Build an internal-note draft agent for Zendesk

Draft a KB-grounded reply as a private comment on every new Zendesk ticket — the human rep reviews and sends.

Overview

In this tutorial, you'll build a Reply Drafter agent in the Inkeep Visual Builder. When a new ticket lands in Zendesk, the agent will:

Read the customer's question
Search your knowledge base for relevant docs
Post a draft reply as a private (internal) comment on the ticket, with sources cited

The rep opens the ticket and the draft is already there — they review, tweak, and send. The work shifts from writing to reviewing.

Prerequisites

Access to Inkeep Enterprise — schedule a demo if you don't have it yet
A Zendesk org where the agent can post internal (private) comments on tickets
A Zendesk MCP server registered in your project, with a tool that posts an internal comment on a ticket. If you don't have one yet, see Build Custom MCP Servers.
An Inkeep Unified Search MCP connected to your knowledge base, with a search tool exposed. If you haven't set this up, follow the Customer Assistant setup — the credential + MCP registration steps there are the same here.

Create the Reply Drafter agent

In the Visual Builder, go to the Agents tab in the left sidebar and click Create agent.

Click the Default Sub Agent on the canvas to configure it. Fill in:

Name: Reply Drafter
Description: Reads a Zendesk ticket, searches the knowledge base, and posts a draft reply as an internal comment.
Prompt: Paste the prompt below

Prompt:

# Your job

For every incoming Zendesk ticket, search your knowledge base for relevant docs and post a draft reply as a **private (internal) comment** on the ticket. Never reply publicly — the comment is for a human rep to review and send.

# How to draft

1. Read the customer's question from the trigger message
2. Call **search-knowledge-base** to find relevant docs
3. Write a clear, 2-3 paragraph draft reply grounded in what the docs say
4. If the docs don't cover the question, say so plainly in the draft — don't invent facts

# Post the comment

Call **add_internal_ticket_comment** exactly once with:

- `ticket_id` — from the trigger message
- `body` — the draft, formatted like this:

✍️ Draft reply

[Your drafted answer here, 2-3 paragraphs]

Sources:
- [URL 1]
- [URL 2]

— Drafted by AI. Review before sending.

Tip

Tool names to verify before you save:

search-knowledge-base is the example name for the Inkeep Unified Search tool. Your MCP may name it differently — swap it in the prompt to match.
add_internal_ticket_comment is the example name for the Zendesk internal-comment tool. Same — swap if your MCP names it differently.

Connect the MCPs

On the agent canvas, drag and drop an MCP block from the top left toolbar. Select your Inkeep Unified Search MCP and connect it to the Reply Drafter sub agent.

Click the MCP block and restrict Active Tools to only the knowledge-base search tool — the agent doesn't need anything else from this MCP.

Drag a second MCP block onto the canvas. Select your Zendesk MCP and connect it to the Reply Drafter sub agent.

Click the Zendesk MCP block and restrict Active Tools to only the tool that posts an internal/private comment — this agent only writes internal comments, so leaving other tools enabled invites mistakes.

Click Save Changes in the top right corner.

Create the webhook trigger

The trigger is the door Zendesk knocks on to wake the agent up.

Go to Triggers in the left sidebar and click New Webhook Trigger.

Select the Reply Drafter agent you just built as the agent this trigger will invoke, then click Continue.

Fill in:

Name: e.g. Zendesk new-ticket trigger (drafter)
Authentication: None — the URL itself is the secret

Click Create Trigger. Copy the webhook URL that appears — you'll need it in the next section.

Wire Zendesk to fire the trigger

Now set up Zendesk so every new ticket POSTs to the trigger URL you just copied.

See Trigger Inkeep agents from Zendesk tickets — paste your trigger URL into the Zendesk webhook's Endpoint URL. Come back here when you're done.

Test the agent

From an outside email address, send a test ticket to your Zendesk support address with a question your knowledge base should be able to answer (e.g., "How do I get started with [product]?").

Switch to the Zendesk tab, find the new ticket, and refresh.

Within about 15 seconds, an internal comment appears on the ticket containing the AI's draft reply and the docs it cited. The customer sees nothing yet — the draft is for the rep, not the customer.