How to launch your Customer Agent
You will learn
How to launch Customer Agent across web chat and email, what to confirm before going live, and where to monitor performance once shoppers start interacting with it.
Before you begin
You’ll need:
- An Owner, Admin, or Manager role
- For web chat: web chat configured at klaviyo.com/settings/webchat/general
- For email: inbound email configured at klaviyo.com/inbox/settings/email
- For SMS: SMS configured at klaviyo.com/settings/sms, with a two-way SMS-enabled sender (see How to launch Customer Agent on SMS)
- For WhatsApp: WhatsApp configured at klaviyo.com/settings/whatsapp, with a verified Meta business account (see How to launch Customer Agent on WhatsApp)
You also want a clean test pass before launching. Run through How to test your Customer Agent if you haven’t yet.
Pre-launch checklist
Before you turn on any channel, confirm:
- Content reviewed — auto-ingested storefront content looks right; major gaps filled
- Guidance set — brand summary, tone of voice, and at least a few comm style + escalation rules in place
- Active skills confirmed — see which skills are running and which fully custom skills you’ve enabled
- Handoff configured — see Managing Customer Agent settings for ticket-to-helpdesk or custom message handoff
- Tested in the test sidebar — sample questions return responses you’d want a shopper to see
If any of these are missing, the Turn on button will gray out for the affected channel.
Set it up — web chat
- Navigate to Customer Agent > Launch > Web chat.
- Review the audience for who Customer Agent should respond to:
- Segments — include or exclude specific Klaviyo segments (e.g., only logged-in customers, exclude wholesale buyers)
- Keywords — set exact-match keywords that should always or never trigger Customer Agent
- Customize the intro — the greeting Customer Agent shows when a shopper opens web chat.
- Review Skills — see which skills are active for your brand. Skills Customer Agent comes with activate automatically based on your integrations; you can disable any skill you don’t want active. Fully custom skills you’ve created are listed here too.
- Confirm handoff settings — where conversations go when a human is needed.
- Preview the experience to confirm rendering, tone, and intro look right.
- Click Turn on.
Customer Agent only responds to messages received after you turn it on. Conversations already in progress won’t be picked up.
Set it up — email
- Make sure inbound email is set up at klaviyo.com/inbox/settings/email. Customer Agent uses your inbound email configuration.
- Navigate to Customer Agent > Launch > Email.
- Confirm the reply address Customer Agent will use.
- Confirm handoff settings.
- Preview sample email responses.
- Click Turn on.
Web chat and email can be turned on independently — you don’t need to launch both at once.
Set it up — SMS and WhatsApp
These channels have unique setup requirements (number provisioning, compliance, Meta verification, message templates). Each has its own guide:
- How to launch Customer Agent on SMS
- How to launch Customer Agent on WhatsApp
You can run any combination of channels simultaneously.
Post-launch monitoring
Once Customer Agent is live, monitor it on the Performance dashboard. Key things to check in the first week:
- % resolved by AI — how often Customer Agent finishes the conversation without escalation
- AI-generated sales — ATC, link clicks, AOV from CA-driven conversations
- Escalation rate per rule — which escalation rules fire most, and whether they should
- Conversation outcomes — Resolved, Routed, Closed, Open
If something looks off — low resolution rate, unexpected escalations, weird tone — go back to the test sidebar to debug. Most issues trace back to content gaps, an over-broad escalation rule, or a skill’s “When to use this skill” being too narrow.
See Understanding the performance dashboard for what each metric means and how to act on it.
Troubleshooting
Symptom: The web chat widget isn’t appearing on my site.
Likely cause: Web chat isn’t configured, or the embed isn’t loading on the page.
Fix: Confirm web chat is configured at klaviyo.com/settings/webchat/general and the chat widget is visible on your site. If using a custom site, verify the embed snippet is present.
Symptom: Customer Agent isn’t replying to emails.
Likely cause: Inbound email isn’t configured, the reply address isn’t set, or the channel hasn’t been turned on after setup.
Fix: Confirm inbound email is configured at klaviyo.com/inbox/settings/email. Check the reply address in Customer Agent > Launch > Email. Confirm the channel toggle is on.
Symptom: The Turn on button is grayed out.
Likely cause: A required prereq isn’t met — usually missing handoff settings, no SMS sender configured, or web chat not configured.
Fix: Hover over the button to see which prereq is failing. Fix the gap and try again.
Symptom: A new shopper message isn’t getting picked up.
Likely cause: Conversation started before Customer Agent was turned on, or the shopper is in an excluded segment.
Fix: Check audience settings — segments and keywords. New conversations from included audiences should pick up automatically.
FAQ
How fast can I turn Customer Agent off?
Toggle the channel off on the Launch page. Customer Agent stops responding to new messages immediately.
Can web chat, email, SMS, and WhatsApp run at the same time?
Yes. Each channel is configured separately and they can run in any combination.
Next steps
- Monitor performance on the Performance dashboard
- Iterate on content and Guidance based on what you see in real conversations
- Run a test pass any time you make a meaningful change
Additional resources
- Getting started with Customer Agent
Learn how to activate Klaviyo's Customer Agent, an AI-powered tool that provides instant support to your website visitors. Customer Agent ingests information from your Shopify store, and learns any additional information you provide, to answer shopper inquiries across web chat, SMS and email (beta).
- How to test your Customer Agent
Learn how to strengthen your Customer Agent’s ability to resolve shopper inquiries by testing its responses and adding knowledge for any gaps you discover.
- Managing Customer Agent settings
Learn how to ensure shopper inquiries are handled smoothly by selecting a handoff method for your Customer Agent. A handoff occurs when Customer Agent can’t resolve an inquiry and needs to escalate the conversation to a human support agent.