Comment to DM that turns Instagram viewers into contacts without flagging creators as bots — then Kajabi’s first Visual Editor, so back-to-back nurture (text, email, social) lives in one canvas instead of ManyChat trees.
Executive summary
30-second readLead Product Designer — sole designer with PM David Wang through Visual Editor handoff.
Owned: Comment to DM end-to-end (safety defaults, setup UI) and the first Automations 2.0 Visual Editor (canvas, branching, performance) through eng-ready specs.
Co-led: Advanced Messaging strategy — Conversation Hub–ready permissions and contact model.
Constraint: Maternity leave at handoff — another designer owned build and launch. Comment to DM shipped; VE launch metrics sit after my ownership.
Creators get seen on Instagram — but those viewers aren’t convertible contacts. Many already pay ManyChat and other tools to turn social engagement into email addresses. Meanwhile Kajabi Automations only supported one trigger → one action, so deeper marketing trees lived outside the product.
of heroes use ManyChat for lead capture — Comment to DM is its #1 adoption driver
of Kajabi contacts are imported from outside the product (85% via bulk upload)
of contacts convert to paid within 35 days; 83% who hit GMV in their first 30 days had ≥5 contacts
Aimed at Hobbyists and Builders. Two steps:
Comment to DM
Instagram → DM in today’s Automations.
Visual Editor
Canvas for multi-trigger flows — up to 50 actions.
Conversation Hub
View and reply to Automations 2.0 conversations in one place inside Kajabi.
These came from creator interviews about off-platform automation trees, survey and discovery work on social → contacts, and 7 usability sessions in Dec 2024 on Comment to DM setup.
Biggest pain: only isolated this→that pairs. Creators walked me through deep, wide trees in ManyChat, GoHighLevel, and Zapier. They wanted that sophistication in Kajabi — one view, and room to build elaborate journeys.
So Design a Visual Editor canvas — multi-trigger, branching, up to 50 stacked actions — so creators can see and edit strategy in one glance. Decision 04.
Creators reach audiences on email, Facebook, and Instagram (71% use Instagram DMs; 63% Messenger). Social is visibility; email is nurture. Viewers aren’t contacts yet — so they can’t convert inside Kajabi. 50% of contacts are still imported from outside (85% via bulk upload).
So Comment to DM bridges Instagram in; the Visual Editor carries the rest — text, email, and future social platforms — so contacts turn into customers inside Kajabi. What we built.
Creators wanted native Comment to DM to drop ManyChat (“too many tools… under one umbrella”). They asked for delay guidance so Instagram wouldn’t flag them — and picked 5–10 seconds. Setup UI split by context: for Step 1 Comment to DM we tested a step-by-step drawer vs. a one-page modal (most preferred seeing the full setup at once); for Step 2’s Visual Editor, one-step config that stays tied to the canvas favored a drawer.
So Delay by default. Ship Step 1 in a modal with accordion sections; use a Visual Editor drawer when detail work has to stay connected to the canvas. Decision 01 · UI.
“There’s just too many tools and we just want things under one umbrella.” Reelika · usability interview · ex-ManyChat
“There is a little bit more of an authentic feel to it if you can have a little delay there.” Robin · usability interview
Those findings set the product calls below — delay and keywords as defaults, a Visual Editor canvas, and setup patterns that differ for Comment to DM vs. the canvas.
Calls that shaped Comment to DM and Automations 2.0 — product rules first, then the setup UI for Step 1 vs. Step 2.
Core responsibility: Automations 2.0 must not get creators flagged as spam or bots on Instagram (and later other social). Chose: configurable delay (0s–5min), up to 10 varied replies, auto-like. Creators picked 5–10s in testing. Business: safe native capture vs. ManyChat. Design: human-feeling defaults, not buried settings.
Most creators want “comment HELPER for the freebie” — not a DM to every comment. Keywords first (max 5); all-comments stays for boost posts.
Capture Hub-ready DM permissions in Step 1, but don’t count Instagram handles against plan limits until Conversation Hub can support two-way messaging — so creators can view and reply to Automations 2.0 conversations in one place inside Kajabi. Avoids punishing early adopters and re-consenting later.
