Zipchat’s AI social media manager is one agent that answers Instagram and Facebook direct messages, replies to comments on posts and ads, hides spam, and passes conversations to your team when a human is needed. It reuses everything you already taught your website agent, so there is nothing new to train. In the closed beta, 98% of social conversations were fully automated, and merchants earned back 40 times what they spent on AI replies (Zipchat beta data, as of October 2026).
This is the written companion to Zipchat’s AI social media manager webinar, hosted by Alessandro Valenti (Head of Success), with Anel from the support team running the questions queue. The recording sits above. Below is the full breakdown: the problem, what the agent does on DMs, comments, and ads, how to set it up, what we tested live, and every question merchants asked.
The problem: your social inbox never closes
Customers write to you 24 hours a day, 7 days a week. They write on email, on Instagram, on Facebook, on WhatsApp, and in the tickets Zipchat escalates to your team. Your support people end up chasing messages across a pile of tabs.
Social makes it worse. There are DMs to answer. There are comments to moderate. There are replies under your ads that nobody answers. And there is the spam: scam links, fake giveaways, and people asking where their order is under a random promotion.
The fix is not a bigger team. It is one agent that does what a social media manager does, all day and night, and sends only the tricky cases to your people. Everything lands in the conversations tab in Zipchat, so nobody opens 40 tabs on Monday morning.
What the agent does, in one table
| Job | What Zipchat does |
|---|
| Direct messages | Replies on Instagram, Facebook, and Messenger at any hour |
| Post comments | Replies in public, or answers in public and continues in private |
| Ad comments | Answers questions under Instagram and Facebook ads |
| Moderation | Hides spam and unwanted comments, likes the nice ones, ignores the rest |
| Handover | Escalates to your team in the conversations tab, or by email if you turn that on |
Direct messages: the same brain as your website agent
You do not train this agent. It uses the same knowledge you built and polished over weeks and months for your website agent: the prompts, the skills, the tone of voice, and the strategy for suggesting products. Connect the channel and it is ready.
Replies go out from your own account, so shoppers see your brand name and not a bot name.
Comments are not the biggest pile. They are the most visible one. One comment on a post is usually read by 100 to 200 people, and an unanswered or negative one can do real damage.
What makes Zipchat good here is context. It knows what your post was about. If the post is a video, it watches the video and understands what happens in it. So when a shopper asks “how much is it?” or “how long is delivery?”, Zipchat knows which product they mean.
It also knows when not to answer in public. If someone asks “can I get a discount?”, Zipchat can reply in the comment and move the real conversation to DMs. Everyone does not get the same answer, and private details stay private, the way a human social media manager would handle it.
Every unanswered question under an ad is a sale that walked away. Zipchat answers those on Instagram ads and Facebook ads alike.
The effect is bigger than one reply. A single shopper asks the question, but 100 people may see the ad and the answer. A good reply under the ad helps the conversion rate and the ROAS of the whole campaign.
Moderation: hide, like, ignore, delete
Not every comment is friendly. Zipchat can hide scam links, fake giveaways, offensive comments, and anything that breaks your guidelines. The comment disappears for everyone except its author and your page admins.
Offensive is not the only reason to hide. Maybe you do not want public questions about delivery, pricing, or compatibility. Tell Zipchat in the rules and it hides those too.
The default rules already cover when to reply in public, when to reply in private, when to like a comment, when to hide it, when to ignore it, and even when to delete it. You can edit all of them. You can also rewrite the automatic message Zipchat leaves under a comment when it says it will text the shopper privately.
Set it up in a few minutes
Alessandro did the whole setup live, and it took about a minute.
For Instagram:
- Open the Channels page in Zipchat, choose Instagram, and click Setup.
- Check the requirements: an Instagram professional account, linked to a Facebook page you administer, with access to messages allowed.
- Click Open account picker, select your account (you can pick more than one for the same agent), and click Connect accounts.
- Switch on replies to direct messages and comments, then save.
For Facebook, the steps are the same: Channels, Facebook, Setup, choose your page, click Connect, then Setup comment replies. The comment rules are identical to Instagram.
The whole recipe fits in one line: connect your account, pick what the AI can handle, set your comment and moderation rules, test it, and go live.
What we tested live
Alessandro opened a test Instagram page with a product post and wrote a comment: “I love it, but do you guys ship to Italy?”
