Workflows help you automate certain actions in your business process to boost your team’s productivity.
The following are some of the common scenarios that you'll find useful based on the different actions available with workflows.
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Updating field property
Scenario 1: Create a workflow to segment customers from prospects
If you want to segment your contacts as prospects, you can automatically do so using workflows. When a deal is created and is in open state, you can mark the contact status as ‘Prospect’ and when the deal is won, change the status to ‘Customer.’
You need two workflows to achieve this.
Workflow 1: Update Lifecycle stage to Lead and and Status to New
Apply Workflow To: Deals
When do you want to execute this workflow:
Execute: when record is created
Run: once
What condition(s) should trigger workflow actions: Deal stage is in ‘New’
What Action(s) should be performed: Update all related contacts: Lifecycle stage =Lead and Status = New
Workflow 2: Update contact Lifecycle stage to ‘Customer’ and status to ‘Won’
Apply WorkflowTo: Deals
When do you want to execute this workflow:
Execute: once, when record is created or update
Run: Once
What condition(s) should trigger workflow actions: Deal Stage is in ‘Won’
What Action(s) should be performed: Update all related contacts: Lifecycle Stage = ‘Customer’ and Status = ‘Won’
Scenario 2: Create a workflow to update the status when the contact is contacted
Let’s say you want to update the contact stage to ‘Responded’ when the contact replies via email. This will allow the users to filter the interested contacts and close more deals.
To set the workflow:
Apply WorkflowTo: Contacts
When do you want to execute this workflow:
Execute: once, when record is created or updated
Run: Once
What condition(s) should trigger workflow actions: Status is in ‘new’, or ‘contacted’ and last contacted mode is ‘replied’ or ‘Opened but no Reply’
What Action(s) should be performed: Update Contact property: Status = ‘Responded’
Scenario 3 - Create a workflow to update contact stage when the contact is created via email
When the contact is created via email, the contact is already established. Thus, it makes sense to start the status from ‘Contacted’. We can make use of the source field here. When a contact is created via email, the status is automatically set to Contacted.
To set the workflow:
Apply WorkflowTo: Contacts
When do you want to execute this workflow:
Execute: when record is created
Run: Once
What condition(s) should trigger workflow actions: Source is in Email
What Action(s) should be performed: Update contact property: Status = ‘Contacted’
Scenario 4 - Create a workflow to assign all the unassigned contacts to sales ops
All the contacts are assigned to respective sales reps using territories but there might be a case or two where the contact remains unassigned. These might be important contacts that fall through the cracks. You can assign the contacts to your sales ops rep so that he/she can rightly assign the contact.
To set the workflow:
Apply WorkflowTo: Contacts
When do you want to execute this workflow:
Execute: weekly on Monday at 9am
Run: multiple times
What condition(s) should trigger workflow actions: Sales owner is empty
What Action(s) should be performed: Update contact property: Sales owner = Choose user or sales owner name
Scenario 5 - Update account country when contact country changes
You can use the update made to one field to apply to another field as well. Say if you are updating the contact country, then you can use the value to update your account country as well. This can be done using the country field in contacts as a Reference field to update the account field. Hence, whenever the workflow is triggered for the particular record, the country field in the account is updated to that of the country field under contact.
To set the workflow:
Apply WorkflowTo: Contacts
When do you want to execute this workflow:
Execute: Whenever the record is created or updated
Run: Recurrently for the same record.
What condition(s) should trigger workflow actions: Country is changed
What Action(s) should be performed: Update Account’s primary country with Contact Country
Create a task
Scenario 1 - Create a workflow to add a follow up for sales rep if he/she has not responded to customer email for more than 3 days
Sales reps sometimes forget follow up with the contact when the activity is more than a few days so it is always good to remind them to follow up if they have not responded to the contact within 3 days.
To set the workflow:
Apply WorkflowTo: Contacts
When do you want to execute this workflow:
Execute: Everyday at 9am
Run: recurrently for the same record
What condition(s) should trigger workflow actions: Last contacted mode = Incoming email and Last contacted time is greater than 3 days ago
What Action(s) should be performed: Create Task
Scenario 2: Create follow up for Contact owner to prepare for an appointment
If you want to create a task for the owner to prepare for an upcoming appointment, you can do the same by creating a workflow that triggers a follow-up reminder one day before the appointment.
