Alert your team in Slack when a VIP customer opens a Gorgias ticket using n8n

Prerequisites

Overview

This workflow receives all new Gorgias tickets via webhook, looks up the customer's profile and order history to determine if they qualify as a VIP, and posts a rich Slack alert with full context if they do. The n8n approach is more powerful than Gorgias native Rules because you can dynamically calculate VIP status — pulling live order data rather than relying on a pre-applied tag.

Step 1: Create the Webhook trigger

Add a Webhook node:

• HTTP Method: POST
• Path: gorgias-vip-alert

Copy the URL and continue.

Step 2: Register the webhook in Gorgias

Go to Settings → Integrations → HTTP → Add HTTP integration:

• Name: n8n VIP Alert
• URL: Your n8n webhook URL
• Events: Ticket created
• Content-Type: application/json

Step 3: Extract ticket and customer data

Add a Code node to pull the essentials:

const ticket = $input.first().json;
return [{
  json: {
    ticketId: ticket.id,
    subject: ticket.subject || '(no subject)',
    body: ticket.messages?.[0]?.body_text?.slice(0, 400) || '',
    customerId: ticket.requester?.id,
    customerEmail: ticket.requester?.email,
    customerName: ticket.requester?.name || ticket.requester?.email,
    existingTags: (ticket.requester?.meta?.tags || []).map(t => t.name),
  }
}];

Step 4: Check for a VIP tag

Add an IF node to fast-path customers already tagged as vip in Gorgias:

• Condition: {{ $json.existingTags.includes('vip') }} equals true

• True branch: Skip the LTV lookup — go straight to the Slack alert (Step 6)

• False branch: Fetch order history to calculate LTV (Step 5)

Step 5: Look up customer order history (LTV check)

On the False branch, add an HTTP Request node to pull the customer's Gorgias data:

• Method: GET
• URL: https://your-store.gorgias.com/api/customers/{{ $json.customerId }}
• Authentication: Basic Auth (Gorgias email + API key)

Then add a Code node to evaluate VIP status:

const customer = $input.first().json;
const stats = customer.meta || {};
 
// Adjust thresholds to match your business
const totalSpent = parseFloat(stats.shopify_total_spent || '0');
const orderCount = parseInt(stats.shopify_orders_count || '0', 10);
 
const isVip = totalSpent >= 500 || orderCount >= 5;
 
return [{
  json: {
    isVip,
    totalSpent,
    orderCount,
    customerEmail: customer.email,
    customerName: customer.name || customer.email,
  }
}];

Add an IF node: {{ $json.isVip }} equals true. Only the True branch continues to the Slack alert.

Step 6: Post the Slack alert

Add a Slack node:

• Resource: Message
• Operation: Send a Message
• Channel: #support-vip
• Message Type: Block Kit

{
  "blocks": [
    {
      "type": "header",
      "text": {
        "type": "plain_text",
        "text": "🚨 VIP Customer — New Support Ticket"
      }
    },
    {
      "type": "section",
      "fields": [
        {
          "type": "mrkdwn",
          "text": "*Customer*\n{{ $('Code').item.json.customerName }}"
        },
        {
          "type": "mrkdwn",
          "text": "*Lifetime Value*\n${{ $('LTV Check').item.json.totalSpent.toFixed(0) }}"
        },
        {
          "type": "mrkdwn",
          "text": "*Total Orders*\n{{ $('LTV Check').item.json.orderCount }}"
        },
        {
          "type": "mrkdwn",
          "text": "*Subject*\n{{ $('Code').item.json.subject }}"
        }
      ]
    },
    {
      "type": "section",
      "text": {
        "type": "mrkdwn",
        "text": "*Message preview*\n{{ $('Code').item.json.body }}"
      }
    },
    {
      "type": "actions",
      "elements": [
        {
          "type": "button",
          "text": { "type": "plain_text", "text": "Open in Gorgias" },
          "url": "https://your-store.gorgias.com/app/ticket/{{ $('Code').item.json.ticketId }}",
          "style": "primary"
        }
      ]
    }
  ]
}

Step 7: Apply a VIP tag to the ticket

After posting to Slack, apply a tag so the ticket is visible in a VIP view:

• Method: PUT
• URL: https://your-store.gorgias.com/api/tickets/{{ $('Code').item.json.ticketId }}
• Body: { "tags": [{ "name": "vip-escalation" }] }

Step 8: Activate and test

1. Create a test customer in Gorgias with a vip tag
2. Submit a support ticket from that customer
3. Verify the Slack alert appears with correct data
4. Toggle the workflow to Active

Cost

• n8n Cloud: ~8 node executions per VIP ticket. Typical VIP ticket volume is low, so this stays well within any plan tier.
• Self-hosted: Free.