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Tutorial: welcome menu

This walks through building a flow that greets a contact when they type a keyword, then routes them to the right agent depending on whether they're an existing customer or a new one — two buttons, two outcomes. It's the same shape as the built-in Welcome menu template; building it from scratch here is a good way to learn the builder's controls.

What you'll build

  • A Keyword trigger on support, help, hi.
  • One Send buttons node with two buttons: "Existing customer" and "New customer".
  • Two Handoff to agent nodes, one per button, each with a short internal note.

  1. Create the flow. From the Flows list, click New flow. You can clone the Welcome menu template here to get this exact shape in one click — for this tutorial, scroll past the template gallery and use Or start blank instead, so you build every piece yourself. Type a name and click Create blank flow.

    The New flow dialog, with the 'Or start blank' name field and Create blank flow button highlightedThe New flow dialog, with the 'Or start blank' name field and Create blank flow button highlighted
    Starting blank walks you through every step; cloning the Welcome menu template gets you the same result in one click.

  2. Land in the builder. A new flow opens with a single Start node and nothing else. The builder has two interchangeable views — Canvas, a drag-and-connect node graph, and List, a form-based view of the same flow — switchable from the toggle just below the header. Canvas is the default and is what the rest of this tutorial uses; List view is covered in step 3, and is the only option on small screens. For reference, here's what the finished flow's canvas looks like:

    The Canvas view of the finished Welcome menu flow: a Start node connected to a Send buttons node, which connects to two separate Handoff to agent nodesThe Canvas view of the finished Welcome menu flow: a Start node connected to a Send buttons node, which connects to two separate Handoff to agent nodes
    What you're building toward — Start → Send buttons → two Handoff to agent nodes, one per button.

  3. Set the trigger. Switch to List view using the toggle. At the top is the trigger panel ("When…"). Choose A message contains a keyword, then enter support, help, hi (comma-separated) in the keywords field.

    The flow builder in List view, showing the trigger panel above the node listThe flow builder in List view, showing the trigger panel above the node list
    List view shows the same trigger panel and the same nodes as Canvas, as a form instead of a graph.
    The keyword trigger fields, with the keywords input showing 'support, help, hi' highlightedThe keyword trigger fields, with the keywords input showing 'support, help, hi' highlighted
    Keywords are matched case-insensitively, anywhere in the customer's message.

  4. Add the Send buttons node. Switch back to Canvas. Click Add node, then pick Send buttons from the Messaging group.

    The Add node dropdown menu open on the canvas, grouped into Messaging, Logic & data, and Flow control, with Send buttons highlightedThe Add node dropdown menu open on the canvas, grouped into Messaging, Logic & data, and Flow control, with Send buttons highlighted
    The menu is grouped exactly like the node reference page: Messaging, Logic & data, Flow control.

  5. Point Start at it, then configure it. Click the Start node and set its next node to the new Send buttons node. Then click the Send buttons node itself to open its editor. Set the body text (for example, "Hi! Welcome to support. Are you an existing customer or new here?"), and add two buttons — one titled "Existing customer", one titled "New customer" (each ≤20 characters). Leave each button's next node unset for now; you'll connect those in the next step, once the handoff nodes exist.

    The Send buttons node editor open, with body text filled in and the Add button control highlightedThe Send buttons node editor open, with body text filled in and the Add button control highlighted
    Up to 3 buttons per node; each one gets its own next-node dropdown.

  6. Add the two handoffs and connect the branches. Add two more nodes from Flow control → Handoff to agent — one for existing customers, one for new. You can give each an optional internal note (for example, "Existing customer"). The note is saved with the run's handoff event, but Relay doesn't show it in the inbox or on the Runs page yet, so don't rely on it to brief agents. Back in the Send buttons node's editor, set "Existing customer"'s next node to the first handoff, and "New customer"'s next node to the second.

    The finished canvas with both Handoff to agent nodes highlighted, each connected from a different button on the Send buttons nodeThe finished canvas with both Handoff to agent nodes highlighted, each connected from a different button on the Send buttons node
    Each button now has its own path to its own handoff — the two branches never cross.

  7. Check the validation panel. It sits at the bottom of the builder, in both views. With every node connected and every required field filled in, it should read "No issues. Ready to activate."

    The validation panel showing a green 'No issues. Ready to activate.' messageThe validation panel showing a green 'No issues. Ready to activate.' message
    If something's still missing, the panel lists it instead — see Templates and troubleshooting for what that looks like.

  8. Activate. Click Activate in the header. The flow's status changes from Draft to Active, and it starts triggering on real inbound messages.

Testing it from your own phone

You can't capture this step as a screenshot — it happens in WhatsApp itself, not in Relay. Message your connected WhatsApp number and type one of the keywords (support, help, or hi) as an ordinary text message. Don't tap a suggested reply or a quick-reply chip from an earlier conversation — only freehand typed text is checked against the keyword list, so a tap will never start the flow. You should get the welcome message with the two buttons; tapping one moves the conversation to the shared inbox as pending.

If nothing happens, see Templates and troubleshooting.