How to Create a Chatbot

Create the Chatbot App

Private Setup (backend-authenticated)

Public Setup (embeddable, no backend)

Find Your Tokens and Usage Later

A Chatbot is an AI interviewer that you can embed on your own site to conduct interviews with visitors.

When creating a Chatbot, choose between Private (server-authenticated) and Public (embeddable). The rest of the setup depends on this choice.

Private (server-authenticated) — your backend creates each interview session using a Secret Token, then passes a short-lived session token to the browser. This provides more control and is best suited to logged-in users or gated flows. It requires a small amount of backend code.

Public (embeddable) — a Public Token is placed directly into a <script> tag on an allowed-listed domain; no backend is required. The Chatbot is pinned to a single Guide, and because the token is publicly visible, this is similar to publicly sharing a Guide’s share link. Interviews conducted from Public access chatbots are rate-limited to prevent abuse.

Choose Private or Public carefully when creating your Chatbot. You cannot change the Chatbot from one access type to the other after it is created.

Create the Chatbot App

In the main navigation, go to Apps and click + New App.

Apps page with the + New App button highlighted to show where to start creating a new app.

Select the Chatbot card.

New App screen with the Chatbot card highlighted as the app type to select.

Enter a Name for the Chatbot. This is an internal label and must be unique within your team.

Create Chatbot form with Private selected, showing the Name field and Create button.

Choose Private or Public.

Private: Click Create. No additional fields are required.
Public: Additional fields appear. Complete the Public Setup below.

The Chatbot creation form is minimal. Name is the only field always required. The Guide and Allowed Domains fields appear only when you select Public.

Private Setup (backend-authenticated)

Private is selected by default. No additional fields are required to create a Private Chatbot.

You don’t choose a Guide when creating a Private Chatbot. Your backend supplies the Guide for each interview session.

Once a Chatbot is created with the Private setup, it cannot be converted to the Public setup.

After you create the Chatbot, it opens on its edit page, where you can access the Secret Token.

Reveal and copy the Secret Token (starts with sk_bot_… ).

Private Chatbot edit page with the Secret Token field highlighted.

Important: The Secret Token authenticates session creation for the whole team's Chatbot. Keep it server-side only — never put it in front-end code or a public repository. If the token leaks, delete the Chatbot and create a new one.

To generate a private session token, go to the Generate a Private Session Token section in [How to Embed a Private Chatbot].

Public Setup (embeddable, no backend)

When you select Public, additional fields appear on the creation form.

Choose a Guide in the Guide field. The field is searchable. The Public Token is pinned to this Guide, so the Guide ID does not need to be exposed in the browser.

Create Chatbot form with Public selected and showing the Guide field.

Add one or more Allowed Domains using Add Domain. At least one domain is required. Enter bare hostnames such as example.com . If you paste a full URL such as https://www.example.com/pricing , it is reduced to example.com . The Chatbot will only run when embedded on the allowed domains.

Public Chatbot creation form showing the Allowed Domains section with example.com and Add Domain.

Click Create. The Chatbot is now created and opens on its edit page, where you can access the Public Token.
Reveal and copy the Public Token (starts with pk_bot_… ). The Public Token is safe to embed.

Public Chatbot edit page with the Public Token field highlighted.

Once a Chatbot is created with the Public setup, it cannot be converted to the Private setup.

Find Your Tokens and Usage Later

On the Chatbot’s edit page, you can access the following:

Secret Token / Public Token — reveal and copy the token for the Chatbot.
Logs — view the Chatbot’s token usage, including sessions issued or denied.

Chatbot edit page with the Logs tab selected, showing the Token Usage section.

Installation — access the embed and setup instructions for the Chatbot.

Note: Tokens do not rotate when you edit a Chatbot. Deleting the Chatbot immediately invalidates its tokens.

The key difference between the two setups is how the Chatbot is embedded and authenticated. Private Chatbots use server-side authentication and give you more control over how interview sessions are created. Public Chatbots can be embedded directly on an allow-listed domain without backend code.

To continue with embedding and managing your Chatbot, see: