Understand how Contacts move through a Workflow
In AVADA, an automated workflow is set in motion by an initial trigger and includes one or more elements. Workflows can be used to send timely information to recipients or to do specified tasks, such as changing an information field of a profile.
This article will explain how contacts move through a workflow and how you can influence their movement and action.
When a new person joins a flow after qualifying the workflow's trigger, they will be scheduled for the first step in the email series right away.
This initial step could be an action, such as sending an email, or a logic evaluation, such as a conditional split.
If there is no time delay before this first stage, the recipient will go rapidly through it and be scheduled for the following elements.
If there is a time difference between the first step and the next, the recipient will be placed in a waiting time until the sending time arrives. You can edit the schedule time of the workflow by using the Wait Time element
If the flow is live, a recipient is only scheduled for one element at a time.
For example, let's look at the Welcome Subscriber workflow from AVADA in the image above. A email with a gift code is sent one day after the initial welcome email, then another email is sent 3 days later to remind the subscriber about the gift code about to expire.
Only when the person has moved past the email #1 about gift code can him/her move to be a scheduled recipient for email #2 to remind about the gift code. If that person decide to unsubscribe after the email about the gift code, then he/she won't receive the email that reminds them about the gift code later.
If you notice any issues with your workflow's timing, please contact our Support Team at Live Chat in app.
If you change the wait time before a step, contacts who are currently in the flow but haven't reached that step yet will be automatically scheduled according to the new timing when they arrive.
Let's say you have a workflow where Email #1 is set to send after 1 day, and Email #2 is scheduled to send 7 days later.
Rainy enters this workflow an is waiting to receive the Email #1 the next day. While she's already scheduled for Email #1, you rescheduled Email #2 to send 3 days later instead of 7 days. As soon as Rainy receives Email #1, she'll be automatically scheduled for Email#1 in 3 days later, according to the updated timing.
In another scenario, when Rainy is already in the waiting time for Email #2, if you update the timing for this email , Rainy won't be rescheduled to receive the email sooner. She will still receive the email 7 days later because she's already scheduled.
It's worth noting that if you set a wait time to wait until a certain day, you won't be able to see the predicted number of days for any emails or SMS that arrive after the timer. Let's say you have a five-day time delay and only send on Mondays and Fridays. AVADA Marketing Automation is unable to predict when a recipient will receive the next message in this situation since each individual in the flow will have a different number of days before receiving the message.
If you add a new element to an existing workflow series (e.g., an email, an update profile property action, a split, etc. ), any recipients who were planned for a prior step will be immediately scheduled for the new step.
Let's imagine you have a welcome series consisting of three emails sent out over the course of a week after someone subscribes. You want to extend this series by sending three more emails at the end. After someone subscribes, the flow now lasts two weeks.
The fresh emails will be sent to all recipients that are currently in your sequence. You don't need to do anything else. This only applies to recipients who are still in the process of traveling through the flow.
Recipients who had already exited the flow previous to the addition of these new emails will not get these new emails.
All elements in a workflow are scheduled one at a time, and contacts must complete one step before moving on to the next.
This means that any modifications made to elements ahead of them will have an impact on those traveling through the flow. If someone is already booked in for a step, they will continue to be scheduled for that step even if it is moved farther down the sequence.
If you remove a step from your flow that has contacts waiting, those contacts will be moved to the next step. When you remove a step from your flow, you'll also remove any data related with that step. When sending emails or SMS, change the message mode to Draft to save the data. In draft mode, contacts will not be scheduled for messages and will proceed to the next phase in your flow.
The only time this does not apply is if:
The step that is being removed is a split (conditional or trigger)
There is no wait time before the separation.
Any contacts in the queue will be removed from the flow when the split is deleted in this situation. If not, they'll move on to the next phase.
This article will explain how contacts move through a workflow and how you can influence their movement and action.
1. How recipients are scheduled for a workflow
When a new person joins a flow after qualifying the workflow's trigger, they will be scheduled for the first step in the email series right away.
This initial step could be an action, such as sending an email, or a logic evaluation, such as a conditional split.
If there is no time delay before this first stage, the recipient will go rapidly through it and be scheduled for the following elements.
If there is a time difference between the first step and the next, the recipient will be placed in a waiting time until the sending time arrives. You can edit the schedule time of the workflow by using the Wait Time element
If the flow is live, a recipient is only scheduled for one element at a time.
For example, let's look at the Welcome Subscriber workflow from AVADA in the image above. A email with a gift code is sent one day after the initial welcome email, then another email is sent 3 days later to remind the subscriber about the gift code about to expire.
Only when the person has moved past the email #1 about gift code can him/her move to be a scheduled recipient for email #2 to remind about the gift code. If that person decide to unsubscribe after the email about the gift code, then he/she won't receive the email that reminds them about the gift code later.
If you notice any issues with your workflow's timing, please contact our Support Team at Live Chat in app.
2. Update the Wait Time in an active workflow
If you change the wait time before a step, contacts who are currently in the flow but haven't reached that step yet will be automatically scheduled according to the new timing when they arrive.
Let's say you have a workflow where Email #1 is set to send after 1 day, and Email #2 is scheduled to send 7 days later.
Rainy enters this workflow an is waiting to receive the Email #1 the next day. While she's already scheduled for Email #1, you rescheduled Email #2 to send 3 days later instead of 7 days. As soon as Rainy receives Email #1, she'll be automatically scheduled for Email#1 in 3 days later, according to the updated timing.
In another scenario, when Rainy is already in the waiting time for Email #2, if you update the timing for this email , Rainy won't be rescheduled to receive the email sooner. She will still receive the email 7 days later because she's already scheduled.
It's worth noting that if you set a wait time to wait until a certain day, you won't be able to see the predicted number of days for any emails or SMS that arrive after the timer. Let's say you have a five-day time delay and only send on Mondays and Fridays. AVADA Marketing Automation is unable to predict when a recipient will receive the next message in this situation since each individual in the flow will have a different number of days before receiving the message.
3. Add a new element into an active workflow
If you add a new element to an existing workflow series (e.g., an email, an update profile property action, a split, etc. ), any recipients who were planned for a prior step will be immediately scheduled for the new step.
Let's imagine you have a welcome series consisting of three emails sent out over the course of a week after someone subscribes. You want to extend this series by sending three more emails at the end. After someone subscribes, the flow now lasts two weeks.
The fresh emails will be sent to all recipients that are currently in your sequence. You don't need to do anything else. This only applies to recipients who are still in the process of traveling through the flow.
Recipients who had already exited the flow previous to the addition of these new emails will not get these new emails.
4. Reorder elements in an active workflow
All elements in a workflow are scheduled one at a time, and contacts must complete one step before moving on to the next.
This means that any modifications made to elements ahead of them will have an impact on those traveling through the flow. If someone is already booked in for a step, they will continue to be scheduled for that step even if it is moved farther down the sequence.
5. Delete an element in an active workflow
If you remove a step from your flow that has contacts waiting, those contacts will be moved to the next step. When you remove a step from your flow, you'll also remove any data related with that step. When sending emails or SMS, change the message mode to Draft to save the data. In draft mode, contacts will not be scheduled for messages and will proceed to the next phase in your flow.
The only time this does not apply is if:
The step that is being removed is a split (conditional or trigger)
There is no wait time before the separation.
Any contacts in the queue will be removed from the flow when the split is deleted in this situation. If not, they'll move on to the next phase.
Updated on: 06/09/2021
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