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Auto funnel without mysticism: a chain of 5 blocks and what to measure in it
There are so many courses and schemes wrapped around the word “auto funnel” that it seems as if it is a separate technology. At the designer level, these are five blocks connected in order: message with benefit, collection of contact, pause, condition by tag and offer or transfer to a person. Everything else is texts, timings and common sense. Below we analyze each block using the example of CHBT, explain what warming up is in terms of “Pause”, and name five numbers by which the funnel can be measured, indicating where exactly in the office to take them. We leave the assembly step by step to the template, here is the logic.
Definition in one paragraph and five blocks
An auto funnel is a pre-assembled sequence of messages that leads a person from the first touch to an lead without the participation of a manager and changes the route depending on what the person did or did not do. The key words are “in advance”, “sequence” and “changes route”. If messages go to everyone the same way without reacting to behavior, it’s a chain, not a funnel. If a manager writes manually, this is sales, not automation.
In CHBT there is no separate entity “funnel” - it is a regular script in the “flows” section, assembled from blocks in the following sequence:
- "Message" — hook: benefit and promise, choice buttons.
- "Data collection" - contact in exchange for what was promised.
- "Pause" - the time during which a person “ripens”; warming lives here.
- “Condition” block by tag - the funnel looks at what happened during the pause and selects a branch.
- "Message" with offer or block “Operator” — final: lead or living person.
Five blocks is the minimum working funnel. Real flows are longer due to the repetition of “Message → Pause” pairs and additional conditions, but the principle does not change. Ready assembly of this circuit - template "Auto Funnel": hook, pause, offer, lead. Opens in your account with one button, then change the texts.
Block 1. “Message”: a hook, not an offer
The first message of the funnel solves one task - to get a person to take the next step. Didn’t buy, didn’t sign up, didn’t leave the phone - just pressed a button or answered. Therefore, there is no price in the hook and there is no “leave your request”: there is a benefit that a person will receive in a minute, and a promise of what he will receive next.
How do they get into it? The script has a trigger - what it starts with. For a funnel, this is usually a code word from a post or advertisement (“write START”), a deep link like t.me/bot?start=post12 with a hardwired source or pressing a button in a different flow. One flow can have several inputs, and each input should be marked with its own tag through the “Action” → “Add Tag” block - this way you will later find out which post or ad brought in more requests. The mechanics of entering by word are discussed in detail in the article about code word in bot.
The buttons in the hook are not decoration, but the first fork. “For myself” / “For business”, “I want to figure it out myself” / “I want them to do it for me” - each button leads to its own branch and adds its own tag. This is the beginning of segmentation: already at the first step, the funnel knows who to offer what. How to name tags so that in a year you can understand them - in the article about tags as a segmentation system.
Variables {{name}} in the first message they work if the name is already known (in Telegram and VK it comes from the profile). But don’t base your tone on this: “Ivan, I have an offer for you” in the first message looks like spam.
Block 2: Data Collection: Spine of the Funnel
Contact is the only thing that connects a person with you outside of the messenger. While he is gone, the funnel lives by the rules of the site: in Telegram, MAX and VK, a bot cannot write first to someone who has not written to it, and on the free plan CHBT there are no broadcasts. The phone number or e-mail collected in the second step is insurance in case the person becomes silent.
The “Data Collection” block asks for one field - Name, Phone, E-mail or your own - and can check the format: it will not miss the wrong number and will ask again with your “Text in case of error” - as many times as specified in the “Attempts” field (three by default), after which the script moves on without a saved value. Writes the response to the contact card and, if specified, to a script variable. Three rules for a funnel:
- An exchange, not a request. “Where should I send the analysis?” converts better than “Leave an email.” The person gives the contact for what was promised in the hook, and the promise must be fulfilled immediately - with the next message.
- One field. The name is already there from the profile; phone and e-mail together are too much. Ask for the second field later, when the person reaches the offer.
- Not deadlocked with refusal. After exhausting attempts, the block silently passes the person on without a number - it does not have a separate branch “after N failures”, so it is better to give a way out of the question explicitly. Method one: in the “Text in case of error” write “...or answer “next” - I’ll send the analysis here in the chat”, and on the word
furthercreate a separate script with a “Keyword” trigger that continues the funnel without a phone; the keyword is also triggered inside “Data Collection”. The second method is simpler: make the phone number optional - in the “Message”, before the question, put the “Skip” button leading past the block. The person in the messenger is already your contact, just without a number; the “variable exists” condition at step 4 will separate those who provided contact from those who did not.
