Connecting
Under Settings, then Channels, connect the Facebook Page and the Instagram professional account you want the agent to answer for. Each channel stores its own page access token, so the two can be connected independently and revoked independently.The 24-hour window
Both channels enforce a 24-hour messaging window after the customer’s last message. Inside it, the agent replies freely. Outside it, the conversation cannot be reopened by you. This is stricter than WhatsApp, which at least allows an approved template outside the window. On Instagram and Messenger there is no template equivalent for a general business reply, so a conversation that goes cold stays cold until the customer writes again. The platform enforces this before attempting a send, so you get a clear skipped state rather than a Meta API error.Identity
Meta identifies a DM sender by an opaque, per-app id rather than by a phone number or an email address. That id is stable for your app, so a returning customer is recognised as the same person on the same channel. It cannot be matched to a phone number. Someone who DMs you on Instagram and later calls you is two customer records until they give you a detail that links them. See Memory and state.What the agent can do
The DM channels carry a narrower tool surface than voice or WhatsApp. The agent answers from your knowledge, qualifies, and escalates. Where a tool would promise something the channel cannot deliver reliably, the agent is told it does not have that tool rather than being left to offer it and fail. Escalation works normally: the thread lands in your inbox and your alerting rules fire.In the inbox
Instagram and Messenger conversations appear alongside every other channel, with their own filter chips and channel badges. Nothing about working the thread differs.Limits
- No sending outside the 24-hour window.
- No group threads.
- Story replies and mentions arrive as ordinary inbound messages where Meta forwards them.
- Identity cannot be reconciled with phone-based channels automatically.