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Enabling/Disabling Structured Content Interactions for Guided Bot Conversations

Technical Configuration Guide
    Updated:
    1 min read

    Structured content enhances conversational commerce by enabling richer interactions, seamless customer journeys, and operational efficiency. While existing behaviors are preserved by default, brands can tailor structured content (SC) configurations to meet their specific conversational needs. Despite some limitations such as current restrictions in the Bot Studio and Agent Workspace, planned updates will expand functionality and address gaps.

    This guide provides a comprehensive overview of enabling and disabling SC interactions in LivePerson to create more guided and predictable bot conversations. It empowers brands to control user interactions by:

    • Enabling or disabling old SC, including outdated or previously presented content, to streamline conversation flows.
    • Restricting or disabling the free text input area when SC is presented, ensuring users interact only with the latest structured options.

    By focusing on these capabilities, brands can eliminate conversation disruptions, improve bot flow predictability, and deliver a smoother, more consistent user experience. These features address key challenges in conversational design, allowing for highly effective and tailored bot interactions.

    Key Benefits

    • Control Over Structured Content Availability: Enables or disables user interaction with structured content (SC) that is not the latest or freshest, ensuring the bot only presents actionable options. This prevents users from engaging with outdated SC and avoids disruptions to the conversation flow.
    • Disable Free Text Input for Guided Interactions: Restricts user input to the latest SC options, eliminating the risk of bot flows breaking due to unexpected free text inputs.

    Customer Benefits

    • Enhanced Flow Control: Enforces response patterns that align with bot or agent expectations, maintaining a smooth conversational flow.
    • Minimized Errors: Reduces unintended user interactions by guiding users to appropriate responses.
    • Improved User Experience: Provides clear, structured pathways, ensuring seamless and predictable interaction.

    To achieve these controls, LivePerson introduces a dual-level configuration approach:

    • Brand-Level Settings: Applied across all flows unless overridden, these settings provide high-level management for SC interactions via the management console.
    • Component-Level Flags: Embedded directly in the JSON of each SC component, these flags offer granular control, taking precedence over brand-level settings when defined.

    This guide equips the following audience with the tools to implement SC effectively while adhering to LivePerson’s best practices:

    • Developers: Implementing SC configurations.
    • Product Teams: Defining user interaction flows.
    • Administrators: Managing brand-level settings.

    Feature Capabilities

    Disabling Old Structured Content

    Objective: Prevent users from interacting with SC that is no longer the latest message.

    Behavior: When the flag blockSCWhenNotLastMsg is enabled:

    • Old SC elements are grayed out.
    • Action buttons are disabled but remain visible.
    • Screen readers indicate these items as disabled.
    Image

    1. All components, including the image and buttons, are interactive. 2. The image and one button are disabled, while two other buttons remain interactive. 3. All components, including the image and buttons, are disabled and non-interactive.

    Locking Text Input Field

    Objective: Restrict user responses to SC options, disabling free text input.

    Behavior: When the flag blockTextInput is enabled:

    • Text input becomes non-interactive.
    • The “Send” button is disabled.
    • Users must select one of the SC options.

    Configuration Overview

    Brand-Level Settings

    • messaging.web.blockSCWhenNotLastMsgDefault: Controls the default behavior for structured content (SC) interactivity. If set to true, SC is interactive; if false, it is not interactive. This setting determines the enablement of SC interactivity at the brand level.
    • messaging.web.blockTextInputDefault: Controls the default behavior for text input interactivity. If enabled, users are restricted from entering free text and are guided to interact only with SC options.

    SC-Level Flags

    • blockSCWhenNotLastMsg: Overrides the brand-level setting for SC interactivity. This flag is set on the structured content JSON object and can be applied at different levels, from the top level (affecting all components of a structured content group, such as a carousel, buttons, links, or images) to the most granular level (specific to individual components).
    • blockTextInput: Overrides the brand-level setting for text input interactivity. Like the SC flag, this is set on the structured content JSON object and can be applied at different levels, from the top level to each component.

    SC-level flags always take precedence over brand-level settings.

    By using these configuration options, brands can flexibly manage SC and text input behavior to meet specific interaction requirements, ensuring both control and adaptability in bot-guided conversations.

    Implementation Details

    Example Configurations

    JSON schema for enabling SC Non-Interactivity flag:

    javascript:
    { "blockSCWhenNotLastMsg": true }

    JSON schema for enabling Lock Text Input flag:

    javascript:
    { "blockTextInput": true }

    JSON schema for enabling both flags:

    javascript:
    { "blockSCWhenNotLastMsg": true, "blockTextInput": true }

    UI/UX Behavior for Disabled SC

    • Appearance: Disabled structured content (SC) components typically appear grayed out. However, the exact disabled color depends on the browser’s default styling for disabled elements. For example, some browsers might use a color other than gray.
    • Screen Reader Support: Screen readers announce disabled SC components as “disabled,” ensuring accessibility compliance.
    • Interaction: Users can view the disabled SC components but they cannot select or interact with them.

    The disabled behavior of structured content is also reflected in the Agent Workspace, allowing agents to see which SC components were disabled during the user interaction.

    Enablement Steps

    Setting Up Brand-Level Defaults

    1. Reach out to your LivePerson account team or support team to enable the required features in the backend configuration.
    2. Work with your account team to set the following parameters:
      • messaging.web.blockSCWhenNotLastMsgDefault 
      • messaging.web.blockTextInputDefault

    Configuring SC-Level Flags

    1. Modify the structured content JSON to include the required flags:
      • blockSCWhenNotLastMsg
      • blockTextInput
    2. Verify the behavior of the flags by testing the structured content to ensure proper functionality.

    Testing and Validation

    Verify SC interactivity and text input restrictions in a non-production environment.

    Conversational Design Guidelines

    • Employ SC interactivity restrictions and text input limitations judiciously to avoid negatively impacting the user experience.
    • Incorporate a fallback option in the bot flow, such as a “Something Else” button, to ensure users can communicate their needs if none of the structured content options suit them. This improves user satisfaction and prevents conversation dead ends.

    Button Naming Standards

    • Use clear and descriptive labels that prompt users to take specific actions.
    • Use language that is easy to understand and resonates with the target audience.
    • Ensure button naming conventions remain uniform throughout the bot for a seamless experience.

    Use Cases

    • Guided Flows: Use for close-ended questions, e.g., “Yes/No” or “Select an Option.”
    • Restricted Input Scenarios: API-driven workflows where free text increases error likelihood.

    Limitations

    • Drag-and-Drop Support in Conversation Builder: Configuration fields for enabling or disabling structured content and text input are not supported in the drag-and-drop UI of LivePerson’s Conversation Builder, where bot flows are designed.
    • Bot Preview Issues: There may be limitations or inconsistencies in previewing bot flows with these configurations in the Conversation Builder preview environment. Always validate in a live testing environment for accuracy.

    For more information on Structured Content, refer to the following in Developer Center:


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