

4. To give your recipient the full picture, you can attach files or even specific ticket comments. Just click the little paperclip icon and choose From computer or From ticket. This is a huge time-saver compared to manually copying and pasting.

5. Click Send.

The person you emailed will get what looks like a normal email. When they reply, their message will thread directly back into this side conversation within the Zendesk ticket. Everything stays neatly organized in one place.

Step 3: Create a side conversation in Slack

For those quick internal chats, Slack is usually the faster option. Need a quick answer from engineering? A status update from logistics? This is the way to go. It brings the discussion right into the tool your team is already using all day.

1. From the ticket, click the Side conversations icon (+) again, but this time, select Slack.

2. The composer will ask you to choose a Slack channel to post the message in. If your company uses multiple Slack workspaces, they'll be clearly labeled so you pick the right one.

3. Type out your message. You can use Slack’s usual Markdown for formatting and attach files just like you would with an email.

4. Click Send.

Your message will show up in the chosen Slack channel as a new thread. Your teammates can reply directly in that thread, and magically, their responses will pop up right back in the Zendesk ticket's side conversation panel. No more chasing people down for answers.

Step 4: Add existing ticket comments for extra context

This is probably one of the most useful parts of the whole feature. Instead of re-explaining a customer's issue from scratch, you can just forward their exact words.

1. Start a new side conversation or open one you've already created.

2. Look for the comments icon (it looks like a speech bubble) at the bottom of the composer.

3. A list of all the comments from the main ticket thread will appear. Just check the box next to each comment you want to include. You can even select them all at once.

4. Click Add. The comments you picked will be embedded right into your message, giving the person you're contacting all the context they need without any extra work from you.

Step 5: Manage and wrap up your side conversations

Once you’ve gotten the information you need, you can mark the conversation as complete to keep your workspace from getting cluttered.

• To close a conversation, just open it and click the Mark done button. This is just an internal status change; it won't stop people from replying.

• If someone replies to a "Done" conversation, it stays marked as done, but you can always reopen it by clicking the Reopen button if the discussion needs to continue.

• Here's a clever safety net: if a ticket is officially closed and someone replies to a side conversation attached to it, Zendesk automatically creates a new follow-up ticket. This ensures no new information gets lost in the void.

Tips and common mistakes when creating side conversations in Zendesk

While side conversations are a huge step up from siloed communication, they aren't a silver bullet. Here are a few things to keep in mind to get the most out of them.

• Lean on macros for common requests. Do you find yourself asking the finance team for the same invoice details over and over? Create a macro that starts a side conversation with a pre-written message. It saves time and keeps your requests consistent.

• Know the channel limitations. The integration isn’t perfect. For example, Zendesk points out that Slack messages have a character limit, and you can’t autocomplete usernames with @mentions. Also, and this is a big one, attachments sent back from a Slack or Teams thread won't appear in the ticket. That can lead to agents having to hunt down crucial files.

• Don't accidentally create new silos. This is the biggest catch. While the conversations are attached to the ticket, the knowledge inside them is still trapped. That information isn't easily searchable for future tickets, and your AI tools can't learn from it. Each side conversation is its own little island of information, which can become hard to manage when you're dealing with hundreds of them.

The bigger picture for Zendesk side conversations: Collaboration is still a manual job

Let's face it, Zendesk side conversations are a great organizational tool, but they only solve part of the collaboration puzzle. Your agents are still doing all the heavy lifting:

• They have to decide when a side conversation is even necessary.

• They need to know exactly who to contact and which channel to use.

• They have to summarize the issue and package up all the relevant context.

• They still have to wait for a response and then translate that internal-speak into a polished, customer-facing reply.

This process is still fundamentally manual. It hinges on your agent's personal knowledge and their availability. Worse, all the valuable information shared in these chats, troubleshooting steps from engineers, policy clarifications from the legal team, remains locked away inside a single ticket instead of being used to build up your central knowledge base.

What if you could skip most of that manual work? Imagine if, instead of an agent having to start a side conversation, an AI could instantly pull the answer from any source, be it Confluence, Google Docs, or a past Slack thread, and resolve the ticket right then and there.

A better way than Zendesk side conversations: Unify knowledge with eesel AI

Instead of just creating another conversation thread, eesel AI works as an intelligent brain that connects all your company knowledge and automates the resolution process from start to finish.

• Get up and running in minutes, not months. Forget about waiting for an admin or navigating a complicated setup. With eesel AI, you can connect your helpdesk and knowledge sources with one-click integrations and go live the same day. Plus, there's no need to be on an expensive Zendesk plan; it works with the tools you already have.

• Actually unify your knowledge. Don’t just link to a Slack channel, let your AI learn from every conversation. eesel AI for Slack connects to all your knowledge sources, whether it's in Zendesk, Confluence, or Google Docs. It analyzes past tickets to understand your brand's voice and most common solutions, so its answers are always accurate and sound like they came from you.

• Automate actions, not just messages. An AI Agent from eesel AI can do a lot more than just send a message. It can perform custom actions like looking up order details in Shopify, checking a customer's subscription status, or triaging a ticket to the right team, all without a human lifting a finger.

• Test drive it with confidence. Before you let the AI take the wheel, eesel AI’s simulation mode lets you test your setup on thousands of your own historical tickets. You can see exactly how the AI would have responded and get solid forecasts on resolution rates, giving you total confidence before you go live.

Wrapping it up: From Zendesk side conversations to automated resolutions

Setting up Zendesk to create side conversations via email or Slack is a solid move for tidying up your team's collaboration. By following the steps we’ve outlined, you can cut down on context switching and keep important discussions organized right where they belong: inside the ticket.

But real, game-changing efficiency comes from making those conversations unnecessary in the first place. By unifying all your scattered knowledge and empowering an AI agent to act on it, you can free your team from the repetitive, manual tasks that burn them out. That means more time for them to focus on what they do best: delivering amazing support for your customers.

Ready to see how AI can truly transform your support workflows? Get started with eesel AI today.