Actions are a series of processes that a contact proceeds through once they enter your automation. As a contact encounters each action in their automation path, the action is executed.
Actions can be external. For example, you can use actions to communicate with your contacts via email, SMS, or site message. They can also be internal. For example, you can use actions to update a deal or contact score, add the contact to another automation, or create goals.
Note that actions available to you in the automation builder depend on your plan level.
In this article, we'll explain each automation action and share examples of how you can use them.
Sending options
You can use actions in this category to send messages.
“Send an email”
This action will send an email to the contact who goes through this step of the automation. You are able to design the email. You are able to time the email by placing a wait condition before it. Note that the contact will need an email address to receive the message.
“Send a 1:1 email”
Available on Professional and Enterprise plans.
You can send a one-to-one email with any connected email through an automation action. It will also allow sales-focused ZendeskConnect users to send automated emails to contacts who have not yet opted in.
Please note: This ability is based on contact limits.
After connecting an email address to the CRM (Settings > Deals), customers will see a new option to choose a Preferred Email Address as well. When %deal_owner_email% is selected as the ‘From Email’ in the 1:1 Email action block in the automation builder, the email address set as the Preferred Email Address will be the one that appears in all automated one-to-one emails. However, you may choose to send from any connected email account in the dropdown box.
Within this automation action, you will be able to:
- Set a CC and/or BCC (use a comma to separate multiple email addresses)
- Use contact, deal, and account personalization tags for the Subject Line and body of the email
- Use Bold, Italics, Underline, Hyperlinks, Bullets, and Numbered Lists in the body of the email
The new automation action can be found under CRM. Note that only Deal triggers will be compatible with this action. If there's a contact-based trigger in your automation, the 1:1 email block will be skipped.
“Send a site message”
Available on Professional and Enterprise plans.
This action lets you display messages to an opted-in contact when they visit a specific page on your site or any page of your site. You may want to use this to display information about a new offering or a coupon code for a product to get your contact to complete a purchase. Read more about this action and how it works.
In order to use this feature, you must have site tracking installed and enabled on your site.
“Send an SMS”
Available on Plus, Professional, and Enterprise plans.
When a contact reaches this action in your automation, a text message will be sent to them.
“Send a notification email”
This action sends a notification email. It could notify someone within your company.
Conditions and Workflow
You can use actions in this category to add logic to your automations and/or manage other automations.
If using Conditional Wait, If/Else, Split, or Goal actions with the "Has opened" or "Has not opened" condition: Contacts who use the Apple Mail app with iOS 15 with Mail Privacy Protection will not correctly meet this condition. To learn more, visit ZendeskConnect and Apple iOS 15 Mail Privacy Protection.
“Wait”
The wait action pauses the automation for the contact at this step. You are able to specify how long they wait before proceeding to the next action in their automation path.
There are two types of wait actions that you can create:
- Timed wait
Contacts will wait in this action for a period of time you specify, then proceed to the next action in the automation. - Conditional wait
Contacts will wait in this action until certain conditions are met, for example, until they perform a certain behavior or until you collect certain information about them. Wait conditions are created with the segment builder. In addition, you have the option to set a time limit for how long a contact will wait in this action if they don't meet the conditions to proceed.
“If/Else”
An “If/Else” action creates a fork in your automation. There are two paths in this fork: A "Yes" path and a "No" path. The “Yes” path is for contacts who match the conditions you define and then “No” path is for contacts who do not match the conditions. "If/Else" conditions are created with the segment builder. This action is useful for treating contacts differently depending on a variety of factors. You are able to create conditions based on any condition that you can create a segment with: actions, tags, custom fields, Site & Event Tracking data, and other contact data.
“Split”
Available on Professional and Enterprise plans.
The “Split” action allows you to create split test automations.
There are two types of split actions:
- Even split
A traditional A/B split test that determines a winning path. - Conditional split
This split will send all contacts down one path until specific conditions are met and then a different path after. This is not a traditional split test and no winning path is determined. Conditions for this split are created with the segment builder.
