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Automated Emails

Updated

You will learn

 

What is an automated email?

An automated email is scheduled and sent to employees through a journey, and can be reused across multiple journeys. A journey is a sequence of automated actions that are triggered when an employee is either: 

  • manually selected to enter the journey
  • becomes a member of a specific list. 

Any lists built or syncing to your Workshop account can be used to trigger journeys. 

For example, a new hire onboarding journey can be triggered when a new employee is added to the all company list. After they are enrolled, they can be sent multiple automated emails over time that introduce them to useful information in relation to their role and the company. Journeys can include sending emails, and scheduling wait steps to ensure proper timing.

If you’ve already created and published automated emails, see our article on Creating a journey

 

Creating & publishing an automated email

The first step in creating a journey is creating the automated emails you would like to send. 

 

Creating an automated email works just like creating any other email in Workshop — you still have all the drag-and-drop tools and features you’re used to, including your templates. There are just a few key differences:

  • You won’t select the recipients
  • You won’t set a scheduled date / time

 

If you have a regular email that you would like to use within a journey, you do have the option to clone that regular email and change the email type to automated. 

  • To note, you can also convert an automated email back into a regular email.

 

Once you’ve created your automated email, it’s time to publish it. To publish an automated email, the email must have: A subject line, a from name, a from email, and a reply-to email. As previously mentioned, you will not select who the email goes to, or when it is sent at this point. To whom the email is sent to and when it is sent, is decided when you are creating a journey.

You do have the option to keep your automated emails in a draft state, until you are ready to publish your journey. Automated emails must be published prior to being scheduled / sent within a journey. 

To publish an automated email:

  1. Verify you have all required information provided within the email settings - subject line, from name, from email, etc.
  2. Within the email editor, select Review & publish
  3. Confirm everything looks good within the review modal and select Publish automated email

 

Editing an automated email

You can edit an automated email even while its journey is live, without needing to pause, clone, or recreate anything. Simply click into the automated email step within a journey, open the Actions menu, and select Edit to update the subject line, copy, or design. 

Any changes you make will stay in draft mode until you click Publish, allowing you to actively work on updates without interrupting or altering the live journey experience. 

Once published, Workshop creates a new version of the email — anyone who hasn’t yet reached that step will receive the updated version, while anyone who already received it will continue to see the original.

Note: If you only need to update a link, you don’t have to open the email in the editor. Links can be edited directly from the Clicks table, and those updates will apply to that specific version of the email without creating a new one.

 

Viewing an automated email

Automated email Details:

You can access an automated email from the ‘automated’ tab on the email index page. Regular and automated emails are separated by navigational tabs to help you distinguish the two types of emails. The email index page can be accessed from ‘email’ in the top navigation.

Once you have selected an automated email, you are able to view all of the email details:

  • Creator
  • Email name
  • Subject line
  • Preview text
  • From name
  • From email
  • Reply-to email
  • Journey (that it is associated with)

You can also view many of the same analytics that you see when reviewing a regular email:

  • Open rate
  • Click rate
  • Click-through rate
  • Total opens
  • Total clicks

 

Analytics:

Engagement data for an automated email includes all sends over time, across every journey where it is used. 

 

If your journey includes multiple versions of an automated email (for example, after publishing edits), analytics will display engagement per version, allowing you to directly compare performance before and after a change. This makes it easy to see whether updates to the subject line, copy, or design had a meaningful impact on engagement over time.

 

For example, if you view an email that’s used in your new hire onboarding journey, its engagement metrics will continue to update as it is sent, and you can switch between versions to see how each one performed. Earlier versions retain their historical analytics, while newer versions begin tracking engagement from the moment they are published, giving you clear insight into the impact of your edits.

One thing to note in this view is that you’re looking at metrics for the individual automated email, not the full journey. To understand performance at the journey level, the best place to look is the campaign view. From a campaign, you can see every individual send of every email in the journey, offering a more complete picture of overall performance with as much granularity as you need.

If you are interested, see our article on Campaigns

 

Sharing an automated email

Sharing an automated email is very similar to sharing a regular email. When sharing a draft automated email, anyone the email has been shared with has access to view, edit, and send the email (if they have sending permission). Once the automated email has been published, anyone that has access will be able to view the automated email’s analytics. 

Once someone has access to an automated email, they can:

  • Edit drafts
  • Share with others
  • Clone automated email

To share an automated email:

  • In the email editor, select Share in the top actions bar.
  • After sending, you share via the Share option within the actions dropdown.
  • In your automated email list, hover over the automated email, select the 3-dot menu, and select Share email.

 

 

Sharing an automated email does not grant a user access to the journey or campaign that it could be associated with. These tools have separate sharing mechanisms. If you’re interested in learning more, see our article about sharing a journey

Item shared What access is granted  
Automated email

Grants access only to the specific automated email.

 

 Collaborate on creating, editing, and managing the automated email.
Journey

 

Grants access to the specific journey plus, any automated emails within that journey.

 

 Collaborate on building and managing the journey.
Campaign Grants access only to the specific campaign. Unlike regular emails, campaign access does not include access to the automated emails within it.

 

Share journey analytics with others without granting them access to create or manage the automated emails or journeys.


 

 

Cloning an automated email

Cloning an automated email is also very similar to cloning a regular email. Cloning a published automated email returns it to a draft state, making it editable for future updates or journeys.

To clone an automated email:

  1. Hover over the automated email within your email index page
  2. Select the 3-dot menu
  3. Select Clone automated email
  4. Make any updates to email
    1. Email type
    2. Name
    3. Share settings
  5. Select Clone or Clone & edit

 

Deleting an automated email

An automated email can be deleted by its owner, up until it’s in a published journey. Once it’s part of a published journey, the automated email cannot be deleted as it will impact the sending of communications within that published journey.

To delete an automated email:

  1. Hover over the automated email within your email index page
  2. Select the 3-dot menu
  3. Select Delete automated email

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