After collecting data, set “Action” → “Add tag”, for example funnel:contact. This is not for beauty: tags are the only way to count how many people have reached this step, as discussed below.
Block 3. “Pause”: time as a warming up tool
Warming up is the most mystified word on the topic. At the designer level, this is the repetition of the pair “Message → Pause” as many times as necessary so that a person who is not ready today becomes ready in a few days. There is no magic: time passes between messages, and during this time the person lives his life, remembers the problem, reads your messages again.
The “Pause” block in CHBT sets the delay before the next step: the ready-made values are 1 minute, 5 and 30 minutes, 1 hour, 1 day or your own number of seconds - two days is 172,800. The script pauses and continues on its own, without human action. Pause works on any plan, including free.
How to build a warm-up from pauses:
- Pause 1 - short (5–30 minutes after delivering what was promised): “Did you manage to look? The main thing is there - on the second page." Returns attention while it is warm.
- Pause 2 - day: answer to the main objection or short case. Not an offer.
- Pause 3 - two to three days: offer with a fair deadline.
- Pause 4 - two more days: a final reminder to those who did not respond, and contact the operator.
Three to five touches over 5–10 days is a typical length; It only makes sense longer for expensive solutions. The main rule: the message before the pause should be closed - without a question to which an answer is expected, and without buttons. A person should not answer into the void while the script is sleeping. Timings, time of day and chain restrictions are discussed separately in the article about trigger chains; Here it is enough to understand that warming up is a pause, and not a special type of message.
Block 4. “Condition”: the funnel reacts to a person
Without this block, you have a chain: everyone gets the same thing. The “condition” after a pause looks at what has changed and selects the “yes” or “else” branch. You can check a tag, variable, channel, time of day and day of the week; operators - equal, not equal, contains, greater than, less than, in list, exists, regex. The most useful funnel checks:
- There is an “lead” or “client” tag → the person has already registered during the pause (through another script, through the “Leave contacts” button in the widget, or the operator manually added a tag in the card). He doesn’t need an offer - this thread leads to gratitude or silence. This is what distinguishes a funnel from a mailing: putting pressure on someone who has already bought is a sure way to get blocked.
- There is a “hot” tag → during a pause, a person wrote the code word “price” or pressed a button in an intermediate message, and a separate short script added a tag. He gets the “Operator” block right away, without a third touch.
- Phone variable exists → we suggest a call; otherwise → we suggest answering in chat.
- Branch “Day”: “Time” ≥ 9 and “Time” < 21 → offer immediately; exit “Otherwise” (night) → another “Pause” for several hours, and only then offer. So the funnel doesn't write to people at night. The “Time” field is a whole hour according to the server clock, a number without minutes.
There can be several conditions in a row, and each is a new fork. But don’t get carried away: three forks give eight branches, and someone must write and maintain the texts for all eight. Practice: one fork in “already formed / not” and one in warmth. Rules within one branch are added by “AND”, branches are checked in order, “Else” catches everything else; fields, operators and value format - in the help for conditions and branches.
Block 5. Offer or “Operator”: final without a dead end
Offer is the only place in the funnel where price, deadline and appeal are appropriate. Three requirements for it in the messenger:
- Specificity. What, for how much, by what date, what needs to be done. One sentence - one action.
- Action button. “I want” / “Sign up” / “Discuss”. Clicking leads either to “Data collection” (if there is no phone yet) or directly to “Action”: “Notify operator”, tag
funnel: leadand “Transaction in CRM” - the card will appear on the kanban in the “CRM” section with a name from the variables (“Request: {{name}}") without the participation of the manager, and the notification will be sent to the account and via Web Push. - Fair deadline. “Only until Friday” every week people notice faster than it seems.
For those who are marked as hot by the condition, you can skip the offer and put the “Operator” block: the conversation goes to “Conversations” with the mark, the bot becomes silent, the person answers from the account - without going to the messenger. Who and when should pick up the conversation is the topic of the article about transferring to the operator.
And the last rule of the finale is no deadlock. After the offer and after the thank you, there should always be a button “Ask a question” or “Write to the manager”, leading to the “Operator”. A person who has changed his mind about leaving should not remain silent.
