Canned Responses

Type less. Reply faster. Stay on-brand — every single time.

TL;DR

• What it is — a shared library of reusable message snippets that your team members trigger inside the inbox composer with a single keystroke.
• Who it's for — every team member uses them; admins usually curate them.
• Top outcome — "Can you share your booking reference?" takes five seconds instead of thirty, phrased the same way every time.

At a glance

How to find it

Breadcrumb: Settings → Canned Responses.

Direct URL: https://app.lodgestory.com/crm/settings/canned-responses

To use one while replying: type \ anywhere in the composer. A picker appears and filters as you keep typing. Pick a match and the saved reply drops into the composer at the cursor.

[SCREENSHOT: canned-responses-nav.png — Settings sidebar with Canned Responses highlighted]

What is Canned Responses?

The problem it solves

Your team answers the same questions a hundred times a day. "Can you share your booking reference?", "Here's the Wi-Fi password.", "We're open 9 AM to 9 PM, every day." Typing each reply from scratch is slow. Copying and pasting from a scratch document is error-prone. Autocorrect quietly rewrites phrasing you agreed on last month.

Canned Responses gives your team a shared snippet library with a one-key trigger. Type \book and your saved response — "Can you share your booking reference? It usually starts with BK." — drops into the composer the instant you pick it. The same phrasing lands in every chat, on every channel, across every team member.

What you get

• A shared snippet library for your whole workspace, searchable by shortcode or title.
• Fast create, edit, and delete with live search — and a bulk-delete action for spring cleaning.
• In-composer picker — type \ anywhere you're replying and a dropdown filters your library as you type.
• Copy-to-clipboard on each row for moving a snippet between workspaces manually.
• Works across every text channel — WhatsApp, Instagram, Messenger, Email, and Web Chat all share the same library.

How it's different

• One library, one trigger, every channel. Nothing is per-channel. A response you save once is usable on every text-capable conversation.
• Zero-click insertion. Type \ plus a few letters, pick, done. No opening panels, no scrolling menus.
• Consistent tone at scale. Marketing owns the vetted phrasings. Your team uses them verbatim. When you update the snippet, the new wording is live for everyone immediately.

Customer scenarios

• Onboarding a new team member. An admin pre-populates thirty common responses covering check-in, check-out, Wi-Fi, parking, and restaurant recommendations. On day one the new team member types \checkin and gets the full check-in script inserted ready to send.
• Brand-consistent tone. Your content lead owns a short list of vetted replies. Team members use them as-is. When the brand voice shifts, a single edit updates the wording everywhere on the very next reply.
• Multi-language snippets. Prefix the shortcode with a language tag — for example \en_hello and \hi_hello — to keep parallel sets for English and Hindi guests. Your team picks the right one for the conversation they're in.

How it fits with the rest of Lodgestory

• Home / Unified Inbox — this is where your canned responses actually get used. The composer on every conversation honours the \ trigger.
• WhatsApp Templates — different concept. Templates are the pre-approved messages you use to proactively reach guests outside a 24-hour reply window. Canned responses are free-text snippets you use inside live conversations. You'll want both.
• Bot Journeys — for automated replies that happen without a team member typing. Canned responses are for the human-typed side of the conversation.

Core concepts

Quick Start — create and use your first canned response in one minute

Step 1 — Open Canned Responses

Settings → Canned Responses.

[SCREENSHOT: canned-responses-qs-1-list.png]

Step 2 — Click + Create

Fill in the shortcode (for example book), a clear title (for example Request booking reference), and the body (for example "Can you share your booking reference? It usually starts with BK.").

[SCREENSHOT: canned-responses-qs-2-create-dialog.png]

Step 3 — Save

The new row appears in your library with copy-to-clipboard and edit actions beside it.

Step 4 — Use it in the inbox

Open any live conversation in Home. In the composer, type \book. The picker shows matching responses. Press Enter (or click a match) and the body drops in at the cursor. Edit if you want to — then hit Send.

[SCREENSHOT: canned-responses-qs-4-in-composer.png]

What's next

• Build a library of ten to thirty responses covering your top FAQs.
• For outbound WhatsApp messages outside a 24-hour reply window, use WhatsApp Templates instead — they're the approved message type Meta requires there.

How it works

Everything runs inside one library per workspace.

1. An admin or team member opens Settings → Canned Responses and adds a snippet.
2. The snippet is saved with a unique shortcode, a title, and a body.
3. Any team member with the composer open in the inbox types \ plus a few letters.
4. A picker appears and filters the library by shortcode and title as they keep typing.
5. They pick a match and the body is inserted at their cursor.
6. They can edit the text before sending — canned responses are a starting point, not a send button.

