Automated emails: setting one up for any trigger

An automated email goes out in reaction to something a contact does, the moment it happens. You design the email once, then build an automation that decides who receives it and when.

The steps are the same whichever trigger you use, so this article covers all of them rather than one per trigger.

Which tool you want

An automated email reacts to an event: they just reached a tier, they just unlocked a reward, they just submitted a form.
A recurring email checks a state on a schedule: it's their birthday today, they haven't visited for 90 days. Birthday and win-back emails are set up there, not here.
A recurring voucher issuance hands a voucher out on a schedule with no email to design. It's set up on the promotion itself, under Issuances.
A campaign goes out once, to whoever you choose, at a moment you pick.

Anything that repeats belongs in one of the middle two. A periodic automation is for scheduled work those can't express, and How to build an automation says what that is.

Step 1: design the email

Go to Marketing → Automated emails.
Click Add automated email.
Pick a template as your starting design.
Choose Marketing as the email category.
Work through the design steps and finish with Publish. The email can't be selected in an automation until you have.

Step 2: choose a starting point

Click Automation in the top menu, then New automation, and pick what starts it:

Empty automation. Start with a clear canvas and choose the trigger yourself. This is the one to use for anything the other starting points don't cover.
Reward unlocked. Asks for a number of loyalty points and the email. It sends the email 10 minutes after a transaction takes a contact's balance from below that number to that number or more.
Thank your loyal contacts for their 10th purchase. Asks for a number and the email. It sends the email 10 minutes after a contact receives points for that number of times, so it isn't fixed to ten.
Tier reached. Asks which tier. It adds no email for you: add an Automated email action to the flow yourself in step 3. To send different emails per tier, build one automation per tier or branch inside one.

For Reward unlocked and Thank your loyal contacts for their 10th purchase, you select the email you published in step 1 right there.

Welcome emails start from the form

A welcome email isn't in the list above, because what triggers it is a form submission. Design the email first, then:

Go to CRM → Forms.
Open the form you want to trigger on.
Go to its Automation page and click Enable automation.
Click Open editor to finish the automation: add the Automated email action, then activate it.

Step 3: build the flow

Click a + in the flow, then click an action in the Add action panel on the right. You can add a Delay, an If/Then branching, or an action straight away.

A delay is worth thinking about. Sending a point update the instant a purchase is recorded reaches the contact while they're still at the till, which usually isn't what you want.

An if/then branch splits the flow on a filter, so one automation can handle several cases. A branch on tier, for example, lets gold members get a different email from silver. The flow continues on the first branch whose filters match, and a contact who matches none takes the else branch at the bottom.

The Automated email action is under External. It isn't sent to anonymous contacts, or to contacts who aren't subscribed to the email's subscription type.

Besides an automated email, an action can:

Send an Internal e-mail to your own team, with a subject, receivers, and a body that can carry contact data like their first name or points balance.
Issue a Voucher.
Credit or debit points with a Loyalty transaction, or record a Prepaid transaction.
Claim a reward on the contact's behalf with a Reward reception.
Create an Identifier.
Set contact attribute, which is how you tag contacts as they pass through a flow.
Set the Contact type, if your account uses contact types.
Run a Calculation, or call a Webhook.

The full list, with what each one does, is in Automation actions: everything an automation can do.

Step 4: activate

Rename the automation on its Information tab if you like: it's named after the template or the trigger. Review the settings, then click Activate at the top right and confirm. Nothing enters the automation until you do.

When it runs, and whether a contact can enter twice

Two settings control this, and they're easy to miss. Open the Settings tab in the automation editor:

Execution window. When the actions are allowed to run: Direct, or held until a day and time range you choose. This is how you stop an automation emailing people in the middle of the night. On a periodic automation this is Schedule instead.
Re-enrollment. Whether a contact who triggers the automation again goes through it again, and how long they must wait first. It's off for a new automation, except for Reward unlocked, which switches it on. Leave this wrong and a contact either gets the email only once ever, or gets it more often than you meant.

Editing an automation that's already live

Changes to an active automation apply straight away, so contacts who enter while you're editing get whatever the flow looks like at that moment. For a bigger change, click Deactivate first and activate it again when you're done. Contacts who trigger it while it's inactive aren't caught up afterwards.

Deleting an automation removes its runs as well. You can only delete an inactive automation.

Sending an automated email to one contact by hand

You don't need an automation to send an automated email to a single person:

Go to CRM → Contacts and search for the contact.
Open them and click Options.
Choose Send automated email, pick the email, and confirm.

Only emails of the automated type can be sent this way.