Channel Cards

A channel card stores a pre-configured messaging route: who to send to, how long to wait, and exactly how to phrase the message and response. Once set up, your agent only needs to populate a message, the rest is handled.

Create a channel card

Open the Channels page

Select a channel

Choose the channel your agent will use to loop in a human.

Fill out the channel details

The required fields depend on the channel type:

Channel	Required fields
SMS	Recipient phone number, wait time
WhatsApp	Recipient phone number, wait time
Slack	Slack member or channel ID, wait time
Call	Recipient phone number

Hit Create

This saves the channel card and generates a unique channel ID.

Use your channel card

Pass the channel ID in any Poku API request. No need to include to, waitTime — those are stored on the card.

curl -X POST https://api.pokulabs.com/messages/<channel-id> \
  -H "Authorization: Bearer <your-poku-api-key>" \
  -H "Content-Type: application/json" \
  -d '{
    "message": "Customer John is asking about the status of his car. When is it ready for pick-up?"
  }'

Find your channel ID on the channel card in the dashboard:

Advanced options

Reply link — SMS, WhatsApp, and Slack channels can include a reply link. Instead of replying via SMS or WhatsApp, the recipient clicks a link that takes them to the Poku dashboard to respond. Follow-up time — How long Poku keeps listening after waitTime closes. Late replies are delivered to your configured webhook. See Follow Up Time. Outgoing message template — Wrap your agent’s message in fixed context before it’s sent to the recipient. Message templates Templates let you add context around the message your agent sends — without changing the agent’s prompt. Example outgoing template:

Request from ABC Store: {{message}}. Please respond within {{waitTime}} seconds.

When your agent sends "We need your delivery address to proceed.", the recipient sees:

“Request from ABC Store: We need your delivery address to proceed. Please respond within 30 seconds.”

Response and no-response templates By default:

Response: Human response: {{message}}
No response: Human did not respond. Continue where you left off.

These are what your agent reads in the HTTP response. You can customize them to trigger specific agent behaviors. Example:

Human did not respond. Let the customer know no one is available for a transfer right now and offer to schedule a callback.

This lets you encode routing logic directly into the channel card — your agent acts on the no-response message without needing extra prompt instructions.

What a channel card stores

Field	Description
`to`	The recipient — phone number, Slack ID, or WhatsApp number
`waitTime`	Seconds to hold the request open for a reply
`followUpTime`	Seconds to keep listening after `waitTime` closes
Outgoing message template	Wraps your `{{message}}` in custom context
Response template	How a reply is formatted back to your agent
No-response template	What your agent receives if no reply comes in

Get Started

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Reference

Integrations

Create a channel card

Use your channel card

Advanced options

What a channel card stores

​Create a channel card

​Use your channel card

​Advanced options

​What a channel card stores

Create a channel card

Use your channel card

Advanced options

What a channel card stores