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Comment automation watches the comments under your posts and acts on them: a public reply, a private DM to the commenter, a like, a hide, or a delete. It runs on three channels (Facebook Pages, Instagram and TikTok) through four triggers in the flow builder:
On Instagram the two triggers are interchangeable today: every Instagram comment (feed, Reel or Live) fires automations built on either trigger. Pick whichever reads better; don’t build one automation on each expecting them to split the traffic, because both will fire on the same comments.
A few things are true for every comment trigger:
  • Only brand-new comments fire it. Edited comments and deleted comments do nothing, and your own Page’s or account’s comments never trigger your own automations. Replies under a comment count as comments too; someone answering another commenter can trigger your flow.
  • A comment creates a contact only when it leads somewhere. Before DMLY records anything it asks two questions: is the commenter already one of your contacts, and does a comment automation on that channel match this comment (the right trigger event, plus the keywords matching if the trigger has any; a quick automation also needs at least one action)? If either answer is yes, the commenter gets a contact, named from their username, and the comment is recorded. If both are no, the comment is dropped: no contact, no comment thread, nothing in the Inbox. Moderate those in Facebook, Instagram or TikTok directly. Drive-by commenters used to become contacts and quietly spend your plan’s contact allowance, which is why the check is there.
  • Comments and DMs from the same person stay in separate threads. On Facebook and Instagram they belong to the same contact but thread separately in the Inbox; you’ll see a comment thread alongside their DM conversation. On TikTok, a commenter and a DMer are separate contacts (TikTok’s API keeps the two identities apart).
  • The comment threads DMLY keeps are real Inbox threads. Your automated public replies appear there as your Page’s own comments, and your team can answer manually with Write a public reply… in the composer.
That check cuts both ways. A comment trigger with no keywords matches every comment, so every commenter becomes a contact again. Switch your only comment automation off (or leave it unpublished) and new commenters stop reaching the Inbox altogether, while people who are already contacts carry on threading as before.
The trigger’s Which posts? setting offers All posts and Specific with a post picker, but the Specific selection is not enforced today. An automation saved with specific posts still fires on comments on every post on the account. Until this changes, scope your automation with keywords, not posts, and be especially careful combining a no-keyword trigger with Delete Comment, which would permanently delete matching comments across all your posts.

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Reply to comments automatically

The simplest comment automation: when someone comments, post a public reply under their comment.
1

Create a comment-triggered flow

Create a new automation on your Facebook, Instagram or TikTok channel in the flow builder and pick the comment trigger for that channel, for example Post or Reel comments on Instagram.
2

Filter with keywords (or don't)

On the trigger, choose how the comment text is matched:
  • Any message (no keyword filter): fire on every comment
  • Message contains a keyword
  • Message is an exact match
  • Message starts with a keyword
Matching is case-insensitive, so Price, PRICE and price all match. Leave the keyword list empty and the automation fires on any comment.The trigger also has Only respond once per contact; turn it on for giveaway-style automations where each person should only ever get one response, however many times they comment.
3

Add a Reply to Comment step

Comment-triggered flows get an extra palette group, Comment actions, with four steps: Reply to Comment, Like Comment, Hide Comment and Delete Comment. (The group only appears when the flow starts from a comment trigger; these steps need a comment to act on.)Drag in Reply to Comment and write the Public reply. It supports contact tokens ({{first_name}} and the rest), but remember a fresh commenter’s name is seeded from their username, so {{first_name}} may resolve to a handle rather than a real first name. The default text is “Thanks for your comment! 🙌 Check your DMs.” Change it if you’re not also sending a DM.If the reply is empty, the builder flags the step with an amber “Public reply text is empty.” warning. Heed it: the flow will still publish, and the empty reply only fails when it runs.
4

Publish and test

Publish the flow, then comment on one of your posts from a different account; your own Page’s comments never trigger it. The public reply appears under the comment, and in the Inbox the comment thread shows the reply as your own comment.

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Comment-to-DM

The classic pattern: “Comment WANT and I’ll DM you the link.” This works on Facebook and Instagram: a comment lets you open a DM with someone who has never messaged you.
1

Start from a comment trigger with a keyword

Same as above: a Facebook comments or Post or Reel comments trigger, matching mode Message contains a keyword (or exact match for a cleaner giveaway), keyword WANT or whatever you announce in the caption.
2

Optionally reply in public first

Add Reply to Comment with something like “Check your DMs!”. It isn’t required for the DM to work, but it tells everyone else scrolling the comments that the mechanic is real, which is half the point of the pattern.
3

Add the Send Message step

Add a Send Message step with the link or content you promised. In a comment-triggered flow, the first text message of the run is delivered as a private reply to the comment, a special Meta mechanism that opens the DM thread even though the commenter has never messaged you, outside the normal 24-hour messaging window.
4

Publish

Publish, announce the keyword in your post caption, and watch the comment thread and DM land per commenter in the Inbox.
The private reply has hard limits worth designing around:
  • One per comment. Only the first message of the run uses it. Each new comment is processed exactly once, so there is no way to get a second private reply out of the same comment.
  • Text only. The private reply carries plain text: no images, cards or buttons. If the first message step in your flow is an image or a card, it skips the private-reply mechanism entirely and is sent as a normal DM instead, which may not reach a commenter who has never messaged you. Make the first message a text message containing what matters (the link), and put media after it.
  • Later messages are ordinary DMs. A comment opens a 24-hour messaging window, so follow-up steps in the same flow are attempted normally, but their delivery is decided by Meta at send time, and a rejection shows up in Logs. Front-load the message that matters.
Not possible. TikTok has no comment-to-DM mechanism: a Send a DM step in a Video comments flow can only deliver to someone who already has an open DM conversation with you (within TikTok’s 48-hour window); for a pure commenter it fails. TikTok also keeps commenters and DMers as separate contacts, so there is no thread to open.What works instead: put the payoff in the Reply to Comment step. The public reply is the only reliable way to answer a TikTok commenter, so use it to point people at your bio link or ask them to message you first.