“Go to”
The “Go to” action allows you to move contacts to another step of the automation. You can use it to bring contacts back to a branch or create loops.
“Goal”
The "Goal" action allows contacts to jump from their current location in your automation directly to that goal step if they meet the conditions to do so. Conditions for this action are created with the segment builder. You can use this to begin other automations, send targeted messages to contacts, adjust contact and deal scores, and even add a contact to a specific step in your automation upon entry.
“Start an automation”
The “Start an automation” action will start an automation you specify when the contact reaches that step.
“End this automation”
The “End this automation” action is an indication that the automation ends at this point. Even without the “End this automation” action, your automation would still end when your contact reaches the last step of the automation. This action is more a “note” that there are no more steps for the contact to take in your automation.
“End other automation”
The “End other automation” action will stop the contact running through a specific automation that you choose or all other automations.
“Webhook”
The “Webhook” action can send a webhook to another app allowing you to automate actions with apps outside of ZendeskConnect. For instance, you could send a webhook to have a support account created with your helpdesk software when a new order comes in.
"Perform Math"
The "Perform Math" action lets you execute calculations on existing custom contact fields or custom deal fields. With this action, you will be able to adjust the numerical value of an existing field using either the add, subtract, multiply, or divide math function.
This automation action is available on all plan levels. Note that customers with a Plus, Professional, or Enterprise plan can also use the "Perform Math" action with custom deal fields.
Contacts
This category of actions gives you a variety of actions related to managing contacts.
“Subscribe”
The “Subscribe” action adds a contact to a list. This will give the contact an "Active" status. For more info on contact statuses, visit "Contact statuses explained."
“Unsubscribe”
The “Unsubscribe” action removes the contact from a list. For instance, when a new customer makes an order, you could remove them from your “prospect” list and, using the “Subscribe” action, add them to your “customer” list.
"Convert"
This is available on Professional and Enterprise plans.
The "Convert" automation action enables a contact to trigger a conversion while in an automation. In this action, you can select an existing conversion to trigger or create a new conversion.
“Update a contact”
The “Update contact” action allows you to add data to the contact record. You could use this action to add data to a custom field. For instance, you could update a “Status” field with “Promoter” if they share a campaign on social media.
“Add a tag”
The “Add tag” action will apply a tag to a contact when they reach this step.
“Remove a tag”
The “Remove tag” action will remove a tag from a contact when they reach this step.
“Add a note”
The “Add note” action will attach a note to the contact record. This is useful for adding information through the marketing process so that when a lead is passed onto sales, they read notes to know what the contact has done, what they’ve viewed, and what they are interested in so they can go into a call aware of what the contact already knows and with insight that will help them close the sale.
"Add to Facebook Custom Audience"
Available on Plus, Professional, and Enterprise plans.
This action is available with the Facebook Custom Audience integration.
This action will add contacts to a Facebook Custom Audience you specify. In addition, this action will let you create a new custom audience. If you're creating a new Facebook Custom Audience, it will be of the "Customer List" subtype.
"Remove from Facebook Custom Audience"
Available on Plus, Professional, and Enterprise plans.
This action is available with the Facebook Custom Audience integration.
This action will remove contacts from the Facebook Custom Audience you specify.
“Adjust a contact score”
This is available on Plus, Professional, and Enterprise plans.
The “Adjust score” action allows you to move a contact score up or down when they reach that step of an automation. If the proceeding actions indicated sales-ready behavior, you could add points to their score. You could give out negative points if the contact unsubscribes or fails to engage (open or click) your campaigns.
Note that you can also set the contact score to a specific value or reset the score to 0 with this action.
CRM
CRM automation actions are available on Plus, Professional, and Enterprise plans.
This category of action gives you a variety of actions related to managing deals.
