Connect an outside service

This guide connects your site to an outside service through its API. The example: when someone submits your contact form, also send them a text message confirmation through an SMS provider.

The pattern is the same for any service with an API key: an email service, an AI model, a shipping provider, a CRM.

1. Have an account with the service

Sign up with the provider yourself. The account, the bill and the key are yours; Willo runs the code on your backend. Find the page in the provider's dashboard where it issues API keys, and keep it open.

If the provider offers a test or sandbox mode, note it: you'll want it for trying things out.

2. Describe what should happen

"When someone submits the contact form, text them 'Thanks, we'll be in touch within a day' using Twilio. Only if they gave a mobile number."

Willo works out what it needs: which keys, and a backend function that holds them, because keys can never sit in your site's pages.

3. Give Willo the key

Willo shows a secure form in the chat for each key, with its name (for example TWILIO_AUTH_TOKEN), what it's for, and a link to where the provider issues it.

Copy the key from the provider's dashboard.
Paste it into the form, not into the chat box.
Save.

The chat then just says the key was set. Some providers need two or three values (an account ID and a token, say); Willo asks for them one at a time.

4. Test it on the draft with test keys

If your business is drafting, the draft uses your live keys unless you say otherwise, so a test would send real messages or charge real money. Before testing, ask Willo to "use my Twilio test credentials on the draft". It shows the form again for a draft-only value under the same name. That value is used only on the draft and never reaches live.

Then try it in the draft preview: submit the form and check what arrives.

5. Go live

Publish. The live function uses your live keys. Submit the form on the live site once to check the real thing.

Changing or removing a key later

New key (rotated, or a different account): "update the Twilio auth token". The form appears again; the new value replaces the old one. Nobody can read the old value back.
Which keys are set? Ask Willo. It lists them by name, never by value.

What Willo won't ask for

Willo never asks for a password, an account-wide access token, or another company's database credentials, and won't accept them through the form either. If a service only offers those, tell Willo, and it will suggest the supported route or point you to support.