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Moderate comments automatically

Keyword-triggered hide and delete keeps spam and abuse off your posts without a human watching the comments.
1

Trigger on the words you want gone

Create a comment-triggered flow with Message contains a keyword and list the terms you moderate: competitor links, slurs, crypto spam phrases. Keep the list specific: matching is a substring check, so a short keyword like win also matches “winter”.
2

Choose Hide or Delete

They are genuinely different:
  • Hide Comment: “Hides the comment from everyone except its author.” The commenter still sees their own comment and doesn’t know it was hidden; everyone else stops seeing it. Good for spam and negativity, because it doesn’t provoke a reaction. Facebook and Instagram only; on TikTok this step is skipped with a note in the thread (“Hiding comments isn’t supported on TikTok — skipped.”), because TikTok has no hide.
  • Delete Comment: “Permanently deletes the comment. Use sparingly — this can’t be undone.” Works on all three platforms. The commenter can see it’s gone.
There is no un-hide, un-like or restore step in a flow: hide is reversed manually on the platform, delete not at all.
3

Publish and watch the thread

Each moderated comment leaves a quiet system note in its Inbox comment thread (“Hid the comment” or “Deleted the comment”) so your team can see what the automation did and to whom.

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Message the commenter after moderating

You can chain moderation with a DM. Hide or delete the comment, then privately tell the person why: “We removed your comment because it broke our rules; here’s how to reach us.” This works on Facebook and Instagram, because every comment step lets the flow continue: a hide or delete (even a failed one) never stops the run, and the private-reply DM still targets the original comment. Order matters, though:
  • Hide, then Send Message: the safe chain. The comment still exists (hidden), so the private reply lands normally.
  • Delete, then Send Message: risky. A private reply to a comment that no longer exists isn’t something DMLY guards against, and Meta may reject it. If you want to delete and notify, put the Send Message step before the Delete Comment step: the DM is delivered first, then the comment is removed. Nothing in the builder enforces this ordering; it’s on you.
On TikTok the notify half isn’t possible at all (no comment-to-DM, see above): you can delete the comment, but you cannot message the commenter about it.

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What works where

The quick builder has the same triggers and equivalent actions (Reply to comment, Send a DM, Like the comment, Hide the comment, Delete the comment) with one difference in keyword matching: a flat comma-separated list, always contains-matching, no match-mode choice (“Comma-separated. Leave empty to trigger on any comment.”). The DM action uses the same one-private-reply-per-comment mechanism.If both a published flow and a quick automation match the same comment, the flow wins and the quick automation does not fire. The quick builder also shows Conditions such as Comment / message text and First-time contact. These are saved but not applied while the automation runs as a quick automation; they only take effect after you convert it with Edit in Flow Builder. Prefer the flow builder for anything beyond a single canned reply.

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Troubleshooting

A failed reply, like, hide or delete does two things: it writes a system note in the comment thread (”… failed — see Logs.”) and records an error row in Logs under the Errors status, with the comment id and the error Meta or TikTok returned. The flow itself keeps going: a failed comment action never cancels the rest of the run, so a failed hide doesn’t stop the DM step after it.
The usual suspects, in order of likelihood:
  • You tested with your own account; the Page’s or business account’s own comments are always ignored.
  • You edited an existing comment; only brand-new comments fire the trigger.
  • The bot is paused for that contact (a teammate took over the conversation).
  • Only respond once per contact is on and that person already triggered it once.
  • A previous run for that contact is still active on the same automation; a repeat comment during an active run is suppressed.
  • You expected Specific posts to include the post, but post targeting is not enforced; check the keywords instead.
The full checklist is at Automation not triggering.
A comment reaches the Inbox only when it leads somewhere: the commenter is already a contact, or a comment automation matches the comment. So switching your only comment automation off, leaving it unpublished, or tightening its keywords all have the same side effect: new commenters stop appearing, while people who are already contacts keep threading as normal. Turn a comment automation back on if you want that traffic in the Inbox, or moderate those comments in Facebook, Instagram or TikTok.One other case looks identical: a Page or account with no Channel behind it in DMLY can’t match any automation, so every comment on it is dropped whatever your automations say. See Fix a silent Facebook Page or Instagram account.
Check the first message step in the flow: if it’s an image or a card, the private-reply mechanism is skipped and the send goes out as a normal DM, which can fail for someone who has never messaged you. Make the first step a plain text message. If it is text, look for a send failure in Logs → Errors. And on TikTok, the DM step cannot reach a commenter at all. See the table above.

Triggers

Every trigger, including the four comment triggers.

Flow builder

The canvas, nodes and ports in full.

Publishing bots

Drafts, versions and the activation checks.

Logs

Where every send and comment action is recorded.