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Instagram Comments Growth Tool

It can be challenging to quickly reply to each comment on your posts, which is why the Comments Growth Tool Trigger is such a powerful feature to help you process all of your incoming messages. 

What you can do with this tool:

  1. Automatically reply directly below a comment publicly on a post.
  2. Automatically send a private reply in the Direct Message with the contact who left the comment.

Also, we recommend to check our articles for the Story Reply, Story Mention and Live Comments triggers.


Contents


Setting Up Comments Growth Tool Trigger

1. Go to your ManyChat account and select —> Automation —> Flows —> New Flow.

2. Open the Flow Builder.  Click Add Trigger —> Instagram Triggers —> Instagram Comments.


3. In the Comment Growth Tool settings, you can choose specific posts or all posts to trigger automation. You can specify comments by keywords on which to trigger or not to trigger the automation. Please note that the Instagram Comment Growth Tool is currently available only for regular posts and Reels. It will not work for Instagram Ads and IGTV due to current API limitations.


Setting up public auto-replies in comments

Within the Instagram Comments Growth tool, you can reply directly below a comment publicly on a post. 

  1. Click Instagram Comments Tool.
  2. Select the specific post for the tool. Click "Auto-Response".
  3. Enter the response that you want people to see who comment on your post.

This is a great opportunity to quickly send a discount code or "thank you" for engaging in your posts!

Note:  You need permission to use the Auto-Response feature.


Setting up automation for private response in Direct Messages

When somebody comments on your post, you can send a message to this person in Direct Messages. Please note that the private response in Direct Messages doesn't open the 24-hour messaging window until contact interacts with this response message by clicking a button or a quick reply.


To set up the private reply's text:

1. Click on the message node. Settings window will appear on the left    

2. In "Use as reply to Instagram Comments", click the checkbox. Due to Instagram limitations, you can only add Text, Buttons, or Quick Replies in the first message node. There is only one exception when you can bypass these limitations, see "Setting up private reply without content limitations" to learn more.

3. Type your reply in the text block of the message node.


Note: Use Buttons and Quick Replies in the first message node to continue a conversation with a contact.  When they click on the "Claim my prize ?", the 24-hour messaging window opens. 

You can also send any type of content without limitations in the next message nodes.  

4. After you've created the Flow, click "Publish". Test the Flow by clicking "Preview".


5. After you publish the Flow, click and activate the Instagram Comments trigger inside the Starting Step. 


Besides the message node, you can use any other nodes after the Starting Step. Here are several examples that nodes can help you engage with your contacts: 

  • Add a tag for contact who left a comment
  • Check the Condition
  • Set up Randomizer to promote a lottery

Make sure to select the checkbox - "Use as reply to Instagram Comments" for all first message nodes in your Flow.

 

Setting up a private reply without content limitations

If a contact responds to your Direct Message within 24 hours, you can add Images, Product Gallery, Use Input, etc., in your reply message. To segment these contacts you need to use two conditions: "Existing Contact is true" and "Messaging window segment is less than 24 hours".  This is the only way you can bypass content limitations by segmenting contacts using these specific conditions. 


Example:

Add Condition block. Select "Existing Contact is true" and "Messaging window segment is less than 24 hours".

Contacts who match these conditions will receive a message without content limitations:

Contacts who don't match these conditions can only receive the message with text, buttons, or quick replies:

Noteif you have multiple activated Comments Growth Tools on your account, certain priorities will be applied:

  1. If there are several CGTs that work with all posts without any keywords, the oldest one (that you created first) will always trigger.
  2. If a keywordless CGT is created before a keyword CGT, it will take priority and trigger each time, regardless of whether a keyword was used.
  3. If a keywordless CGT is created after a keyword CGT, it will only trigger if the comment does not match any of the keywords of a keyword CGT.
  4. If all CGTs have a specific keyword, each keyword will trigger the respective flow.

Troubleshooting

1. Checkbox won't appear if Instagram CGT isn't selected.  

2. If a red window "First post after IG Comment trigger must have specific content type" appears, it means you didn't select the checkbox "Use as reply to Instagram Comments". 
    If you checked off "Use as reply to Instagram Comments" and see this modal it means that your message contains some         content that is not allowed in the comments reply. Delete all content except text block with buttons or quick replies, or             create a new message node without the extra content.


Please note that we cannot guarantee that the Comments Growth Tool will work with Instagram Ads. For CGT to work, users need to open your profile, open your post and comment under it. If they open it through their timeline as a sponsored post, the Comments Growth Tool won't work.
Unfortunately, Instagram API doesn't send Manychat a special webhook from Instagram Sponsored posts that would allow us to read comments and react to them.
Meta is planning to launch the Ads referral webhook for IG Ads. Once they release the feature, we'll support it on our end as soon as possible.