“Add a deal”
Available on Plus, Professional, and Enterprise plans.
The “Add deal” action will create a deal record for an opportunity. This action allows you to automatically create deals for contacts as they reach sales-readiness. You may want to use this action with a “Score changes” trigger so that when a contact score reaches a threshold score, a deal record is automatically created and placed in your pipeline.
“Update a title”
Available on Plus, Professional, and Enterprise plans.
The “Update title” action will edit a deal’s title.
“Update a status”
Available on Plus, Professional, and Enterprise plans.
The “Update status” action can be used to change a deal’s status to “Open,” “Won,” or “Lost.” You could use this action to mark a deal as “Won” when the associated contact makes a purchase.
“Update an owner”
Available on Plus, Professional, and Enterprise plans.
The “Update owner” action will change who a deal is assigned to. You could use this action to change ownership as the deal reaches a point where there is a hand-off. For instance, as deals are qualified and near closing, the deal could be handed off to a more experienced sales rep.
“Update a value”
Available on Plus, Professional, and Enterprise plans.
The “Update value” action changes a deals estimated value.
“Update a stage”
Available on Plus, Professional, and Enterprise plans.
The “Update stage” action moves a deal to another stage of your pipeline. This action is a crucial part of automating your sales process so you may use it often. When a contact performs a certain behavior, such as replies to an email or visits a link you sent them to, you could move them further down the pipeline.
"Update a custom field"
Available on Plus, Professional, and Enterprise plans.
This action updates the value of a custom deal field. You can use this action to automatically enter a new value, copy data from an existing contact field, or clear the value for the custom deal field.
"Update an account field"
Available on Plus, Professional, and Enterprise plans.
The “Update an account field” action allows you to add or modify an account level field value. You could use this action to add data to a custom field.
“Add a task”
Available on Plus, Professional, and Enterprise plans.
The “Add task” action creates new to do items. This action is very useful for staying organized and making sure no lead falls through the cracks. You can automatically add tasks as the pipeline stage changes so that all associated work has task reminders created.
“Add a note”
Available on Plus, Professional, and Enterprise plans.
The “Add note” action adds a note to the deal record. (The “Add note” action under the “Contacts” category adds notes to the contact record.)
“Complete a task”
Available on Plus, Professional, and Enterprise plans.
The “Complete task” action closes a task by marking it as completed. You can use this action to automate your workday and stay organized by having tasks closed as you or the contact perform certain behaviors.
“Adjust a deal score”
Available on Plus, Professional, and Enterprise plans.
The “Adjust score” action moves a deal score up or down.
Note that you can also set the contact score to a specific value or reset the score to 0 with this action.
"Add Contact to Account"
Available on Plus, Professional, and Enterprise plans.
The "Add Contact to Account" action lets you create and add contacts to a new or existing account. With this action, you can automatically assign new contacts to existing accounts, create new accounts from data collected from a contact record, or clean up and maintain appropriate data hygiene related to accounts and contacts.
"Add Account Note"
Available on Plus, Professional, and Enterprise plans.
The “Add Account Note” action adds a note to the account record. When configuring this action, you can use personalization tags from contacts, deals, and accounts to insert dynamic values into the note text. Once a contact reaches this action in your automation, a note is added to the contact's account record.
Salesforce
Salesforce automation actions are available with the ZendeskConnect Salesforce integration.
This category of action gives you a variety of actions related to creating contacts and leads in Salesforce.
"Create a contact in Salesforce"
When a contact reaches this step in your automation, they will be added to your Salesforce account as a contact.
"Create a lead in Salesforce"
When a contact reaches this step in your automation, they will be added to your Salesforce account as a lead.
More resources to help you create Automations
Now that you are familiar with automation actions, you may want to learn about how the automation workflow builder works or go through a walkthrough of creating an automation so that you can see how combining triggers and actions allows you to create fully automated sequences of events.
Comments
0 comments
Article is closed for comments.