Why This Matters
Support often requires input from people across your organization: engineers for technical issues, finance for billing questions, product managers for feature requests. But not everyone has (or needs) an Intercom license.
With BackReply, anyone in your Slack channel can see conversations and reply directly. Their response syncs to Intercom and reaches the customer—no extra seats required.
How It Works
When a conversation appears in your Slack channel, anyone with access to that channel can participate:
They see the conversation thread
They reply in the thread
Their message syncs to Intercom
The customer receives their response
No special setup needed. Just reply.
What Customers See
How your reply appears to customers depends on whether you're mapped to an Intercom account.
Your Setup | Customer Sees |
Mapped to Intercom admin | Your name and avatar |
Not mapped | Your company name and logo |
Both work well. Mapped users get personal attribution. Unmapped users appear as "Acme Support" (your company name), giving customers a consistent team identity.
Teammate Mapping
Mapping connects your Slack account to your Intercom admin account. When you reply from Slack, customers see your name instead of the company name.
Automatic Mapping
BackReply automatically maps users who have the same email address in both Slack and Intercom. If you're sarah@acme.com in both systems, you're already mapped.
Manual Mapping
Admins can manually create mappings in the BackReply dashboard:
Go to Connections → [Your Connection] → Team Mapping
Select a Slack user
Select their corresponding Intercom admin
Save
Manual mapping is useful when someone uses different email addresses across systems.
Who Should Be Mapped?
Role | Recommendation |
Primary support agents | Map them — customers build relationships with individuals |
Support managers | Map them — they need to assign and manage conversations |
Engineers (occasional help) | Optional — company identity works fine |
Executives (rare involvement) | Optional — company identity works fine |
Internal Notes
Sometimes you need to coordinate with teammates without the customer seeing. Internal notes let you do that.
Adding an Internal Note
Click Add Note on the conversation
Type your message
Click Send Note
The note appears in Slack and Intercom but is hidden from the customer.
Use Cases
Coordinating handoffs: "I'll take this one"
Looping in specialists: "@engineering can you check the API logs?"
Documenting context: "Customer renewed last month, high priority"
Flagging issues: "Customer mentioned evaluating competitors"
Options When Adding Notes
Option | What it does |
Post to channel | Also shows the note in the main channel (not just the thread) |
Close conversation | Posts the note and closes in one action |
@Mentions
Mention teammates in notes to get their attention:
@jane Can you check the billing history for this customer?
Slack notifies them directly. They can then view the conversation and help out.
Best practice: Use @mentions inside internal notes. If you @mention someone in a regular reply, the customer will see that message.
Notes to Channel
By default, internal notes stay inside the thread. But if you need the whole channel to see a note—especially one with an @mention—you can configure notes to broadcast to the channel.
Three modes are available (configured per notification rule):
Mode | Behavior |
Off | Notes stay in the thread only |
Mentions | Notes with @mentions appear in the channel (default) |
Always | All notes appear in the channel |
This ensures @mentioned teammates actually see the notification, since Slack's thread visibility is limited.
Collaboration Examples
Technical Escalation
A customer reports an API error. You add an internal note:
@engineering Customer seeing 500 errors on /payments endpoint. Can someone check the logs?
An engineer sees the @mention, investigates, and replies in the thread:
Found the issue—null pointer in the payment handler. Deploying a fix now.
The customer receives the engineer's response under your company name.
Billing Question
A customer asks about a duplicate charge. You add an internal note:
@finance Can you verify order #12345? Customer says they were charged twice.
Finance investigates and replies with an internal note:
Confirmed duplicate. Refund processed, will reflect in 3-5 days.
You then reply to the customer with the resolution.
Getting Product Input
A customer asks about an upcoming feature. You add an internal note:
@product Customer asking about Feature X timeline. What can I share?
Product manager replies with an internal note:
Launching next month. You can say "Coming soon, Q1 launch planned."
You respond to the customer with the approved messaging.
Managing Access
Channel access = conversation access. Anyone in a Slack channel can see and participate in conversations routed there.
For sensitive conversations (VIP customers, billing issues), use private channels and limit membership.
Recommended structure:
Channel | Access | Use for |
#support-general | Public | Standard conversations |
#support-vip | Private | VIP customers |
#support-billing | Private | Financial discussions |
Common Questions
Can contractors or external consultants help? Yes. Add them as Slack guests to the channel. They can reply like anyone else—their responses appear under your company name.
What if someone accidentally replies instead of adding a note? The customer will see their message. Train your team to use the Add Note button for internal coordination.
Do unmapped users need Intercom licenses? No. That's the point—anyone can help without additional seat costs.
Will @mentions in replies go to the customer? Yes. Only use @mentions in internal notes if you don't want the customer to see them.
Tips
Use internal notes for team discussion. Never expose coordination to customers.
@mention the right person. Be specific about who you need.
Provide context. Include relevant details when looping someone in—don't make them dig.
Close the loop. After getting input, update the customer with a clear response.
Avoid "Let me check with engineering." This creates expectations. Just check, then respond with the answer.