Importing from Intercom

What comes over

• Conversations with their messages, internal notes, attachments, assignee, team and status. Messages from users and leads both arrive as customer messages. Open stays Open, Closed becomes Resolved, Snoozed stays Snoozed.
• CSAT ratings and their remarks on the matching conversation.
• Contacts (users and leads) with their details, tags, notes, custom attributes and company, which becomes an organization.
• Teams, tags as labels, data attributes as custom attributes, saved replies as canned responses and user segments. If a canned response with the same short code already exists in Deskwoot, the imported one is left out, and Import History shows how many were left out.
• Teammates are matched to your Deskwoot teammates by email (see below).
• Help center: every collection and its sections in a new help center called "Intercom Help Center". Published articles stay published, drafts stay drafts.

Files and images

The import copies every file Intercom hosts into Deskwoot: message attachments, images and file links inside messages, help center articles and saved replies, and the profile pictures of your contacts. Nothing stays a link to Intercom, so your files keep working after you leave Intercom. If your workspace has booked the Virus scan, every file is scanned before it is stored.

• If a file cannot be copied right now (Intercom does not answer even after several tries, or the virus scanner or Deskwoot's storage cannot be reached), the import ends with Imported partly. Start the import again to copy it. When 3 files in a row from the same server do not arrive, the run skips that server's files for 2 minutes and then tries one of them again. If that file arrives, the run carries on with the server's files. If not, it waits another 2 minutes. That way a server that does not answer cannot hold up the whole import, and the next run tries the skipped files again.
• A file that no run can copy is left out, and the import still finishes. This includes a file that could not be reached in 3 runs, so a server that never answers cannot keep your import at Imported partly. Only runs in which the file could not be reached count, not runs in which the virus scanner or the storage was down. The count starts over when the last of those runs was more than 7 days ago, and deleting any import of your workspace clears it. Import History lists these files under Files that could not be imported with the reason, for example too large (over 25 MB, profile pictures over 2 MB), a file type that is not allowed, refused by the virus scan or no longer available at Intercom.
• Images that a message or an article loads from another website, such as your own, stay as they are.

What does not come over

• Intercom's internal articles, because Intercom's API for help center articles does not include them.
• Messages beyond the first 500 parts of one very long conversation. Intercom's API returns at most 500 parts per conversation. The import notes which conversations are affected.
• Bots, product tours, series and outbound messages.

What stays internal

• A collection of a help center whose website is not turned on in Intercom becomes an internal category, with its sections.
• An article without a collection goes to an internal category called "Intercom articles (internal)".

Internal categories and their articles are visible only to your team in the dashboard. They never show on the public help center, in the sitemap, in the chat widget or to Fynn, the AI bot.

Before you start

1. In Intercom, go to Settings > Integrations > Developer Hub.
2. Click New app, give it any name (for example "Deskwoot Migration") and click Create app.
3. In the new app, open Authentication and copy the Access Token.
4. Invite your teammates to Deskwoot with the same email they use in Intercom. You can also do this later.

How to import

1. In Deskwoot, go to Settings > Import & Migration. Only admins can import.
2. Pick Intercom.
3. Paste the Access Token.
4. Under What to import, choose what comes over. Everything is on by default. To import only newer conversations, pick a day under Only conversations created on or after.
5. Click Start Import.

While the import runs

• The import runs in the background, so you can close the page. The import page shows the step it is on and how many records are done. After a few minutes of measuring, it also shows the speed.
• Deskwoot updates and server restarts don't stop it. It continues where it stopped. If a run crashes or gets stuck 3 times in a row without getting any further, the import stops and says so. Start it again to continue.
• One import runs per workspace at a time. Start the next one when the current one has finished.
• To stop an import, click Cancel import on the import page and confirm with Cancel and delete. The import stops and what it imported so far is deleted. A conversation someone wrote in since then keeps those new messages.
• If Intercom stops answering or refuses a list, the import keeps what it already read, finishes the other steps and ends with Imported partly and the steps that stopped early. Start the import again to continue.

