Configuring Telegram channel

Introduction

In today's competitive marketplace, brands with better customer experiences always win. Businesses have shifted their focus from brand awareness to better brand engagement. Communicating with your customers through one channel alone is no longer enough. Timely and relevant communication with your customers is more important than ever before. To achieve this, businesses need to have an omni-channel presence.

However, as a business, managing multiple conversational tools for communication can be time-consuming and disrupt workflow due to the constant switching of tabs or windows to access their instant messaging app.

One such platform is Telegram, a popular instant messaging platform used by businesses across the world. Telegram is primarily designed for messaging, which can make it difficult for organizations that use Telegram as their main instant messaging medium to manage tasks, collaborate on projects, or perform other functions that may be necessary for their business operations.
To help get it right, create a shared inbox with Zoho TeamInbox for your Telegram, so that every member of your team can access and respond to messages and collaborate more effectively from a single location. This reduces the need for multiple communication channels and ensures that everyone is on the same page.

Create a Telegram inbox

To create an inbox:

1. Log in to Zoho TeamInbox.
2. Click the Plus icon from the top pane and select Inbox.
3. Select Team as the inbox type to create a shared inbox. 
4. Enter a name for your inbox and select the team you want to create it under. If necessary, provide a description about your inbox and click Next. 

Set up your Telegram inbox

1. Select Telegram as the channel for your inbox.

2. Paste the Auth Token (Access Token) of your telegram bot in the Telegram Auth Token field.

    To learn how to generate an Auth token for your bot, click here.

3. Write an invite greeting message for your Inbox members if necessary.

4. Click Create inbox.

Add members to your inbox

1. There are three ways to add members to your inbox:

• Invite members: If you want to invite new members to your inbox, enter their email addresses and click Invite. Once they accept the invite, they will be added to this inbox.
• Choose members: If you want to add a member who is already part of the organization, select them from the list of members. 
• Import users: You can also import users from your Zoho groups. Select your preferred group and click Invite.

Members who are already on the team are added to the inbox by default. Members can be removed by simply deselecting them.

2. Click Save and Next. 

Manage your inbox 

You will land in the settings from which you can:

• Automatically add new teammates to this inbox: When you add a new member to the team under which you have created this inbox, the member will be added automatically to this inbox.
• Automatically assign thread upon reply: Assign threads automatically to the member who makes a reply when there is an unassigned thread.

Enable the settings as per your preferences. Or you can do it later in your Organization settings section.

Click Save changes after setting up your inbox settings.

Generate Auth Token for your Telegram bot

To configure your Telegram bot with Zoho TeamInbox, an Access token (Auth token) of your Telegram bot is needed.

• The Telegram bot acts as a bridge between the two platforms, which ensures seamless communication and allows users to manage their Telegram channel messages within Zoho TeamInbox, providing a more centralized experience.
• The Telegram API token is a unique identifier for your bot.  The API token is required to authenticate your bot and make API calls between the Telegram server and your inbox.

To Generate auth token for your Telegram bot

   1. Sign in to your Telegram account.

   2. Search for "@botfather" in the search bar and click Start. 

           Note: The official Telegram bot has a verified tick mark beside its name. 

   3. Select Token from the list of commands or enter "/token" and send it. 

   4. Choose the bot for which you want to generate a token from the list of bots that you have previously created. 

   5. Select API token from the list. Copy the access token generated for the bot you have selected.

Refer to this Telegram help doc, to learn how to create a new Telegram bot.