Split any email automation into its trigger, conditions, delays and actions.
Every email automation is built from four parts: a trigger, conditions, actions and delays. Once you can name those parts, you can draw any automation on paper first. Building it in your email tool then means copying the drawing across.
An email automation is a set of steps that runs by itself whenever someone does something. Different tools call it a flow, a workflow or a journey. You have already built one, the welcome sequence in module 4.
Priya runs a tuition centre. Every evening after classes she went through her enquiries by hand. She checked whether she had replied to the parent who asked about P5 maths on Monday, whether that parent had booked a trial class, and whether she had followed up with the families who came for Saturday's trial.
Some weeks she remembered everyone. Most weeks a few parents slipped through, and some of them enrolled at another centre while they waited to hear back from her.
The checklist in her head was an automation waiting to be built. Each check she made by hand matches one of the four parts below.
Every automation begins with a trigger, the event that puts a person into the flow. Common triggers are:
someone signs up through a particular form someone makes a purchase, or buys a particular product a date arrives, such as a birthday or the anniversary of a first order a tag is added to a contact, for example "status: trial booked" someone clicks a particular link in one of your emails
A trigger has to be something the tool can actually detect. "A parent is thinking about tuition" cannot be a trigger, because nothing records it. "A parent submits the trial class enquiry form" can.
Some events happen outside the email tool, such as a booking made in a separate calendar or a payment taken in your shop. For those, the two systems need a connection so the email tool hears about the event. For purchases, shop integrations provide that connection. Lesson 6.2 covers where this kind of outside data comes from.
Once a person is in the flow, a condition decides which path they take. A condition is a yes-or-no question about the person at that moment: have they bought since entering, did they click the link in the last email, do they have the customer tag, is their child in P6. Each condition splits the flow into two branches. Yes goes one way and no goes the other. You can put several conditions in a row, but each one is still a simple yes or no.
Without conditions, everyone gets the same emails in the same order, like a recording. With them, the automation responds to what each person has done. A parent who booked a trial gets a reminder, and a parent who did not gets a gentle nudge.
Actions are what happens on each branch. Sending an email is the most common action. Others are adding or removing a tag, waiting a set time, moving someone to another flow, and sending a notification to yourself or a colleague so a human can step in.
Delays are a kind of action, and they keep the flow at a sensible pace. You used them in the welcome sequence in lesson 4.2, with steps like "wait two days" between emails. Many tools also let you wait until a condition is met, for example waiting until the trial date and then continuing. Some also let you wait a set time and then check a condition.
The notification action is underused. Some moments call for a person rather than another email. If a parent attended a trial but has not enrolled after a week, a short phone call or WhatsApp message from Priya often helps more than an email. At that point the automation's job is to remind her to make it.
Every tool has a visual builder where you drag triggers, conditions and actions onto a canvas. It is tempting to start there, but it is better to start on paper. Draw a box for the trigger at the top. Draw arrows down to each delay and each email. For each condition, draw a diamond with the question written inside and two arrows coming out, labelled yes and no. Next to each email, write its purpose in a word or two.
Priya's enquiry flow works like this. The trigger is the trial enquiry form being submitted. The first action sends an email with the available Saturday slots and a booking link. The flow then waits one day and checks a condition: has the trial been booked?
On the yes branch, the flow sends a confirmation with directions to the centre and what to bring. It then waits until the day before the trial and sends a reminder.
On the no branch, it sends one short follow-up email answering the questions parents ask most. It waits three more days and checks the condition again: booked now? If the answer is still no, the flow notifies Priya to follow up personally, and the flow ends there.
The finished drawing has one trigger, two conditions, several delays, and a mix of emails and one notification. It took her ten minutes to draw. It also showed her a gap: she had no plan for parents who booked a trial and then did not turn up. She built that as a second flow later.
Before you build, check that your whole flow fits clearly on one sheet. If you cannot draw it clearly on one sheet, it will confuse you inside the tool, and it will confuse whoever has to fix it later.
In the activity below you will draw one automation for your own business on paper, with its trigger, two conditions, the delays, and the actions on each branch.
On paper, draw one automation for your business. Show the trigger, two conditions, the delays and the actions on each branch.
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