Telegram specifics

Telegram is more relaxed than Instagram: there is no 24-hour window here, and a bot can write to a user at any time once they have started it. But it has rules of its own that are worth knowing.

The “Start” button

A conversation with a Telegram bot is always started by the user. Opening the bot for the first time, they see a “Start” button — that is the /start command.

In the wizard this is the trigger kind “The /start command”: “The bot starts when a user taps ‘Start’ or sends /start.” It has no settings of its own.

Important: a bot cannot write first to someone who has not started it. Until a user taps “Start” or opens your link, there is no way to send them a message — that is how Telegram works.

A link to your bot is a separate entry point

The trigger kind “Opening a link” gives you a ready link you can put anywhere: your profile bio, an ad, a post. Whoever opens it lands in this bot, and the bot starts on its own, without anyone typing a word.

The fields of this entry:

• “Your link” — the ready address with a copy button.
• “Where users come from” — the name of the source: an ad, profile bio, a post. It becomes the link tail, and it shows where each user came from.

Make a separate link for every source — then “Contacts” shows what works best. Two links with the same label in one bot are impossible: the wizard says “This link is already added to this bot”.

Opening a link never overlaps with other triggers: every link has its own code, so it can never override another bot’s code word.

Checking a channel subscription

For the bot to check a subscription, it must be an admin of the channel. Telegram does not let an outside bot see who is subscribed — that is a platform rule, and there is no way around it.

How to add it: open the channel → tap its name → “Administrators” → “Add administrator” → pick the bot and grant all rights except adding admins. Exactly this is written in the wizard on the “Bot” step.

Then the “Channel” field is where you pick the channel itself: from the list of channels where your bot has already been seen, or via “Add channel” — the address is accepted in any usual form (@my_channel, my_channel, t.me/my_channel, a link). The wizard immediately asks Telegram whether the channel exists and whether the bot is an admin there, and will not let you move on until it is.

With the check on, the bot adds an “Open channel” button to the welcome and to the “If not subscribed” message by itself — you do not need to set it up.

Private channels

There is a catch with a private channel. It has no public @name, so the “Channel” field gets a numeric id. There is nothing to build a link from, so such a bot has no “Open channel” button.

What to do: put the invite link straight into the welcome text — users follow it and subscribe, and the subscription check works as usual.

Private messages under heavy load

Telegram has no 24-hour window, but it does have a platform that dislikes being shot at with a thousand messages a second. So broadcasts and chain messages go out at an even pace, not in one burst.

What follows from that:

• With many recipients, some messages go out later. The order is kept and nothing is lost — sending simply takes time. On a broadcast you can watch it happen: the Sent number climbs.
• If the platform refuses a message, a chain message is not thrown away: we hold it for a few minutes and try again, several times over. The person’s next messages never overtake the retry.
• If it still does not work after every attempt, the person is taken off the chain and their card shows the reason: “the message could not be sent”. They appear in the Taken off chains list, and the Put back button returns them together with that very message.
• Blocked the bot — no more messages for them: there is nothing to retry, they are taken off the chain straight away and never enter a broadcast selection. They come back by themselves when they write to the bot again.
• Stopped the bot (the “Stop” command) — new messages will not reach them either. The note clears itself if they start the bot again.

More about chain messages: How a chain behaves.

What the bot can send

The welcome image and an attachment gift (image, video, audio, file) go out as a separate message. A link is sent as a button inside the message, with your own label, for example “Watch the lessons”.

Common questions

The bot does not see the subscription although the user is subscribed. Almost always the bot is not an admin of the channel, or its rights were trimmed. Check the channel’s admin list.

Can it check a subscription to somebody else’s channel? No: the bot must be an admin of the channel it checks.

Can I write to a user first? A bot cannot, until they have started it. Technical notifications and login codes come to you from our service bot, not to your followers.

Someone tapped “Start” a second time. They land in the bot again. If they already took the gift, the bot will not hand it over twice.

Someone scrolled the chat up and tapped an old button. Buttons live on the bot’s latest message: as soon as the bot sends a new message with buttons, the previous ones go dim and stop working. If the user still taps an old one, they see a hint “This step is already done” and the step does not run again. Link buttons (“Open the channel”, “Watch the lessons”) always work.