Power Intercom Fin to act proactively based on frustration signals (beta)

The Pendo integration with Intercom's Fin AI Agent sends real-time frustration events from Pendo to Intercom through webhooks. Joint Pendo and Intercom customers can use this to trigger proactive Fin conversations when visitors show signs of friction in their app.

This article explains how the connection works, what you need before you begin, and how to set it up in both Pendo and Intercom.

Use cases

This integration sends frustration signals (rage click, error click, U-turn) to Intercom in real time. Pendo and Intercom customers can use these signals to:

• Re-engage users before they drop off and churn.
• Identify and solve frustrations as soon as they occur.

How it works

The integration connects Pendo frustration event data to Intercom's automation and messenger products through webhooks. The end-to-end flow has four stages:

1. A visitor shows friction in your app. Pendo detects a frustration event, such as a rage click, error click, or U-turn on a tagged Page or Feature.
2. Pendo sends an event to Intercom. The Intercom webhook in your Pendo subscription delivers the event to Intercom in real time, including Page or Feature context.
3. Intercom triggers a Fin conversation. An Outbound message rule in Intercom listens for the incoming event and opens a proactive Fin Messenger conversation with the visitor, such as "I noticed you're having trouble with X. Want me to help?"

The webhook delivery is configured in your Pendo subscription. The Outbound message and Fin conversation flow are configured in Intercom.

Frustration signals

The integration sends events for the following frustration types that Pendo detects on tagged Pages and Features:

• Rage click. A visitor repeatedly clicks in a focused area of your UI.
• Error click. A visitor clicks an element that triggers a client-side JavaScript error.
• U-turn. A visitor navigates to a Page and returns to the previous Page within seven seconds.

Tip: Frustration events are tracked on tagged Pages and Features. For best results, give your Pages and Features descriptive names and descriptions so Fin has clear context about where the visitor is stuck.

Before you begin

To complete this set up, you need:

• An Intercom workspace with Fin enabled.
• An Intercom access token. Access this from the Intercom Developer Hub.
• Subscription admin permissions in Pendo to turn on and create webhooks.

Step 1. Turn on Webhooks in settings

You must turn on Webhooks in Pendo to send data to Intercom Fin. To do this:

1. In Pendo, go to Settings > Subscription settings.
2. In the Settings tab, go to the Integrations settings.
3. Select Enable Webhooks if it isn't already enabled.

Step 2. Create the Intercom webhook in Pendo

The Intercom webhook is how Pendo sends frustration events to Intercom in real time. Without this webhook, Intercom has no way to know when a visitor rage-clicks, error-clicks, or U-turns in your app.

To create the Intercom webhook:

1. In Pendo, go to Settings > Integrations.
2. Select the Webhooks tab.
3. Select Add Webhook.
4. In the webhook configuration page, provide the following information:
   • Name. Give a descriptive name to the Intercom webhook, such as where the webhook is going and which data is being sent.
   • Type. Select Intercom.
   • Region. Select the Intercom region your workspace runs in (US, EU, or AU).
   • Access Token. Paste the access token you generated in Intercom. To find this token in Intercom, go to Developer Hub, select your app, and open the Authentication tab.
   • Frustration Signals. Choose which frustration types to send: rage click, error click, U-turn, or any combination.
5. Select Save Webhook.
6. In the webhooks list, toggle the new webhook to On.
7. To confirm the webhook is working, rage-click in your app and check that pendo-frustration-events appears on your user's page in Intercom.

Step 3. Configure the outbound message in Intercom

Create an Intercom outbound message that listens for the Pendo frustration signal and opens a proactive Fin conversation with the visitor.

Important: The final step of activating the outbound message is handled manually by the MCP team at Pendo. Once you've configured your outbound message, contact the Pendo MCP team to finish the process and set the outbound message live. This step is temporary while the feature is in beta. Once it's generally available in Intercom, this manual step won't be required.

In the Intercom app:

1. Go to Outbound.
2. Select New Message > Chat.

3. In Rules > Triggers > When to send, search for Pendo frustration signal and select it.

   Note: If Pendo frustration signal doesn't appear in the trigger list, no frustration signal has been received yet. Generate a frustration event in your app, for example, by rage-clicking, and try again. If the trigger still doesn't appear, check that the Intercom webhook is turned on in Pendo.

4. In Content, select Add follow up action > Let Fin respond.
5. Choose how the proactive support appears to the visitor: badge, snippet, or full message.
6. Optionally, set frequency limits to control how often proactive support can be triggered for a single user.
7. Save the outbound message, but don't set it live yet.
8. Contact the Pendo MCP team to configure the proactive frustration support tag. You need to provide your Intercom app ID and Outbound chat ID, which are available in the URL for the new outbound message.
9. Once Pendo confirms the tag is configured, set the outbound message live.

When a visitor triggers a frustration event on a tagged Page or Feature, Fin offers to help in real time.