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Automations: Creating and Managing

Adding an Automation

  1. Select Automations from your Simplero Dashboard

  2. In the Automation tab, click the + Create new automation button in the upper right corner

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  3. Give your new automation a name and click the OK button

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  4. Select the + Add a step button for your automation

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  5. Complete all appropriate fields and click the Save changes button

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  6. Repeat steps 4-5 until all steps for your automation have been added.


Conditions on an Automation

  1. Select Automations from your Simplero Dashboard

  2. In the Automation tab, select the automation name you want to add conditionals to

  3. Select Settings tab and then you can choose it here

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  4. Scroll down the Condition section where you will have 3 options...

    • Always run means that every time a contact enters the automation they will be allowed to go through it assuming of course that you have the settings set to allow him/her to enter it more than once. 

    • Only run when a contact has a tag means that if a contact is entered into an automation but does not have the selected qualifying tag linked to his/her name then they will not go through the automation. 

    • On run when the contact does not have this tag is going to be the same thing only the opposite, s/he will only be allowed to go through the automation in the absence of a tag. An example of when you might use one of the last two automations is when the automation is being used for a sales funnel or when trying to exclude people from an automation.


Automation Wait steps

You have several options for Wait steps in an automation.Image 2021-03-13 at 1.12.08 PM

  • A date specific time (if the date is in the past, the automation will perform the action on new contacts in that step)

  • A general wait time such as a number of days or minutes.

  • A contact field that has a date/time value such as a customers Birthday - To use this option you will need to be using the birthday or custom date field which can be set up in your form fields, and then added to opt-ins and order forms. 

  • A course start date - This option is only available when it is connected to a product, and a start date has been added on the Selling tab within the product.

  • Subscription period ends. This option is used when an automation is in conjunction with a subscription purchase. 

Important: Changing an automation wait step affects those already waiting in that step. 

For example John enters the wait step 7: wait 1 day. If you change step 7 to wait 1 week, John would now wait 1 week in that step, not 1 day. 

We do not recommend making changes on steps where there are currently active contacts.

 Excluding people from an Automation

Is one of your opt-ins linked to a sales funnel automation for a specific product? If so it is likely you don't want people who have already purchased that product to go through that sales funnel. It's a bit redundant since they already bought it and it could possibly frustrate them. So how do we remedy this? Below you will find the steps for how to exclude someone from entering an automation. 

  1. Select Products from your Simplero Dashboard

  2. In the Products tab, select the product are selling through the sales funnel

  3. Select the Content tab of that product

  4. Scroll to the Triggers section and you will add a trigger that adds a tag to the contact upon purchasing

  5. Locate or create your sales funnel automation 

  6. Go to the Settings of your Automation

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  7. Scroll down to the Condition section and select the condition "Only run when the contact does not have this tag" and select the tag you added in step 4

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Want to exclude multiple groups of people?

Are you using your automation as a sales funnel where you are selling more than one product? If so it is likely that you want to exclude people from any of the products being sold so that they aren't being resold a product they already have bought. The conditional option above only allows you to exclude people based on a single Tag. So you could add that same tag to anyone in any of the products being sold. However, If you have used different tags for the different products then you will need to do a bit of extra work. Below are the steps you would need to follow for each of the tags you want to exclude from an automation not covered via the conditionals in settings. 

  1. Select Products from your Simplero Dashboard

  2. In the Products tab, select the product are selling through the sales funnel

  3. Select the Content tab of that product

  4. Scroll to the Triggers section and you will add a trigger that adds a tag to the contact upon purchasing
    For example, I have 2 products I am going to sell in my sales Funnel, Product A, Product B. Product A will be tagged A, Product B will be tagged B 

  5. Create your sales funnel automation with all your wait steps and sales emails as you would for someone who has never purchased anything from you.

  6. Go to Tags

    1. Select Lists & Contacts from your Simplero Dashboard

    2. Select the Tags tab

    3. Locate and select Tag A, the once you've added in step 4

    4. Add a Trigger to Tag A that says when {When Tag is removed, Stop Automation, select the sales funnel automation from the above step 5}

    5. Repeat steps 3 and 4 for Tag B

  7. Open up the sales funnel automation you created in step 5

  8. Add an action step to remove the Tag A and move it to just before you sell Product A

  9. Repeat step 8 for Tag B 

Now when a participant goes through the automation If they have purchased one of those two products they will be removed from the automation and never go through any of the steps that occur after their tag has been removed. 


Editing an Automation

From time to time you may want to update an automation. Maybe you want to add a step, remove a step, make a change to an email that is being sent or rearrange the steps of your automation. This is not a problem, follow the steps below to edit the automation. But please NOTE...when you edit an automation the change will only affect the people who have not yet reached the step where the change is made. 

What does this mean?

  • If you are editing a wait step - People currently in that wait step will be affected. They receive the new wait rule. 

  • If you are adding a step - Only people who are in the steps prior to it will receive the additional step.

  • If you add a step to the end of the broadcast - People who have finished the automation will not be affected.