Your teammates' conversations and replies

A conversation assigned to an Intercom teammate goes to the Deskwoot teammate with the same email, and their replies show them as the sender. If that person has no Deskwoot account yet, the conversation arrives unassigned and their replies show their name with (imported).

When they join your workspace later with the same email, Deskwoot hands them their work automatically: their unassigned imported conversations are assigned to them and they become the sender of their replies. Open, pending and snoozed conversations come with one notification for all of them. Resolved ones are assigned quietly. No status changes, and your customers see nothing. A conversation that someone in Deskwoot has already held stays as it is.

Imported conversations stay quiet

Imported conversations are history, so they stay quiet until the customer writes again or someone on your team replies in Deskwoot. Until then Deskwoot sends the customer nothing from them (no farewell message, no satisfaction survey), starts no SLA clock and does not resolve them automatically. Imported conversations never count toward your plan's monthly conversation limit and are never locked by it, also after the customer writes again. Resolving or reopening one by hand fires no webhook and no automation rule. From the first new message on, the conversation works like any other, except that Fynn, the AI bot, never answers in an imported conversation.

After the import

• Imported conversations have no inbox yet. Open one and pick an inbox in the This conversation has no inbox notice before you reply.

Frequently asked questions

Does the import change anything in Intercom?

No. It only reads from Intercom, and your Messenger keeps working. Once every conversation is read, the import reads again the ones that changed in the meantime, so they arrive up to date. Anything new in Intercom after the import has finished is not in Deskwoot until you start the import again.

Can I start the import again?

Yes, that is safe. A new run finds what is already in Deskwoot and skips it, so conversations and contacts are not duplicated. It finishes conversations that were only partly imported and brings in what is new. Help center articles your team edited in Deskwoot keep their new text, and a new run never publishes an article you unpublished or made internal. If Intercom has since hidden an article, a new run makes it internal in Deskwoot too, even if your team moved it to another category. If Intercom has since unpublished an article, a new run unpublishes it in Deskwoot too, but only if your team has not edited it. Keep in mind that conversations, contacts and notes you deleted or erased in Deskwoot since the last import come back if Intercom still has them, and so do contacts you merged.

Can I import only part of my data?

Yes. Under What to import, everything is on by default, and you can switch off Conversations, Contacts and organizations, Knowledge base (the help center), Canned responses (your saved replies) and Satisfaction ratings. With a day under Only conversations created on or after, only conversations created on or after that day come. Ratings come only with the conversations they rate, so that option is greyed out without the conversations. Teams, teammates, tags, data attributes and segments always come. If you leave out the contacts, each imported conversation still brings its own contact. Import History shows under each import what was not selected and the start date. To get the rest later, start an import with everything selected: it skips what is already in Deskwoot and brings in what was left out, including the ratings of conversations that came without them.

Is there a limit on the number of conversations?

No. The import reads every conversation and every help center collection. Only a single conversation with more than 500 parts is cut off, because Intercom's API returns no more.

Why is a collection marked Internal?

Its help center has no live website in Intercom, so nobody outside your team could read it there either. To publish it in Deskwoot, open the category in the Help Center and switch off Internal category.

Can I import two Intercom workspaces?

Yes, one after the other. Deskwoot remembers which workspace each conversation came from and gives each workspace its own help center.

Does Deskwoot keep my access token?

Only while the import runs, stored encrypted, so it can continue after a restart. It is removed when the import ends.

Some files are missing. Why?

Open Import History. If the import ended with Imported partly, some files could not be fetched yet: start the import again to copy them. Files listed under Files that could not be imported are left out for good, each with its reason, for example too large or no longer available at Intercom. A file that Intercom did not deliver in 3 runs is listed there too.

How do I undo an import?

In Import History, click the trash icon next to the import. This deletes the conversations and contacts it created, together with the files it copied for them. A conversation someone wrote in since then stays with those new messages, without the imported ones, and a contact who still has a conversation stays too. Teams, agents, canned responses, labels, help center articles and other settings stay. Deleting continues after a restart, and you can start a new import once it is done. While another import runs, an import cannot be deleted. If you imported from Intercom more than once, delete the imports from the newest to the oldest: while a newer Intercom import exists, Deskwoot asks you to delete that one first.