Every team member in the workspace sees the same library. When you update a snippet, the new wording is live on the next trigger — there's nothing to publish, nothing to push.

Features in depth

The library page

Each row shows the shortcode (prefixed with \ for clarity), the title, a truncated preview of the body, and the date it was created. Actions on the row let you:

• Edit the snippet in place.
• Copy to clipboard — useful for sharing a snippet with a colleague by email, or porting it into a different workspace.
• Delete a single snippet.

A search box at the top filters by shortcode and title together, so typing book quickly surfaces every snippet related to bookings. The list paginates at 20 rows per page by default.

Create and edit

When you create or edit a snippet, the shortcode is normalised automatically — it's lowercased, spaces are stripped, and any leading \ you typed is removed. The trigger \ is added back in the composer, so you never have to type it in the shortcode field itself.

The body is a single-line or multi-line block of up to 5,000 characters. Line breaks are preserved when the text is inserted into the composer.

Bulk delete

Select multiple rows in the library, click Delete selected, and confirm. Useful when you've duplicated snippets between workspaces and need to clean up, or when you're retiring a set of responses that don't match your new brand voice.

Using a response in the composer

In any text channel's composer — WhatsApp, Instagram, Messenger, Email, or Web Chat — typing \ opens the picker. As you keep typing, the picker filters the library to matches across shortcode and title. Enter, click, or tap a result, and the body drops in exactly where your cursor sat.

The text is inserted as-is. You can keep typing around it, delete parts, or send as-is.

Roles and permissions

Every team member in your workspace can curate the library. If you want curation centralised, we recommend agreeing a convention inside your team (for example, only admins edit snippets tagged with specific prefixes) rather than relying on role walls — the library is designed to be collaborative.

Connections

• Home / Unified Inbox — the only place canned responses are used today. Every reply composer honours the \ trigger across every channel you've connected.
• WhatsApp Templates — separate system for approved outbound WhatsApp messages. Canned responses work inside active conversations; templates are for initiating or re-engaging.
• Bot Journeys — bots can reply without anyone typing. Canned responses speed up the humans on your team.

Limits a user will run into

Errors and FAQ

You might see

• "Shortcode already exists" — a response with that shortcode is already saved. Pick a different one, or prefix with something specific to your team (for example \acm_book if your organisation is Acme).
• "Response body is too long" — trim the body to 5,000 characters or fewer.
• "Couldn't save" — check your network and retry. If the problem persists, contact support.
• Picker not appearing when you type \ — confirm you're in the inbox composer (not a different field) and that your keyboard isn't autocorrecting \ to a different character.

FAQ

Can I insert variables like the guest's name into a canned response?
Not today. The inserted text is literal — {{guest.name}} would appear as-is. For message types that support variable substitution at send time, use a WhatsApp Template.

Can I attach a file or image to a canned response?
No — canned responses are text only. If you want to send an image, video, or document, attach it in the composer as you normally would.

Can I have per-language versions of the same response?
Yes, by convention. Prefix each shortcode with a language tag — for example \en_book, \hi_book, \es_book — and save each language as its own response.

Why does the composer trigger on \ and not /?
Lodgestory uses \ so the canned-response picker doesn't clash with other slash-style commands elsewhere in the product. Muscle memory kicks in quickly.

Can different team members have their own private canned responses?
The library is shared at the workspace level. Every team member sees the same list. If some snippets are only for certain people, agree a prefix convention inside your team.

What happens if I delete a canned response while someone else is mid-typing it?
Their delete succeeds immediately. If another team member had already picked the response and inserted it into their composer, the inserted text stays — deleting doesn't retroactively change messages that are already drafted or sent.

How do I move responses between workspaces?
Use the copy-to-clipboard action on each row in the library, then paste into a new + Create dialog in the other workspace. We don't offer an import/export file today.

API

Canned Responses is available via the Lodgestory partner API for organisations that want to manage their library programmatically. Ask your Lodgestory point of contact for API credentials and the current reference; endpoints let you create, list with search, fetch by shortcode, update, delete, and bulk-delete.

Related modules and next steps

• Home / Unified Inbox — where your canned responses come to life.
• WhatsApp Templates — the companion feature for outbound WhatsApp messaging outside a 24-hour reply window.
• Bot Journeys — automate replies your team doesn't need to type at all.
• Team Members — invite the people who will use the shared library every day.