An automation sends a series of emails on its own, triggered by something a person does rather than by you pressing send. Set one up once and it keeps running: confirming a submission, following up after a decision, reminding someone about the event they registered for. Automations live at Admin → Marketing → Automation.
Automations compared with campaigns
A campaign is one email to a list at a chosen time. An automation is a reusable series that starts whenever its trigger fires for one person, so everybody moves through it on their own clock.
Use a campaign for newsletters, announcements and call promotions. See Email Campaign Basics.
Use an automation for follow-up that should happen every time, without you remembering.
What you need
Automations are part of Marketing Hub. If the Automation item is missing from the Marketing menu, or you land on a card headed Unlock Marketing Hub, your organization needs the module added. See Pricing and Plans, then Manage Subscription in your billing settings.
The Marketing Automations page
Marketing Automations has three sections.
Welcome Email Sequence is a dedicated onboarding series for new subscribers, configured in place.
Recipe Gallery holds five ready-made automations: Welcome series, Re-engagement, Event reminder, Submission journey and Donor/member thank-you. Selecting Apply Recipe creates an inactive draft with sensible subjects and delays already filled in, which you then edit before turning on.
Triggered Automations lists every automation you have built, each showing its trigger, its steps and whether it is running.
Build an automation
Select Create Automation, give it an internal name, add a description if it helps your team, and choose the trigger.
Four triggers are available:
Submission Created fires when an artist completes a submission to one of your calls.
Decision Made fires when a jury decision is recorded for a submission.
Event Registration fires when someone registers for one of your events.
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Manual / Custom covers sequences you start yourself rather than from a built-in event.
Each automation has exactly one trigger. If you want different messaging for an acceptance and a submission receipt, build two.
A new automation is created disabled, so nothing sends while you are still writing.
Add steps
Select Add Step for each email. Every step has:
Subject Line, the subject of that email.
Send After, the delay before it goes out. Choose Immediately, 1 hour, 6 hours, 1 day, 2 days, 3 days, 6 days, 7 days, 10 days, 14 days or 21 days.
The email content itself.
Removing a step renumbers the rest.
A common shape is an immediate first email, a follow-up a few days later, and a last nudge a week or two out. Give the steps room. Days between emails read as thoughtful; hours read as pestering.
Branch on engagement
Each step can carry a Condition (Branching): No condition, Previous email opened, or Previous email link clicked. When you set one, you also choose If true, go to step and If false, go to step.
Start without branching. Get a straight line working, then add a branch only where the two paths genuinely differ.
Turn it on
Select Save Sequence to store your work, then switch the automation from Disabled to Active. Only an active automation enrolls people and sends. Switching it back to Disabled stops further steps for everyone already enrolled and stops new enrollments, and turning it on again resumes normal behavior for future events.
The welcome sequence
Welcome Email Sequence is configured directly on the automations page. Turn it on, then add up to three emails with Add Email. Each card takes a Send Delay of Immediate, 1 day, 3 days, 7 days or 14 days, and a Subject Line. Select Save Configuration, after which Edit Content opens each email for writing.
The sequence has its own Welcome Email Analytics page for opens and clicks per email, so you can see which of the three is doing the work.
Who does and does not receive automation emails
Standard eligibility applies to every step. An automation never sends to someone who has unsubscribed, whose address has bounced, who is suppressed, or who has not confirmed their opt-in. Consent is checked again immediately before each send, so a decision made after enrollment still takes effect. Every automation email carries a one-click unsubscribe header alongside its unsubscribe link.
A person can be enrolled in more than one automation at a time. They are independent.
Sending limits
Your plan includes a monthly email allowance shared by campaigns and automations. When you pass 80 percent of it, a warning appears on the Marketing Hub page telling you how much is used and offering to upgrade. Once the allowance is exhausted, sending holds rather than failing, and resumes when the allowance resets or you raise it.
Controlled rollout: visual automation journeys. Some organizations also see a visual journey canvas below the step editor, for drawing an automation as a diagram rather than a list. Access varies by organization. Everything described above works the same way whether or not you have it.
Troubleshooting
No one is being enrolled. Check the trigger matches something that is actually happening. A Submission Created automation only enrolls people when someone submits.
Nothing is sending. Confirm the automation is Active. A disabled automation neither enrolls nor sends.
The first email arrived at the wrong time. Check Send After on the first step. Immediately sends as soon as the trigger fires; anything else waits.
A delay shows an unexpected value. An automation started from a recipe keeps that recipe's exact timing even when it is not one of the named presets. Leave it, or pick a preset.
Someone did not receive it. Check their subscriber status. Unsubscribed, bounced and pending contacts are excluded from every automation.
