Automations

What it is

Automations are the jobs you would otherwise do by hand: texting a new enquiry back straight away, reminding a customer the day before you turn up, telling the office when an estimate gets signed, chasing an unpaid invoice. You describe the situation once, and Joby does it every time from then on.

You open it from Settings›Pipeline›Automations. It is not in the left-hand menu. (This page used to be called Visual Workflows, and older links with that name still open the same page.)

Every automation is three things in a row:

The Automations page lists everything you have, whether it is on, how many people are part way through it, and when it last did something. A second tab, Activity Log, shows every individual run.

When to use it

• Answering new enquiries and missed calls faster than anyone can type.
• Appointment reminders the day before, and review requests after the visit.
• Telling the right person the moment something happens — a signed estimate, a failed card, a new online booking.
• Chasing quotes and unpaid invoices on a schedule instead of from memory.
• Keeping records tidy: moving a status, adding a tag, adding a note, raising a task.

Use Bulk SMS instead when you want to text a list of people once, today. Use Visual Call Flows instead when you want to decide what a caller hears while the phone is still ringing — Automations run after the fact, not during a live call.

Before you start

• Automations are a Pro plan feature. On a lower plan the page shows an upgrade message instead of the builder.
• Your role needs the right switch. An owner or admin turns it on under Settings›Team Roles, in the Admin & Settings group, on the line called Visual Flows. Without it the page will not open.
• Set your statuses and service types up first. Trigger filters are picked from Settings›Pipeline›Lead Statuses and Settings›Pipeline›Service Types. If you rename one later, any automation still pointing at the old name quietly stops matching.
• Write your messages first if you can. Text and email steps can pull in a saved message from Settings›Pipeline›Communication Templates, which is easier than retyping the same wording into five automations.
• Texting needs a registered number. A Send a Text step needs a from-number, and outbound texting needs your registration finished under Settings›Channels›Phone Registration.
• Marketing steps only appear if you have Marketing. Add to Campaign and Remove from Campaign are hidden unless the Marketing module is switched on for your account and your role has Marketing access.
• Your company may use different words. "Lead", "Office Agent" and "Field Worker" can all be renamed for your account, so the cards may read "Job", "CSR" or "Technician" instead.

Step-by-step

Start from a ready-made automation (easiest)

1. Go to Settings›Pipeline›Automations.
2. Click New Automation at the top right (the Browse templates button next to it goes to the same place). The Add new automation page opens.
3. Find the card you want and click Add automation. Anything you already have shows a green On badge and an Add another button instead.
4. The builder opens with the steps already laid out and your company name filled into the wording. Click any step to read and change its settings on the right.
5. Change the name in the box at the top left if you want, turn the Active switch on, then click Save (or press ⌘S).

Build your own

1. From Settings›Pipeline›Automations, click New Automation, then Create your own automation on the gallery page.
2. Type a name in the box at the top left. An orange dot appears in that box whenever you have changes that are not saved yet.
3. The left panel opens on When this happens. Search it (try "missed call"), then click the card you want. It lands on the canvas. You can only have one starting event.
4. Click that card and fill in its settings on the right. Most starting events have optional filters — Service Type Filter, Status Filter, Service Area Filter, Ad Source Filter, Tag Filter and so on. Leave them blank to catch everything.
5. The left panel now reads Add a step. Click a card to add it and join it up automatically, or drag it if you want it in a particular spot.
6. Fill in each step. A Send a Text step needs a From Number, a To and a Message Template; use the variable picker under the message box to drop in details like {{Lead.first_name}}.
7. To join two steps by hand, drag from the dot on the bottom of one card to the dot on the top of the next. An Only if card has two dots underneath — Yes on the left, No on the right.
8. Click Checklist in the toolbar and clear anything marked as required — it tells you plainly what is missing ("A wait step has nothing after it", "SMS message is empty").
9. Turn the Active switch on and click Save.

Handy while you are building: Tidy up tidies the cards into neat rows, Delete or Backspace removes whatever you have selected, and ⌘C / ⌘V copy and paste steps (the starting event cannot be copied).

Turn one off, copy it, or throw it away

1. On Settings›Pipeline›Automations, find the row you want.
2. The switch at the end of the row turns it on and off. The badge next to the name flips between Active and Paused.
3. The copy button makes a duplicate called "name (Copy)". Copies always arrive switched off, so you can rework one safely while the original keeps running.
4. The bin button deletes it. You get a warning first, because deleting takes the run history with it and cannot be undone.

How to check it worked

• It saved. A message says "Automation saved" and the orange dot next to the name disappears.
• It is switched on. The row on the Automations list shows a blue Active badge, and the counter at the top of the page ("3 active") goes up.
• Nothing is missing. The strip under the builder toolbar turns green when there are no outstanding items; it stays orange with a count while something still needs fixing.
• It actually ran. The Last activity column stops saying "Never run", the runs count on the row goes up, and the runs today pill at the top of the page increases.
• See the individual run. Open the Activity Log tab. Each row shows Success or Failed, which automation ran, how long it took and when. Click a row to expand it and read the error message and the information the run was working from.
• See who is part way through. The four tiles at the top of the page — Entered workflows, Currently in workflow, Done all steps and Needs review — count people across every automation. Each row has the same numbers just for itself.

Common mistakes

• Leaving a card floating. A step that is not joined to anything never runs. The Checklist counts them ("2 steps not connected").
• An empty message. A text step with no wording, or an email with no subject, is caught by the Checklist before it can go out blank.
• Adding a second starting event. One per automation. If you need two different starting points, build two automations — copy the first and change its trigger.
• Expecting "Assign to a Field Worker" to assign an office agent. That step hands the job to a field worker. To tell an office agent about it, use Notify My Team and set Send To to Assigned Office Agent.
• Stacking messages on top of each other. If several automations can fire on the same event, a customer can get three texts in a minute. Put a wait in, or narrow the filters.
• Deleting to "start again". Deleting removes the run history too. Switch it off or copy it instead.