Reply to Instagram and Messenger chats
You will need:
- The Social feature on your workspace. It is included in the Pro plan. On other plans, the Instagram and Facebook Messenger cards in Channels show a locked badge and an Upgrade to Pro → button.
- An Instagram Business or Creator account, for Instagram DMs and comments.
- Admin access to a Facebook Page, for Messenger.
| What | Where to find it in the sidebar |
|---|---|
| Connect accounts | Settings › Channels & WhatsApp. Use the Instagram and Facebook Messenger cards. |
| Read and reply to chats | Inbox, then the Social tab. (It used to be a separate "Social Inbox" item.) |
| Auto-replies | Automate › AI Agent, then the Instagram & Facebook tab |
| Write and schedule posts | Grow › Social |
| People from lead form ads | Customers › Leads. The forms are on the Grow › Ads page. |
If you downgrade later, connections you already made stay active and can still be managed from Channels.
Setting up Instagram for the first time? Follow Set up Instagram in Tanvik.
Instagram and Facebook connect in two different ways. Pick the one that matches what you need:
| You want to… | Use this button | Result |
|---|---|---|
| Receive and reply to Instagram DMs | Connect with Instagram | Instagram login. No Facebook Page needed. Sending is enabled. |
| Use Facebook Messenger | Connect Facebook | Facebook login. A Select Facebook Pages window lists the Pages you manage. Tick the Page(s) you want and click Connect. |
Keeping Instagram connected. The Connect Instagram page shows how long your access is valid. Within 7 days of expiring it shows reconnect soon. When it expires it shows Access expired — reconnect now. Click Reconnect with Instagram to renew it. The full steps are in Set up Instagram in Tanvik and Connect your channels.
The Social tab has a conversation list on the left and the open chat on the right. The top of the list shows how many chats are unread. New messages appear by themselves, and you get a pop-up when one arrives in a chat you don't have open. The Social tab in your Inbox shows how many conversations have new messages.
| What you see | What it means |
|---|---|
| Reply window: … left | Instagram only. How long you have to reply, counted from the customer's last message (24 hours). |
| Reply window expired | Instagram only. The customer's last message is too old to answer, so the reply box is turned off. You can reply again as soon as they send a new message. Late replies of up to 7 days are waiting for Meta's approval. |
| Standard 24-hour window has passed | Messenger. The customer's last message is older than about a day. Your reply is sent as a human-agent reply, which Meta allows for up to 7 days. |
| Sending is not enabled for @… | This Instagram account was connected through Facebook only. The reply box is turned off. Click Reconnect with Instagram to fix →. |
| This message was deleted | The customer unsent the message on Instagram. |
| Unsupported message | The message type can't be shown in Tanvik, for example some stickers or shares. |
Click More › Comments to see the latest comments on your posts. Click Sync comments to pull in any you missed. Click a comment to open it. From there you can:
- Reply: choose Public reply, type in Reply to this comment… and send. It is posted under the comment on Instagram.
- Private DM: choose it in the same menu to message the person who commented instead. Instagram allows one private message per comment, within 7 days of the comment.
- Hide / Unhide: hides the comment from the public on Instagram without deleting it. Hidden comments are marked.
- Delete: removes the comment from Instagram for good. You will be asked to confirm.
Want to answer price questions in comments automatically? See Turn Instagram comments into WhatsApp chats.
You don't have to add anyone by hand. In Customers › Leads you will find:
- Everyone who sends you an Instagram DM or a Facebook Messenger message, one lead per person per platform. The lead's source shows Instagram or Facebook.
- People who ask about price or details in an Instagram comment.
These leads have no phone number until you add one. If a lead came from a post, the lead remembers which one. Social posts › Analytics lists the Posts that brought leads, counting comments, Story replies and messages from boosted posts, and each post in your list shows its leads and chats. See Manage leads in the pipeline for what to do next.
Auto-replies answer Messenger and Instagram DMs and comments for you. Rules run when someone messages your Facebook Page or Instagram account. They are checked in priority order and the highest priority match wins.
| Trigger type | When it fires |
|---|---|
| Keyword | The message matches one of your keywords. Choose a match type: Contains (default), Exact match or Starts with. |
| Greeting | The message is a greeting such as hi, hello, hey or namaste. |
| Always | Every incoming message. |
| AI Fallback | No keyword rule matched, so AI writes the reply. |
| Buying question | The message asks about price, details, availability or buying. Used for comments to WhatsApp. |
Each rule in the list shows its trigger, channel, priority and how many replies it has sent. Use the switch to turn a rule on or off, Edit to change it, and the ✕ to delete it. Use {name} in a reply to insert the person's Instagram name.
When someone fills in a lead form from one of your Facebook or Instagram ads, the lead arrives in Tanvik automatically. You can see the forms and their leads on the Grow › Ads page, and in Customers › Leads. Facebook Page connected? Then you can also create a form there. See Create a lead form ad.
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