A few seconds later the comment appeared in the Zipchat conversations tab with an answer already drafted. On Instagram, Zipchat had replied under the comment, saying it would help check shipping options to Italy. It had also sent a DM, where the agent kept asking questions to see whether it could meet the request.
Had the comment been hateful, Zipchat would have hidden it. Had it been a compliment, Zipchat would have liked it.
Make rules around your products
Rules can depend on what the post is selling. Alessandro’s example: if a customer asks about the product in the post, reach out in private and give them discount code ABC, never in public. The agent follows your instructions, so you decide the offer, the product, and the channel.
His summary of the cost: it is like getting a free employee, for the price of a few AI replies.
Questions merchants asked live
Does the reply show my name or a chatbot name?
Your own. Replies are sent from your Instagram account under the name you already use.
I use ManyChat with keyword automations. What happens?
Turn them off. Two providers on the same account means shoppers receive multiple messages, and that can cause trouble with Meta, up to a blocked or suspended account. You can copy the logic into Zipchat instead, using the additional instructions section. For example: when someone writes “discount”, reply with this message.
Yes, with a double instruction. There is one section for when to hide a comment and one for when to reply privately. Put the same rule in both and Zipchat does both.
Alessandro’s advice: use hiding for hateful content and spam. When a question is a real question, leave the comment up and reply in private. Other shoppers with the same question see it is answered, and you can reach out to them in private too.
Can I decide which questions the agent answers?
Yes. Use the skip conversation feature, which can filter by channel, together with the prompt. You can tell the agent never to reply to certain topics, or to answer only specific kinds of questions on comments.
For stores with a very high volume of comments, in the range of 2,000 a day, Alessandro offered free replies for a test of a week, a few weeks, or a month. After that you can check whether answering every comment moved sales, or whether picking the right ones is the better plan.
Is this different from what Zipchat did before on Instagram and Facebook?
Yes. Before, Zipchat handled direct messages only. Now it handles comments and posts too, and it acts like a social media manager: it can hide a comment and answer a user in private. It also has the context of the post, story, or video you published, which makes its answers more complete.
Who this is for
This is for ecommerce owners, marketing managers, and customer care teams who run Instagram and Facebook, spend on ads, and want to grow on social without living in the inbox.
Two requirements are worth stating plainly. You need an Instagram professional account linked to a Facebook page you administer. And you should not run another automation provider on the same account.
Frequently asked questions
It is one Zipchat agent that answers Instagram and Facebook direct messages, replies to comments on posts and ads, hides spam and unwanted comments, and hands conversations to your team when a human is needed.
Instagram, Facebook, and Facebook Messenger. You can connect more than one Instagram account to the same agent.
No. It uses the knowledge, prompts, skills, tone of voice, and product strategy you already set up for your website agent. You connect the channel and it picks everything up.
Yes, on both Instagram ads and Facebook ads. Every question under an ad gets an answer, so the traffic you paid for stops leaking sales.
Yes. It can hide spam, scam links, fake giveaways, offensive comments, and anything else that breaks your guidelines. A hidden comment stays visible only to its author and your page admins.
Whose name appears on the replies?
Your own. Replies go out from your Instagram or Facebook account under the name you already use, not under a chatbot name.
Can I keep ManyChat running on the same account?
No. Two automation providers on one account means shoppers get duplicate messages, which can trigger problems with Meta, including a blocked or suspended account. Turn ManyChat off and move its keyword rules into Zipchat’s additional instructions.
What do I need to connect Instagram?
An Instagram professional account, linked to a Facebook page you administer, with access to messages allowed. Most merchants already meet all three.
How long does setup take?
Connecting an account takes about a minute. Adjusting the comment and moderation rules to your taste takes a few more minutes.
Watch the recording and connect your accounts
The full session is above, including the live setup and the test comment. To try it, open Channels in Zipchat, pick Instagram or Facebook, and click Setup. You can read more about the product on the AI social media manager page, or look at the Instagram and Messenger channels.
Alessandro also pointed to the next session, held on October 22: 10 plug and play improvements to get 20% more revenue this Black Friday. The recording and the full written breakdown are now online.
Written by Alessandro Valenti, Head of Success at Zipchat. Published October 8, 2026.
Website chat Turns browsers into buyers on every page. 
WhatsApp Sell on the app your customers read. 
Instagram Answers every DM in seconds. 
Messenger Turns Facebook ad questions into sales. 
Email Answers every email in the same thread. 
