Creating workflows

The procedure describes the creation of a workflow.

Requirements

You must be granted user permissions which allow access to the Automation module.
If a workflow uses nodes that rely on customer activity on the website (for example page.visit, product.buy, and so on), you must implement a tracking code into the website.
If the workflow uses nodes that rely on sending emails, text messages, pushes or web pushes, the respective accounts for sending these must be configured in the Synerise system.

Basic information

Workflow and path are terms you can encounter in the documentation on Automation.
You can create workflows of these types:
- Business-oriented workflow - This type of workflow in most cases is oriented at integrating Synerise with external services.
- Profile-oriented workflow - This type of workflow is oriented at performing direct actions towards customers.
A workflow is linear and it always moves in one direction.
A node is an element a workflow is built with. It can be a trigger that launches a workflow, a condition such as the Profile Filter, an action such as the Send Email, and so on.
Action nodes are processed on the basis of a fire and forget method. It means that in a situation where the process consists of a trigger, condition, action (for example, Send Email), and a finalizing End node, the workflow is finished when email sending is launched. The completion of the workflow isn’t conditioned upon the completion of sending emails.
While creating a workflow, you may follow the hints in the Issues and Insights tabs which will help you through the process of creating a workflow:
- Issues - This tab presents all issues that need to be addressed in order to activate the workflow, for example, missing connections between nodes, missing title to the workflow, and so on.
The Issues tab
- Insights - This tab presents collective information about communication (messages) that have been concluded upon workflow launch. It also contains suggestions on actions you may want to take, such as updating message templates used in a workflow to the latest version.
  The Insights tab
You can preview node statistics for activated workflows.
You can use workflow limits that let you restrict the number of repetitions in the context of a particular workflow and nodes used in a workflow, as well as ignore the global limit of messages.

Important: Segmentation, expression, and aggregate definitions are cached for 20 minutes after a node with the analysis is activated in a journey.
When another journey in the Automation requests a result of the same analysis in that period, the cached definition is used to calculate the results. This means that if you edit a segmentation, aggregate, or expression used in an Automation, it takes 20 minutes for the new version to start being used in journeys.
This includes definitions of segmentations, expressions, and aggregates nested in other analyses and used in Inserts.

Creating a standard workflow

Go to Automation > Workflows > New workflow.
Result: A canvas opens:
Start view
From the canvas, select a node that will trigger a workflow.
Result: The chosen node appears on the automation process dashboard.
To edit the settings of the node, click the node. Result: A pop-up is shown.
Configuration of the Profile Event node
On the pop-up, define the settings of the trigger.
To inform other users about the purpose of the node, you can write a short description. In the header of the pop-up, click the pencil icon and enter the text.
Confirm the settings by clicking Apply.
To select the further elements of the workflow, click the THEN button on the trigger node. You have three types of nodes to choose from:
- Flow - Settings that concern the connections between the nodes.
- Conditions - Nodes in the workflow that allow you to narrow the group of customers the workflow is directed to.
- Actions - Nodes which define the kind of action to be executed as a response to the fulfilled conditions.
- Integrations - Nodes which let you integrate with external systems.
When you choose the next node, adjust its settings by clicking the node on the canvas.
Place at least one End node in the workflow. Otherwise, you won’t be able to save it.
You can define an automatic change or changes of the workflow status by clicking Define schedule. This option lets you create schedule rules according to which the workflow changes status at a given date and time. You can find the detailed instructions in the Workflow scheduler article.
Define a limit on the number of workflows that a customer can launch/that can be launched within a specific time range, by clicking Set capping in the upper-right corner.
1. In the Limit field, enter the number of times the automation process can be triggered.
2. In the Time field, enter the number.
3. From the dropdown list, select the time unit.
4. Confirm the settings by clicking Apply.

Saving the workflow

You can:

save a workflow as a draft, which lets you save your progress without running the workflow.
save and activate the workflow immediately.

The process of saving and activating the workflow depends on application of scheduler rules in it.

Save as draft

If you want to save your progress without activating the workflow, follow the instructions in this section.

The pop-up which appears after clicking the Save button in the workflow

In the upper-right corner, click Save.
Result: A pop-up appears. This pop-up appears while saving a draft for the first time.
In Workflow name, provide the name of the workflow.
From the Folder list, you can select the folder in which the workflow will be saved.
Saving workflows in folders lets you quickly find and efficiently manage them.
Optionally, you can add tags to workflows by clicking Add tag. Tags are a method of organizing and managing your workflows. By assigning relevant tags from the predefined automations folder, you can keep your workflows structured and easy to navigate.
From the dropdown list, select the tags you want to assign to the workflow.
The list contains only tags from the automation tag folder.
Confirm the settings by clicking Save.

Save and run

To save and activate the workflow, in the upper-right corner, click Save & Run.
Result: A pop-up appears.

Without scheduler rules

Confirm by clicking Yes, run workflow.

With scheduler rules

A pop-up with activate options — A pop-up that appears after clicking Save & Run for a workflow with schedule rules

Option	When selected
Run workflow immediately	Ignores schedule rules and runs the workflow immediately. Schedule rules are disabled, and any status changes must be done manually.
Activate schedule rules	Runs the workflow according to the schedule rules. The workflow stays in Pending status until the scheduled activation date, then proceeds based on the schedule rules.
Run workflow immediately and Activate schedule rules	Runs the workflow immediately and applies schedule rules. The workflow is immediately set to Active status, schedule rules are enforced, but if the first rule is activation, it is ignored since the workflow is already active.

Confirm by clicking Yes, run workflow.

Workflow status

The status of the workflow changes to Stopped when (applies only to workflows triggered by Audience):

it’s been 62 days from the latest execution of the trigger,
it is a one-off workflow and it is completed,
the limit of repetitions in the trigger settings runs out

In the audit log, this change of the workflow status will be marked as a change done by internal user.

WARNING: Activating a paused or stopped automation that starts with the Audience trigger results in restarting the automation for all customers (also those who completed the automation before pausing or stopping it).

Important: If your automation includes any communication nodes (send email/SMS/mobile push/webpush), a communication is created for each node. The communication is named after the template that was used and the author is Automation. The UUID of the communication is available in the details of the node.
DO NOT remove communications created for nodes. Removing such a communication breaks the node.

Keyboard shortcuts and bulk operations on nodes

Batch operations on nodes allow you to efficiently manage multiple elements on the canvas.

Action	Keyboard shortcut	Description
Selecting multiple nodes	Hold shift and select	To select several nodes, hold Shift while clicking individual nodes or drag a selection box across the desired area.
Copying selected nodes	Cmd+C / Ctrl+C	Copies the selected canvas elements.
Pasting the copied nodes	Cmd+V / Ctrl+V	Pastes canvas elements from the clipboard.
Deleting selected nodes	Backspace	Deletes the selected elements.

Important: Remember that the diagram’s structure can only be modified while it is in draft status.

Tagging worfklows

You can assign the automation tags to workflows.

Workflow folders

You can save the workflows in folders which will let you better organize and manage your workflows.

Adding folders

To create your custom folders, follow the instructions in this section:

Go to Automation > Workflows.
On the left pane, click Add folder.
Result: A text field appears under the Add folder button.
Enter the name of the folder.
Confirm the name by clicking enter.
Result: A folder appears on the list.

Assigning workflows to folders

You can assign workflows to folders in the following ways:

while saving the workflow as draft
after saving the workflow, on the list of workflows, click > Move to.
Result: A pop-up appears.
From the dropdown list, select the folder name and to confirm the action, click Apply.