Set up AI-powered smart replies

Oct 14, 2026
Knowledge

Procedure Steps

Article updated: June 22, 2026

Set up AI-powered smart replies

Create AI-powered smart replies that your agents can use to create on-brand, context-aware responses to social media comments, mentions, and messages. The smart reply AI analyzes the content, sentiment, and intent of public conversations and suggests a contextual reply to your agents. Your agents can then accept the reply or edit it before sending it. Smart replies can help your agents respond faster, more consistently, and in an on-brand manner.

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Audience: Enterprise Inbox admins with Advanced Inbox. Want more Hootsuite features? Upgrade your plan.

Build your knowledge file

The Knowledge center in Inbox hosts your brand-approved FAQ, policies, and key responses for use in AI-powered automations like smart replies and chatbot. You can use your knowledge source files to train the AI with relevant company data. This helps to ensure more accurate and on-brand responses. Your knowledge files can be in PDF or TXT format and must be less than 1MB in size. Learn how to build a knowledge file.

Create a new smart reply

Create a new smart reply and assign it to your channels.

Go to Nest, select Settings, and then select Admin settings.
Expand Inbox intelligence, and then select Smart replies.
Select Create new smart reply.
Enter an Internal name. This is the name that your administrators use to identify your smart reply. It is not shown to customers.
Select your language preferences and your default language. The default language will be used when a customer's language is not recognized.
Select the knowledge sources you want the smart replies to use.
Save your new smart reply, and then switch on each channel you want assign it to.
Note: Smart replies are not available for Facebook or Instagram private messages or for WhatsApp.
Switch on your smart reply to make it available for agents.

Go to Inbox, select Settings, and then select Admin settings.
Expand Inbox intelligence, and then select Smart replies.
Select Create new smart reply.
Enter an Internal name. This is the name that your administrators use to identify your smart reply. It is not shown to customers.
Select your language preferences and your default language. The default language will be used when a customer's language is not recognized.
Select the knowledge sources you want the smart replies to use.
Save your new smart reply, and then switch on each channel you want assign it to.
Note: Smart replies are not available for Facebook or Instagram private messages or for WhatsApp.
Switch on your smart reply to make it available for agents.

Edit or delete a smart reply

If you want to select a new knowledge source for your smart reply, make sure you have added it to your Knowledge center prior to using the following steps (see Build an AI knowledge center).

Go to Inbox, select Settings, and then select Admin settings.
Expand Inbox intelligence, and then select Smart replies.
Find the smart reply you want to update in the list, and then select from the following options:
- Edit - Edit your name, languages, selected knowledge sources, and assigned channels.
- Delete - Delete the smart reply. This cannot be undone.
Save your changes, and switch on or off your smart reply.

Go to Inbox , select Settings, and then select Admin settings.
Expand Inbox intelligence, and then select Smart replies.
Find the smart reply you want to update in the list, and then select from the following options:
- Edit - Edit your name, languages, selected knowledge sources, and assigned channels.
- Delete - Delete the smart reply. This cannot be undone.
Save your changes, and switch on or off your smart reply.

FAQ

How does the smart replies feature handle sensitive or private information? Smart replies follows strict data privacy guidelines and does not store or use sensitive information beyond what is necessary for response generation.

Is the smart replies feature compliant with data protection regulations? Yes, smart replies aligns with industry-standard data protection and privacy regulations, including GDPR and other relevant policies.