I was the first to design Automations 2.0’s Visual Editor. Extending Rails-era one-to-one UI for long chains would make it unusable — and Comment to DM is only one recipe on a much bigger canvas. Chose: a new canvas (pan/zoom) with multi-trigger, branching, and stacked actions across text, email, and (later) more social platforms — up to 50 actions per flow, not unlimited — plus per-step performance on the journey, and a drawer for detail config so creators keep the canvas in view. Business: deep multi-channel trees stay in Kajabi. Design: clear journey view with data on what works; intricate one-step edits (SMS copy, etc.) open beside the flow, not over it.
Triggers
Actions
In Dec 2024 usability sessions we tested both patterns for Comment to DM. Most creators — especially Builders — preferred seeing the full setup at once over a forced Next → Next path. They called the one-page version clearer and “better to visualize”; the step-by-step drawer split decisions across screens.
Explored
Select options, then press Next for the next set. Clear for some first-timers, but felt linear and fragmented in testing.
Preferred
All options on one page; accordion opens more as creators select. Preferred in sessions — full setup visible, faster to scan and edit.
On the Visual Editor canvas, the call flipped. Many option layers are already chosen on the nodes themselves; the panel only needs to open for denser, one-step work — writing SMS copy, longer message fields, and similar detail. A modal would cover the canvas those controls still need to stay tied to. Creators preferred a drawer here: one step, beside the flow, interacting with what’s already selected on the Visual Editor.
Explored
Blocks the journey view while creators configure a node — breaks the link between drawer contents and the Visual Editor they’re editing.
Chose
Opens when options get intricate (SMS text, etc.); stays connected to the selected node. Preferred for one-step config in the Visual Editor experience.
Step 1 — Comment to DM
Shipped into Marketing → Automations (next to Email and Funnels): connect Instagram, pick a post, keywords or all-comments, delay + auto-like, DM with Kajabi link, results (delivered / opened / clicked). Lead capture without waiting on the new canvas.
Comment
Keyword
Delay
DM
Results
Step 2 — Visual Editor
A canvas far beyond Comment to DM: creators compose journeys across text, email, and — later — more social platforms, with multi-trigger, branching, and stacked actions — up to 50 per flow (vs. 1 trigger + 1 action today). Detail config opens in a drawer beside the canvas — not a modal — so node options stay tied to the flow (SMS copy and other one-step, text-heavy edits). Performance sits on the journey too — creators can see how each step runs, not just that the tree exists. Comment to DM is one recipe on that canvas. Every Step 1 field was shaped so it doesn’t need a redesign when it lands there.
Performance on the canvas
Building the journey is only half the job. Toggle performance on the canvas to see how each step runs — sends, opens, clicks, unsubscribes — without leaving the flow. Creators can spot what’s working and tune what isn’t on the same tree they built.
Designed and tested both steps through eng-ready handoff. Another designer took build and launch when I went on maternity leave.
Delivered
Targets (post-handoff — not measured in this case)
What worked: Comment to DM in today’s Automations first — Instagram capture before the Visual Editor existed — with delay defaults and varied replies so accounts weren’t flagged. Interviews made the Visual Editor job clear: creators couldn’t see how automations connected, and they’d already built deep trees outside Kajabi. Designing and testing that canvas before handoff gave eng a real interaction model, not just frames.
What I’d change: Flag contacts / social-handle engineering earlier. Comment to DM looked quick until that rearchitecture slowed it vs. the Visual Editor.
On the handoff: Maternity leave meant stopping after design + testing. Docs for the two-step plan, safety defaults, and Conversation Hub–ready permissions let another designer own build without reopening those calls.
Lesson: On social automation, speed is the wrong default. Delayed, human-feeling replies make native capture viable — and one Visual Editor makes text, email, and future social marketing livable inside Kajabi, not just Comment to DM.
AI that drafts and suggests on the Visual Editor and Comment to DM — creators still control send.