An automation is when something happens, do these steps: emails, tasks, tags, opportunities and more. You build it on a canvas: the trigger at the top, then each step joined by a line, down to END.
Make one
Automations → New automation → give it a name (for example "New lead follow-up"), then Start blank or Use this template (see Templates). Automations can be put in folders.
The builder
The top bar has the name (click the pencil to rename it), Undo / Redo, whether it's Saved, Test, the On / Off switch and Publish. Below it are the tabs Builder, Settings, Runs, Stats, Versions and Add people.
On Builder the automation is drawn as a canvas:
- Move around: drag the background (or hold Space and drag) to pan, scroll to move up and down, and Ctrl / ⌘ + scroll to zoom. The buttons at the bottom left zoom in, zoom out and Fit to screen; the map at the bottom right shows where you are (click it to jump there).
- Each step shows its icon, what it does in plain words ("Wait 2 days (business hours)"), a red mark when something's missing, and Stats (how many people reached it, were done, skipped, failed, and for emails how many opened and clicked, over the last 30 days).
- The ⋯ menu on a step: Edit, Duplicate, Move up, Move down, Turn off (skip it) and Delete (deleting an If / else that has steps inside asks first).
- Problems: the button at the top left lists everything that needs fixing; click one to go to that step.
On a phone or tablet the same automation shows as a simple list, top to bottom, with the paths indented, and the panels open from the bottom of the screen.
Adding steps and triggers
Click a + on any line (between two steps, inside a path, or at the end) to open Add a step on the right. Type to search (for example "wait", "text" or "tag") or browse the groups: Messages, Conversations, Contact, Opportunities & tasks, Flow / Internal, Calls, Data and Other. Each step has a one-line description. Recent shows what you added last, and the star adds a step to Favorites. Use ↑ ↓ and Enter to add with the keyboard, Esc to close.
Clicking a step adds it there and opens its settings in the same panel: fill them in, then Save (or Cancel, which takes a step you've only just added away again). Problems show at the top of the panel as you go.
Triggers: when it starts
Click Add new trigger (beside the trigger at the top) to search the triggers the same way: a contact is created, a tag is added, a form is submitted, an opportunity moves to a stage, an email is opened, a date comes round, and more (the full list is in Triggers and steps). Each trigger can have its own filters, for example "only for the Contact form" or "only in the Sales pipeline". Several triggers can start the same automation. With no trigger, people only join when someone adds them.
Steps that shape the flow
- If / else: up to 10 branches, each with its own conditions (set them in the step's panel); the first one that's true is followed, otherwise None of the above. On the canvas each branch is its own path with its own +, and the paths join again below, so everyone carries on with the next step.
- Wait: A time delay, Until a date and time, Until a date in a field, Until something happens or Until conditions are true. Waits for something to happen or for conditions can Give up after a while; with Add a “Timed out” path the canvas splits the wait into Done waiting and Timed out, each with its own steps. See the Wait step.
- Goal: the moment a contact meets the goal ("the opportunity is won"), they jump there from anywhere above it.
A step can be turned off without removing it (⋯ → Turn off (skip it)): people skip it, and it shows as Off.
Automation settings
On the Settings tab:
- Can someone go through it more than once? No — once ever, or Yes — again after they finish (never twice at once).
- Send window: Only send messages at certain times (other steps still run), on chosen days and hours, in the business's time zone or in the contact's time zone (the business's if unknown).
- Stop when: checked before every step; when it's true, the contact leaves the automation (for example, the opportunity is won).
- Stop when they reply to an email: replies are copied into the business app, so this works with no extra setup.
- Send its emails from: the business's default sender, or one of its addresses (a step can use a different one).
Switching on, publishing and versions
Your changes are saved as a draft as you go (the top bar says Saved). Switching it On (or Publish for an automation that's already on) checks it first: while something's missing, Test, On and Publish are blocked and problems on the canvas lists exactly what to fix on which step.
Publishing makes a new version. People already inside finish on the version they started; new people get this one, so nobody gets half of an old flow and half of a new one. Versions lists the published versions; Put back as the draft reopens an old one so you can publish it again.
Switch off stops new people joining. People inside stay where they are and carry on when it's back on. Delete keeps it under Recently deleted for 30 days; restoring brings it back switched off.
Who can do what
- Owners and managers build, change, switch on and off, and delete automations.
- Staff can see automations and their runs and add people to them, unless Can't add people to automations is set for them.
- A client's business can only build automations when the agency switches Build automations on for it (off at first). Without it, the client's people can still see their automations and runs, and add people or take them out; the agency builds and switches them on.
- Everything an automation does shows in the Activity history, credited to Automation.