What to Measure: Five Numbers Instead of “Funnel Conversion”
“7% conversion funnel” says nothing about where exactly people fall off. Count five numbers in steps:
| Step | What count | How to mark in CHBT |
|---|---|---|
| 1. Login | How many people launched the funnel | Tag funnel:input the first “Action” after trigger |
| 2. Contact | How much did you leave phone or e-mail | Tag funnel:contact after the “Collection data" |
| 3. Reached the offer | How many did not fall off during the pause | Tag funnel:offer before message with offer |
| 4. Application | How many people clicked “I want” and completed the transaction | Tag funnel: lead + “Notify operator” |
| 5. Operator | How much went to the person | Tag funnel:operator before the block “Operator” |
Conditional example: 200 inputs → 120 contacts (60%) → 95 reached the offer (79% of contacts) → 18 applications (19% of the offer) → total 9%. You can see from the steps where to work: pauses have eliminated a few, but most people are lost on the offer and on the contact - look there first. If 40% of contacts reached the offer, the problem would be pauses - too long or messages between them empty. Compare these fractions to your past months, not to someone else's "norms".
What is Lead, Qualification and Conversion as a Fraction - No Jargon in Marketing Dictionary; One thing is important here: count in steps, and not in one number.
Where to get numbers in the office
An honest disclaimer first: there are no counters “how many people passed through this block” in CHBT. Therefore, the measurement is based on tags and three sections of the cabinet.
"Contacts". Filter by tag shows the list - and its size. Filtered funnel:input — 200, funnel:contact - 120, and so on for each step. Export to CSV with one link - if you want to count in a table by week and source. It is for this reason that tags are placed at every step, and not just at the end.
"Analytics". “Review” tab: incoming messages by day for 14 days with changes to last week, on the same chart - responses from the bot and operator, the “Awaiting response” tile and the “By channels” block with conversations for 30 days. There are no funnel steps here, but the dynamics are visible - not “how much,” but “what changed after we changed the hook.” The “By Channels” block shows where the conversations are coming from - from Telegram, MAX or from the website.
«CRM». The number of transactions in the “New” column are orders; movement through the columns up to “Paid” is already sales, which the bot does not control, but you can see how many of the 18 leads became money.
Sources. If the funnel has several inputs with different tags (input: post 12, entrance: advertising-vk), intersection with tag funnel: lead in the “Contacts” filter it will show which source provides requests and which provides only inputs. For a fair comparison of the two versions of the hook, there is a “Random Branch” action: half of the inputs go along one branch, half along another, with different tags. How to set up such an experiment is in the article about How does a bot affect conversions?.
Ritual: once a week, five numbers, one change in the funnel. Changing two blocks at the same time means you won't know what worked.
Five reasons why your funnel isn't working
- The hook is the offer. The first message contains the price and “leave a request.” People leave without achieving anything useful. It can be treated by moving the offer to the fifth block.
- Contact is asked for benefit. “Enter your phone number to get a guide” without the guide itself. The order is: promise → contact → fulfillment of the promise immediately.
- Pause without condition. Everyone receives an offer, including those who have already signed up through another script or through an operator. One “Condition” block under the “lead” tag solves the problem.
- Message with a question before a pause. “How do you like the material?” - and a day of silence. The person answered, the bot is silent, trust is lost. Before the pause - only closed statements.
- No tags - no numbers. The funnel “seems to be working,” but no one knows where people fall off. Without the five tags in the table above, you won't be able to improve anything except by guessing.
A separate sixth reason outside of blocks is traffic. The funnel does not create inputs, it processes them. If ten people log into the bot per month, no optimization will yield more than two applications.
What a funnel is not and where to start
Not a newsletter. Newsletter - one message to the entire database or segment using a tag from the “Mailouts” section (on paid plans). A funnel is a personal chain that starts from the action of a specific person. A newsletter can lead people into a funnel (“write START”), but does not replace it.
Not AI. Five blocks work without a neural network. An AI agent can stand inside - for example, answer questions between touches - but this will not make the funnel smarter if the hook and offer are weak.
Not "passive income". Texts are written and rewritten, numbers are looked at weekly, the offer becomes outdated. Delivery is automated, not thinking.
Where to start? Open the “Auto Funnel” template in your account - there is already a hook, a pause, an offer and an lead there. Add “Data collection” after the hook and “Condition” by tag before the offer - you’ll get a complete five-block diagram. Hang five tags from the table. Run on one source - one post or one ad - and after a week see five numbers. This also works on the free plan: pause, conditions, tags and CRM are available on Free, the limit is only 30 conversations per month - just for testing the hypothesis. Build your first funnel for free →
Template "Auto funnel"Trigger chains: pause, condition, tagCode word in the botTags as a segmentation systemHelp: conditions and branches