Support Channels & Elements

Mantle Helpdesk supports multiple channels for receiving customer support requests, plus elements that extend your helpdesk with integrations to external tools. All messages flow into a single unified inbox where your team can respond.

This guide covers the three support channels and the available elements:

• Email — Traditional email support with forwarding and custom domains

• Slack — Turn Slack messages into tickets with emoji reactions

• Chat — Live chat widget embedded in your app or website

• GitHub element — Create GitHub issues from tickets and sync status

Email support

Email is the most traditional support channel. Customers send emails to your support address, and those emails appear as tickets in your Mantle inbox. When your team replies, the response is sent back to the customer via email.

How email support works

Mantle uses email forwarding to receive inbound emails. Here's the flow:

1. Customer sends an email to your support address (e.g., [email protected])

2. Your email provider forwards the message to Mantle's forwarding address

3. Mantle creates a ticket and matches it to the customer (if known)

4. Your team responds from the Mantle inbox

5. The reply is sent from your verified domain back to the customer

Setting up email support

To enable email support, you need to configure two things: email addresses for receiving mail, and domains for sending mail.

Adding an email address

1. Go to Help Desk > Settings > Channels

2. Select the Email tab

3. Click Add email address

4. Enter a name (e.g., "Support team") and the email address

5. Optionally associate the address with a specific app

6. Click Add email address

After adding the address, Mantle generates a unique forwarding address. You'll need to configure your email provider (Gmail, Outlook, etc.) to forward emails to this address.

Adding a sending domain

To send outbound emails from your domain (instead of a generic Mantle address), you need to verify domain ownership:

1. Click Add domain in the Domains section

2. Enter your domain name (e.g., yourapp.com)

3. Add the required DNS records to your domain:

   • CNAME records for DKIM authentication

   • TXT record for DMARC policy

4. Click Verify domain once DNS records propagate (usually 15 minutes to 24 hours)

Email configuration options

Slack support

Slack integration lets your team receive support tickets directly from Slack channels. This is ideal for B2B apps where you already communicate with customers via shared Slack channels.

How Slack support works

Instead of monitoring Slack 24/7, you can configure Mantle to watch specific channels and create tickets based on emoji reactions:

1. Customer posts a message in a monitored Slack channel

2. A team member (or the customer) reacts with the trigger emoji (e.g., eyes emoji)

3. Mantle creates a ticket linked to that Slack message

4. Your team can respond from Mantle or directly in Slack

5. React with the resolved emoji (e.g., checkmark) to close the ticket

Setting up Slack support

1. Go to Help Desk > Settings > Channels

2. Select the Slack tab

3. Click Connect Slack workspace and authorize the Mantle app

4. Click Add channel to monitor a Slack channel

Adding a channel to monitor

1. In Slack, right-click the channel you want to monitor

2. Click View channel details

3. Scroll to the bottom and copy the Channel ID

4. Paste the ID in the Mantle "Add channel" modal

5. Configure the trigger emoji and resolved emoji

6. Invite the Mantle bot to the channel: /invite @Mantle

Slack configuration options

Pro tip: Use dedicated Slack channels for your biggest customers and link them to specific customer records. This automatically associates all tickets with the right customer.

Chat support

The chat widget provides real-time messaging directly in your app or website. Customers can get help without leaving your product, and conversations can seamlessly continue via email if needed.

How chat support works

1. You embed the Mantle widget on your app or website

2. Customers click the chat icon to start a conversation

3. Messages appear in your Mantle inbox as tickets

4. Your team responds in real-time (or the AI agent can help)

5. If the customer leaves, the conversation can continue via email

Setting up chat support

Chat support is configured through the widget settings in Help Desk > Settings > Widget. You'll need to:

1. Create a widget and associate it with your app

2. Configure the chat channel settings (availability, authentication)

3. Embed the widget code in your app or website

See the Support Widget documentation for detailed setup instructions.

Chat configuration options

Managing multiple channels

All channels feed into the same unified inbox. When viewing tickets, you can see which channel each ticket came from using the channel badge (Email, Slack, or Chat).

Channel-specific responses

When you respond to a ticket, the reply is automatically sent through the same channel the customer used:

• Email tickets — Reply is sent as an email

• Slack tickets — Reply is posted as a thread reply in Slack

• Chat tickets — Reply appears in the chat widget (or email if customer is offline)

Enabling and disabling channels

Each channel can be enabled or disabled independently. When a channel is disabled:

• No new tickets will be created from that channel

• Existing tickets remain accessible

• You can respond to existing tickets

To toggle a channel, go to its settings page and click Enable channel or Disable channel at the bottom.

Elements

Elements extend your helpdesk by connecting to external tools. Unlike channels that receive incoming messages, elements let you take actions from tickets—like creating issues in your project tracker or syncing ticket status with external systems.

GitHub

Connect your helpdesk to GitHub to create issues directly from support tickets. When a customer reports a bug or requests a feature, you can turn that ticket into a GitHub issue—or link it to an existing one. AI helps draft the issue details, and Mantle can even find similar issues to prevent duplicates.

Setting up GitHub

1. Go to Settings > Extensions > Marketplace

2. Find GitHub and click Add installation

3. You'll be redirected to GitHub to install the Mantle GitHub App

4. Choose whether to install for your personal account or an organization

5. Select which repositories Mantle can access (all or specific ones)

6. Click Install to complete setup

You can add multiple installations if you have repositories across different GitHub accounts or organizations.

Creating issues from tickets

From any ticket, click Create GitHub Issue to open the issue creation modal. The modal helps you:

• Select a repository — Choose from your connected repositories

• Generate with AI — Let AI suggest a title, description, and labels based on the ticket

• Find similar issues — Mantle searches for existing issues that might be duplicates

• Add labels — Tag the issue with labels from your repository

When you create the issue, Mantle adds a "Mantle Relations" section to the issue body. This links back to the original ticket so developers can see the full customer conversation.

Linking existing issues

Already have a GitHub issue for this problem? Instead of creating a duplicate, you can link the ticket to an existing issue:

1. Click Create GitHub Issue on the ticket

2. Paste the URL of an existing GitHub issue or pull request

3. Mantle updates the issue to include the ticket reference

If the issue was closed, Mantle will reopen it automatically.

Reopening tickets when issues close

When a GitHub issue is resolved, you probably want to follow up with the customer who reported it. Mantle can automatically reopen the linked ticket when a GitHub issue is closed.

To enable this:

1. Go to Settings > Extensions > Marketplace > GitHub

2. Click the installation you want to configure

3. Enable Reopen tickets when GitHub issues are closed

When enabled, closing a GitHub issue will:

• Reopen the linked Mantle ticket

• Add an internal note: "This issue has been resolved, please review the ticket and contact the customer if necessary"

Issue templates

Create templates to standardize how issues are created. Templates can include:

• Default title format (using Liquid variables)

• Description template with sections for reproduction steps, expected behavior, etc.

• Assignment to specific repositories

Manage templates in Settings > Extensions > Marketplace > GitHub > Templates.

Go further

• Getting started with Helpdesk — Overview of the helpdesk features

• Support Widget — Detailed guide to embedding the chat widget

• AI-Powered Support — Configure automated responses for your channels