When's the last time you volunteered to manually sort through hundreds of customer support tickets to gather feedback about your company or product? … Anyone?
Let's ignore the fact that nobody wants to do it. Manual sentiment analysis isn't the best idea because it takes a long time to do well and we humans just aren't as good at analyzing patterns as robots.
It's easy to miss important details when you've been crunching massive amounts of data on your own. It's like trying to understand a full conversation by only hearing random snippets versus having access to the full transcript.
But here's the good news: You can build the customer service sentiment analyzer of your dreams by connecting Zendesk to Zapier Agents. This agent can automatically process Zendesk tickets to identify customer feelings and attitudes, grouping similar sentiments together for review at a glance. It takes away the overwhelm of sifting through feedback data and turns it into actionable insights.
Watch the video below to see how it works, or keep reading for step-by-step instructions:
How to set up a customer sentiment analysis system with Zapier Agents
In this example, we'll start with a template in Zapier Agents. The agent assesses and categorizes the feedback in Zendesk tickets based on sentiment and compiles the results into a structured Google Doc. This is handy for understanding customer feedback trends quickly and without manual hassle.
To get started, click on the button below, then follow the steps to customize your agent.
Step 1: Activate the template and connect Zendesk
Click Use template on the template landing page.
Once you're in your new agent, navigate to Data Integrations. Click Configure next to Zendesk to connect your Zendesk account.
Optional: Review Behaviors for context regarding how the agent operates.
Click Use this template to start customizing your agent.
Step 2: Connect Google Docs
Use a connected Google Docs account or connect a new account.
Once configured, click Create.
Step 3: Customize your agent's trigger
The trigger is what kickstarts your agent. Set the trigger based on what should happen in order for your agent to run. By default, this is set to On demand. You can also trigger the agent using trigger activities in other apps, as well as use Schedule by Zapier to set a recurring agent frequency.
Step 4: Customize your agent's actions
The agent's tools are the actions it will take on your behalf. The template already has the tools you need to run this workflow in the instructions—"Zendesk: Data integration" and "Google Docs: Create Document From Text"—but you can change these, if needed.
If you'd like to customize the Google Docs: Create Document From Text tool, such as to set a custom document name or folder, click on the widget icon next to the tool and change Let your agent select a value for this field to Set a specific value for this field for any desired fields.
Click Save once you're done customizing.
Step 5: Customize your agent's behavior
If you'd like, you can rename the agent's behavior by replacing "Sentiment Analyzer" with something else in the top-left corner.
To change the basic functionality of this template—such as to more specifically target Zendesk tickets and customize your report structure—you can edit the instructions pre-filled in the Instructions field.
Step 6: Test your agent
Click Save to finalize the agent behavior.
Optional but recommended: Click Test behavior to run a sample agentic workflow. You can follow along with the steps the agent takes to execute the task and determine if anything needs to be changed to work how you'd like it.
Once everything's saved, you can safely navigate away from the page. Your agent will run through this workflow whenever the trigger criteria are met.
Now, relax and enjoy the benefits of relinquishing a manual task that AI seems made for.
Analyze customer sentiment in a snap with Zapier Agents
By automating sentiment analysis with Zapier Agents and Zendesk, you're not only saving time—you're unlocking insights that help your team respond faster and smarter. Let AI do the heavy lifting so you can focus on what really matters: delivering an exceptional customer experience.
Want to learn more about Zapier Agents and start building your own? Check out Zapier Agents guide to get started. Or, if you're a developer or a builder and prefer to create AI workflows using code, check out Zapier MCP.