  • If you make a change to the broadcast - Only people who have not yet received the broadcast will see the new version.

  1. Select Automation from your Simplero Dashboard

  2. In the Automations tab, locate and select your automation

  3. Locate and select the step you want to edit 

  4. Select the Pencil icon in the far right side within the step box and make the edits

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Note: If you make changes on the fly to an automation that's already running, note that the change will only affect the people who have not yet reached the step where you made the change.

However, if someone is waiting in a wait step, they will be affected by the change. 


Rearrange Steps of an Automation

  1. Select Automation from your Simplero Dashboard

  2. In the Automations tab, locate and select your automation

  3. Select and hold the Double dotted lines to the left of the automation step and drag it to the desired location within the automation
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We don't recommend rearranging steps where there are currently active contacts.

Removing a Step in an Automation

  1. Select Automation from your Simplero Dashboard

  2. In the Automations tab, locate and select your automation

  3. Locate and select the step you want to remove 

  4. Select the Trashcan icon in the far right side within the step box

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  5. Click OK to confirm your removal of the step

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We don't recommend deleting steps where there are currently active contacts on.

Adding a Step in an Automation

  1. Select Automation from your Simplero Dashboard

  2. In the Automations tab, locate and select your automation

  3. Select the + Add a step button below your current steps

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  4. Complete all appropriate fields and click the Save changes button

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  5. You can also click the (Plus) + icon to Add step after this step 

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  6. Select and hold the Double dotted lines to the left of the automation step and drag it to where you want it in the sequence
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Duplicating a Step in an Automation

  1. Select Automation from your Simplero Dashboard

  2. In the Automations tab, locate and select your automation

  3. Locate and select the step you want to duplicate 

  4. Select the Paper icon in the far right side within the step box

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  5. You will now see a duplicate step within your automation

  6. Select the Pencil icon in the far right to update the name of your automation 

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  7. Click the Save changes button

Sending Emails through an automation

  1. + Add a Step

  2. Choose the Action Send email

  3. You have two options now:

Option One: Create a unique email for this automation step >> Add a Subject and the email Body >> then Save changes. You can then save a copy of this email in your email library so you can use it in other Steps or Automations. 

Option 2: Reuse an existing Email from the Email for Automarions library:

Learn more about the Email Library in our guide Emails for Automations

Editing an email that is part of an automation

On the automation Summary tab, locate the step with the email you’d like to edit, then click on the edit icon at the far right:

  • If the email is unique to that step, you will be able to edit the subject and email body on that same screen:

You can also Save this unique email to your Email Library so it’s available to be used in other automation steps or triggers.

  • If you are using an already saved email from your Library, then click on the Email name (or edit icon next to it) to edit its content. When you edit the Library Email you are editing it everywhere you have used that email. It's a single email, which can be used in multiple places. 

And Save the changes.

Duplicating Steps that contain Emails

  • Duplicating steps containing unique emails will make a second copy of the email. It will then be unique to that new step and you can edit one without affecting the other. 

Any changes made to the email linked on Step#3 will not apply to the email linked on Step#2. They are independent of each other.

  • There are 2 ways of duplicating an automation step that contains an already saved library email:

    •  Duplicate the ste and reuse the Library email >> any changes made on either the original or the duplicate will affect both steps (they are using the exact same email!

    • Duplicate the step and duplicate the library email too >> any changes made on the original will not affect the copy, they are linked to different emails!

Advanced Automation Step Settings

Add Notes

You can add a note to any automation step. These are internal notes for your reference. This is a great way to help you remember down the line why you set up a condition on a step, or maybe you run a seasonal course and need to remember to update certain action steps each round. 

Add Conditions

Run the steps only under certain conditions (if contact has a tag, subscribed to a list…). Very helpful to exclude contacts to run specific steps on the automation.


Skip Step if wait step exceeded

If you have a waiting step set to a specific date, let’s say wait until May 5th 2022, to then give access to a course lesson and send an email. If a contact starts the automation on May 6th, you may want to skip sending the email but allow getting access to the lesson. In that case, Step#2 would be set to skip if the last wait step was exceeded (do not fire this step if we are past May 5th).

Duplicating an Automation

  1. Select Automation from your Simplero Dashboard

  2. In the Automations tab, locate and select your automation

  3. Select the three dots button on the top right-hand corner

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  4. You will now be able to choose Duplicate

  5. Select the Settings button on the tab bar

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  6. Update the name of your automation

  7. Click the Save changes button

  8. Update or add steps as needed to the automation

Warning! If you duplicate an automation, any Library emails linked on the original will be reused in the new automation.

Deleting an Automation

  1. Select Automation from your Simplero Dashboard

  2. In the Automations tab, locate and select your automation

  3. Select the Three dots button 

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  4. You can now click Delete


  5. Click OK to confirm your deletion

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  6. The automation will now be removed from your Simplero account. Any emails that were created within will still exist in your email library. 

Last updated 6 May 2022.
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