I can see that in the Manychat live chat it is able to see the full DM conversations on my IG account which includes the reels that another user directly shared to me. However, i cant figure out how to trigger an automation when this happens, it only works if someone sends a message with text to my IG account but it doesn’t trigger if they share a reel. Is this feature possible with Manychat?
Solved
Can Manychat detect if someone shares an Instagram reel or Tiktok via DM to me?
Best answer by cata_rendon
Hi
Hope this helps!
Cata Rendon
This is a limitation with how ManyChat handles shared media. When someone shares a reel or post to your DMs, Instagram's API delivers it as a ig_reel attachment with no text content. ManyChat's automation triggers only fire on text-based messages, which is why you can see the reel in live chat but can't trigger a flow from it.
Workaround: Ask users to send a keyword instead. Pin a comment on your reel saying "DM me REEL to get the guide" — that text message will trigger the automation reliably.
Worth noting that there are other tools out there using AI-driven responses that can actually respond to shared reels automatically since they don't depend on keyword matching. Something to explore if this is a dealbreaker for your workflow.
Hi, thanks for responding! Would you be able to share the names of some of those other tools that can respond to shared reels?
+5Hi
Hope this helps!
Cata Rendon
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