To set the workflow:
Apply WorkflowTo: Appointment
When do you want to execute this workflow:
Execute: Whenever the record is created or updated
Run: Runs recurrently for the same record.
What condition(s) should trigger workflow actions:
1) Appointment Property Start date is in 1 Days
What Action(s) should be performed: (i) Create Follow-up task to Prepare for appointment
Send emails
Scenario 1 : Create a workflow to send an automated email reminder to the related contacts of a deal when subscription renewal date is nearing.
Sales reps generally focus on getting new business. It becomes difficult to follow up on existing business. Thus, an automated email reminder can be sent to the associated contacts to renew the subscription.
To set the workflow:
Apply WorkflowTo: Deals
When do you want to execute this workflow:
Execute: Everyday at 12pm
Run: Once
What condition(s) should trigger workflow actions: Deal renewal date is in 15 days
What Action(s) should be performed: Send email to related contacts
Scenario 2: Send follow-up email to Contact owner when a Demo task is overdue
To remind the owner of a contact about an overdue demo, create a workflow that triggers a follow-up reminder when the due date is less than a day away.
To set the workflow:
Apply WorkflowTo: Task
When do you want to execute this workflow:
Execute: Whenever the record is created or updated
Run: Recurrently for the same record.
What condition(s) should trigger workflow actions:
1) Task Property Title is in Demo
(AND)
2) Task Property Related to is in Contact
(AND)
3) Task Property Due Date is in 0 Days
What Action(s) should be performed: Send email to sales owner
Scenario 3: Send birthday greetings to contacts every year
If you want to send birthday greetings to your contacts, you can automate the same using workflows. You can create a workflow that triggers an email on the date of the contact’s birthday in the current year and updates the date to the next year after the email is sent. This can be done by updating the birthday field by 1 year.
To set the workflow:
Apply WorkflowTo: Contact
When do you want to execute this workflow:
Execute: Whenever the record is created or updated
Run: recurrently for the same record.
What condition(s) should trigger workflow actions: Birthday is in 0 days
What Action(s) should be performed: (i) Send Birthday Email
(ii) Update birthday relative value in 1 year.
IMPORTANT FIELD BEHAVIOR TO CONSIDER FOR WORKFLOW
Source - Source field stores the source of contact creation. This field gets auto-updated based on the channel such as if the contact is created via email, the source will be auto-updated to email. You can run multiple workflow actions based on the source.
Last Contacted Mode and Last Contacted Time - Last contacted mode and time stores the activities done to contact the contact. These activities can be a common trigger to take some actions.
Last Activity Type and Last Activity Date - These fields store the activities done by the contact. These activities can be a common trigger to take some actions.
Note:
- As of now, we have the workflow option for the core modules(contacts, accounts and Deals) along with Tasks, Meetings, Call logs and for all the Custom Modules that you create. However, we do not have the workflow option for Custom Sales Activities.
- Cross-module fields are not supported on workflow conditions. For eg: While creating a workflow on contact, you cannot add fields from the related account or deal as a condition. This is the expected behaviour.
- If you have added conditions to the workflow, updates made to those fields alone will be considered for triggering the workflow. Even if the contact satisfies the workflow conditions, if you update some other random field, the workflow will not trigger. This is the expected behaviour to prevent the workflows from triggering multiple times for the same record.
- You can trigger workflows without making updates based on existing field values using the time-based workflow triggers(Daily/Weekly/Monthly):
- You can also use the "Once for each record" option so that after the workflow triggers once for a record, it never runs again for the same contact.
- For the options "Send email to Owner", "Send email to contact" and "Send email to related contacts" option, you can delay the sending to a maximum 23:30 hours. In case you are looking to add a delay in days, workflows would not be the right choice. You can explore the "Sales Sequences" feature instead.
- Using the "Send email to Owner" option, you can only add existing users on the CC/BCC of the email. Any other email address cannot be added, even if they are added as part of Team Inbox email aliases.