About the user experience for messaging user authentication

When you provide conversational support, users might try to carry on a conversation across multiple devices and channels. Authentication in messaging allows you to leverage your app or website's existing authentication mechanism to propagate the user's identity to Zendesk.


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When you provide conversational support, users might try to carry on a conversation
across multiple devices and channels. Authentication in messaging allows you to leverage
your app or website's existing authentication mechanism to propagate the user's identity
to Zendesk.
Authenticated users can participate in a single conversation across devices, access
current and past conversations across all of their devices, and continue conversations
while switching from one channel to another. This can enhance the quality of support
your agents provide and increase the security of sensitive information that might come
up while agents assist your end users.
This article contains the following topics:
Understanding the agent experience with authenticated users
Understanding the user experience with messaging authentication
Resources to implement
authentication for messaging users


Related article:
Understanding and setting up user
authentication for messaging




Understanding the agent experience with authenticated users

When an end user is authenticated, agents see a green check mark icon next to the
visitor's name in conversations and the end user's external ID in the user's
profile.

Additionally, each response posted by an end user after they're authenticated has the
check mark icon.

Authenticated end users can participate synchronously in a conversation across
devices.
If an end user authenticates mid-conversation, there are two possible outcomes:
If no user exists with the external ID, the unauthenticated user is upgraded
to an authenticated user, and agents will see the green check mark icon next
to the user's name.
If a user with the same external ID already exists, the unauthenticated user
and all of their conversations and tickets are merged with the authenticated
user.




Comparing the agent experience of single-conversation and multi-conversation messaging

In single-conversation messaging, each end user engages in only one conversation
at a time, with a check mark appearing promptly in the user's profile after
authentication. When a user authenticates mid-conversation, the user records are
merged and the conversation is merged with prior conversations.
Conversely, with multi-conversation messaging, end
users can participate in several conversations simultaneously through the Web
Widget or your mobile app. This feature enhances the speed of support and issue
resolution for customers. When a user authenticates mid-conversation, the user
records are merged, but the current conversations aren't merged with prior
conversations. Delayed authentication in multi-conversation messaging can result
in duplicate tickets for a single issue, which agents might need to manually merge.
Additionally, with multi-conversation messaging, it's important to understand
that while unauthenticated users can have an unlimited number of active tickets
(any status other than Solved or Closed), after a user is authenticated, they
can be marked as authenticated with the green check mark icon on a maximum of
100 active tickets at a time. In the event an authenticated user has more than
100 active tickets, Zendesk prioritizes displaying the green check mark icon on
tickets based on the following criteria:
The most recent activities involving the end user and agent
The most recently created or updated ticket






Understanding the user experience with messaging authentication

After you implement end-user authentication for messaging, end users shouldn't notice
much of a difference. After they've been authenticated and their identity is
verified with Zendesk, end users aren't prompted to provide their name or email
address by AI agents for messaging as part of the default messaging response.
Conversations for authenticated end users are synced across devices when the end user
is authenticated. Separate user records and conversations are created for
unauthenticated end users. If an end user authenticates mid-conversation, the
anonymous user that was created before they signed in is automatically merged with
the authenticated user to provide conversational continuity.



Resources to implement authentication for messaging users

See the following resources to implement authentication for messaging users:
Understanding and setting up user
authentication for messaging
Enabling authenticated visitors for
messaging with Zendesk SDKs
Turning on help center authentication for
messaging




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