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Choosing an action for your automation

Actions are what your automation actually does. After your trigger has captured the right contacts and any criteria have narrowed them down, the action is the step that sends an email, applies a tag, alerts a staff member, or otherwise gets things done. This article explains how actions work, the critical settings to know, and the full list of actions available in Connect.

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How actions work

When an automation reaches an action, it runs that action against every contact currently flowing through that step. Where do those contacts come from? They were captured by the trigger at the start of the automation, then narrowed by any criteria blocks the automation has passed through.

This is why the Email action knows who to email: it uses the list of contacts handed to it by the previous step. You don't have to specify recipients on the action itself. You shape that list with your trigger and criteria, then let the action do its job.

You can put multiple actions back-to-back in a single automation. For example: send an email, then tag the contact, then send a follow-up email a few days later.

Send to contacts vs notify your team

Two of the most important actions look similar but do very different things:

  • Email and SMS send to the contact flowing through the automation. The recipient is the person the automation is acting on
  • Notify via Email and Notify via SMS send to an address you specify, typically a staff member's inbox or phone. The recipient is not the contact, it's whoever you nominate

Use Email when you want to message the contact (a thank-you, a welcome, a reminder). Use Notify via Email when you want to alert your team that something happened (a new feedback form, a high-value purchase, a booking from a VIP). Mixing these up is one of the most common reasons an automation sends the wrong message to the wrong person.

Important: always set a frequency on your messages

⚠️ Warning, every email and SMS action has a Frequency setting that controls how often the same contact can receive that specific message. If you leave it on Always send, the same contact can receive the message every time the trigger fires. For triggers like Contact Updated that can fire many times for the same contact in a single visit, this leads to repeat messages and complaints.

Frequency options include:

  • Always send, the default, no limit
  • Once, the contact can only ever receive this message once
  • Weekly or Monthly, once per week or month
  • Every X days, a custom interval

A common pattern is to set frequency to Once on welcome emails (the contact only joins your database once) and to a longer interval on win-back emails (so you don't keep nudging the same contact every day).

Sending messages: Email and SMS

These are the two most common actions and they share most of the same settings.

Email

Sends an email to the contact flowing through the automation. Key settings:

  • Subject line, what the contact sees in their inbox. Supports merge tags for personalisation (for example, the contact's first name) with a fallback value
  • From email and From name, the sender details the contact sees
  • Reply-to address, optional. Use it if replies should go somewhere different from the From address
  • Frequency, as covered above
  • Ignore opt-out status, off by default. Only enable this for transactional messages (order confirmations, booking confirmations) that must reach the contact even if they've unsubscribed
  • Template, click Select template to pick an existing email design, or create a new one
  • Campaign folder, every email sent through an automation is logged in a folder for reporting

SMS

Same shape as Email but sends an SMS to the contact's mobile number on file. The contact needs a valid mobile number for the message to send. Like Email, SMS supports merge tags, frequency limits, and campaign folders.

ℹ️ Note, depending on your region, SMS sending may require a registered Sender ID. If your SMS messages aren't being delivered, check with Support to confirm your Sender ID setup.

 

Notifying your team: Notify via Email and Notify via SMS

Use these when the message needs to go to a staff member, not to the contact.

Notify via Email

Sends an email to one or more addresses you specify. Settings:

  • To, the recipient address. You can enter a specific email, or select from existing user accounts and roles in Connect. Multiple addresses are supported
  • Subject line and From name, set as you would for a regular Email action
  • Message content, the body of the notification

A common pattern is to set up an automation that fires when a feedback form is submitted, with the action set to Notify via Email to the venue manager. The manager gets an inbox alert in real time without needing to log into Connect.

Notify via SMS

Same shape as Notify via Email but sends the alert as an SMS to a nominated mobile number.

 

Updating contact data: Set Contact Field and Unset Contact Field

These actions update data on the contact's profile without sending a message.

Set Contact Field

Sets a contact field to a specific value. Most commonly used to add a tag to a contact (for example, tag them as Recent purchaser or VIP). Can also update any other contact field, including custom fields.

Unset Contact Field

The opposite. Removes a value from a contact field. Most commonly used to remove a tag.

Together these are the building blocks for keeping your contact data tidy. Tag contacts based on what they do, untag them when they no longer fit the criteria, and use those tags to drive future segments and campaigns.

 

Controlling timing: Add Delay

Pauses the automation for a set period before moving to the next step. Configurable in hours, days, or months.

Two main uses:

  • Spacing out messages, send a welcome email today, then a follow-up seven days later
  • Setting up a fair check, send an email, then wait several days, then use a criteria block to check whether the contact opened it

Without an Add Delay before a criteria like Email Opened, the criteria always returns no because the email hasn't had time to land. See Choosing criteria for your automation for more on this pattern.

 

Resending earlier messages: Resend Email and Resend SMS

These actions resend a message that was already configured earlier in the same automation. You don't have to redefine the subject line, template, or settings, you just point at the original block.

A common use is to re-send an email to contacts who didn't open it the first time:

  1. Send the email
  2. Add a delay
  3. Use Email Opened criteria to check if the contact opened it
  4. On the No path, use Resend Email pointing at step 1, optionally with an updated subject line (for example, prefixed with Reminder)

When you drop in a Resend Email block, you'll be asked to select which earlier email block to resend. You can also adjust the subject line at the resend step if you want to flag the message differently the second time.

 

Sending data externally: Webhook

Sends a POST request with contact data to a URL you provide. Used for technical integrations where you want Connect to push data to another system when something happens. You'll need the correct authentication key from the receiving system to ensure the webhook is accepted.

This is the most technical action in the list. Most automations don't need it, but it's there when you want Connect to talk to systems beyond email and SMS.

FAQs

What's the difference between Email and Notify via Email? Email sends to the contact flowing through the automation. Notify via Email sends to an address you specify (typically staff). Same kind of action, very different recipient.

Can one action have multiple recipients? Email and SMS send to all contacts currently at that step in the automation, so the number of recipients depends on how many contacts the trigger and criteria let through. Notify via Email and Notify via SMS let you enter multiple addresses manually.

Does frequency apply across all my automations or just one? Frequency is set per email or SMS action within a single automation. The same contact could receive a message from automation A and a different message from automation B in the same day, as long as each automation's frequency rules are respected.

Can I undo a Set Contact Field action? Yes. Use Unset Contact Field to remove the value, or set the field to a new value with another Set Contact Field action. Changes apply going forward, they don't reverse messages that have already been sent.

Why would I use Resend Email instead of just dragging in another Email action? Resend Email reuses the original email's settings (template, frequency, sender details) without you having to reconfigure everything. It's faster, and it keeps the resent message tied to the original for reporting.

Related articles

You now know which action to reach for in different situations, and the settings that make the difference between an automation that works smoothly and one that frustrates your contacts.

Any questions? Reach out to us via email at support@meandu.com

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