New in Smooch this month: Lots of new stuff for Web Messenger. You can now filter and transform messages before they are displayed in the conversation; we’ve added a new configuration option to automatically open Conversation Extensions; and we’ve got the gossip on what’s to come for 2019. We’ve also made it way easier for you to connect your Smooch app to your WhatsApp API client via the dashboard, and have made a few other tweaks to our APIs.

What’s new 🎉

A bunch of Web Messenger updates

Many improvements have been made to our Web SDK this month. Here are the key ones.

Filtering and transforming messages

It is now possible to run code in the browser to conditionally hide or modify messages before they are sent to the business, or before they are displayed to the user in the conversation using the new beforeSend and beforeDisplay delegates. For example, using the beforeSend delegate, user messages can be transformed to pass additional metadata to the business. A common use case would be to add the URL of the page the user is visiting while messaging with a business. Armed with this information, the human agent or bot engaged in the conversation now has even more context to help their customer. One use case for the beforeDisplay delegate can be to hide messages from the user's view, so that Smooch can be used to communicate system or status messages to the browser without polluting the user's conversation history.

Better still, with these new delegate methods, you can implement your own creepy “monkey loves you” stored consciousness doll from that episode of Black Mirror. 😜

Check out our new guide to learn more and read the v4.15.0 release notes here, which also include some bug fixes. On the same topic, v4.16.0 includes a new beforePostbackSend delegate that allows you to add metadata before a postback is sent.

Automatically open Conversation Extensions

A year ago, we launched Conversation Extensions to help you create custom interactive experiences that sit on top of the chat window on any messaging channel. Powered by standard web technologies (HTML, JavaScript and CSS), Conversation Extensions combine the intimacy and contextuality of conversational interfaces with the richness and flexibility of traditional UIs. This feature allows multi-step tasks to be carried out seamlessly through an intuitive workflow, enhancing the experience for the user.

This month, we’ve added a new configuration option that lets you automatically open Conversation Extensions in Web Messenger. For example, at the end of a conversation with a user, a business could send a CSAT survey and have it automatically open to increase their response rate. Simply set the openOnReceive property on Webview Actions and Web Messenger will open the extension when the message is received. Read the release notes to learn more and check out our mini-guide to building a custom CSAT survey with Conversation Extensions.

2019 Web Messenger 5.0 Sneak Peek 👀

Great things are brewing at Smooch in regards to Web Messenger. Our Product, Design and Engineering teams are actively working on the next major release and many of you have been involved in the conversation to help us make this update a killer one. We can’t spill the beans just yet, but here are some big themes that we are exploring: better ways to capture data from users (think capturing name or email before the conversation starts); making chat more prominent on the page by proactively engaging users; more configuration options to customize the UI; and a refreshed look in line with the top messengers on the market. Stay tuned for more in 2019!

Other API & SDK updates ⚙

• AppUser Events: Further to the App User deletion feature we released earlier this year, we added an appUser:delete webhook that enables you to know when an appUser is deleted through the Delete App User API.
• WhatsApp user names: Messages from WhatsApp now populate a user’s givenName and surname from their WhatsApp profile when available. We also put the raw profile info into the WhatsApp client’s raw field.
• Dashboard update: We’ve made it easier for you to connect your WhatsApp API client (hosted by Smooch or yourself) to your Smooch app directly from the dashboard without having to make any calls to our API.