Test, activate, pause, and troubleshoot a chat flow

Building the canvas is only one part of preparing a chat flow. The important question is whether the trigger starts at the right moment, every visitor path feels complete, and the expected lead, booking, category, or ticket reaches your team.

Because an active flow can match real visitors, use a controlled page or a low-risk testing window. This guide will take you from the final paused review through activation, testing, troubleshooting, and a safe pause when you need to stop the journey.

In this article, you'll learn:

• How to review the paused flow
• How to prepare a controlled website test
• How to activate and complete the journey
• How to test situations that should not trigger the flow
• How to launch, pause, and troubleshoot the flow

Review the paused flow#

Begin on the canvas while the flow is still Paused. This lets you correct the structure without exposing an incomplete journey to matching visitors.

1. Confirm the internal name describes the audience and result.
2. Confirm there is exactly one trigger.
3. Open every action and complete required settings.
4. Resolve all setup warnings.
5. Trace every branch to a clear endpoint.
6. Save the flow while it is Paused.

Pay particular attention to missing or inactive forms, meeting readiness, disabled categories, unavailable assignees, and ticket actions that lack email capture on any route. Select each warning to return to the block that needs attention.

Prepare a controlled website test#

Use an installed domain and conditions you can reproduce. Write down the expected trigger, visitor path, and team-side result before activation so the test has a clear pass condition.

For a proactive flow, choose a specific test page or a moment with limited traffic. For AI intent, prepare matching, borderline, and unrelated messages. For Suggested Question click, confirm the selected question is saved and visible in the intended context.

Activate and test#

When the paused review is clean and the test conditions are ready, activate the flow for the shortest practical time needed to complete the test.

1. Activate the flow.
2. Open the website in a private browser window.
3. Reproduce the trigger conditions.
4. Complete every action and branch as a visitor.
5. Confirm messages, images, links, validation, delays, and confirmations.
6. Verify the resulting lead, booking, category, or ticket in Zeltino.
7. Pause the flow immediately if the result differs from the expected path.

Test negative cases#

A flow can complete its intended route and still be too broad. Verify that it does not start for unrelated AI intent, the wrong page, the wrong visitor type, or a visitor who has already sent a message when that restriction applies.

Check for overlap with other active flows. If two journeys target the same moment, pause one and decide which experience should take priority.

Launch and monitor#

After successful testing, keep the flow active and repeat a short smoke test from a fresh visitor session. Review early conversations to confirm the trigger and paths behave the same way outside your prepared examples.

Re-test whenever you change the flow or one of its forms, meeting types, categories, assignees, or Suggested Questions.

To stop a journey without deleting its configuration, change the flow to Paused. The canvas remains available for review and editing.

If a trigger does not run, confirm the flow is active, its trigger conditions match, the domain widget is enabled, and another flow is not competing for the same visitor moment. Then repeat the exact same test instead of changing several settings at once.

Use Understand automation dependencies as a maintenance checklist.