Understanding Automations
Learn what automations are and when to use them
Understanding Automations
Automations in Mailnaptic let you send emails and perform actions automatically based on triggers and conditions. Instead of manually sending a welcome email every time someone subscribes, or remembering to follow up after a purchase, automations handle these workflows for you, running 24/7 in the background.
What is an automation?
An automation is a workflow that starts with a trigger (an event that enrolls a contact) and contains a series of steps (actions, delays, and conditions) that execute in order. Each contact moves through the automation independently at their own pace.
For example, a welcome series automation might look like:
- Trigger: Contact subscribes to a list.
- Action: Send "Welcome to Mailnaptic" email.
- Delay: Wait 2 days.
- Action: Send "Getting started guide" email.
- Delay: Wait 3 days.
- Condition: Did the contact click a link in the previous email?
- Yes branch: Send "Advanced features" email.
- No branch: Send "Need help?" email.
When to use automations
Automations are ideal for any email workflow that should happen in response to a specific event or on a schedule:
- Onboarding — Welcome new subscribers with a series of introductory emails.
- Nurturing — Guide leads through your sales funnel with educational content.
- Re-engagement — Win back subscribers who have not interacted with your emails in a while.
- Transactional follow-up — Send post-purchase emails, review requests, or shipping updates.
- Abandoned cart recovery — Remind shoppers about items they left in their cart.
- Date-based — Send birthday emails, anniversary messages, or renewal reminders.
- Behavioral — React to website visits, page views, or custom events tracked by the Mailnaptic site tracking snippet.
Automations vs campaigns
Campaigns are one-time sends to a specific audience. Automations are ongoing workflows that enroll contacts individually as they meet the trigger criteria.
| Feature | Campaign | Automation |
|---|---|---|
| Timing | Sent once at a scheduled time | Runs continuously |
| Audience | Fixed list/segment at send time | Contacts enroll individually via triggers |
| Content | Same email to all recipients | Can branch and personalize per contact |
| Use case | Newsletters, announcements, promotions | Onboarding, nurturing, behavioral responses |
Key concepts
- Trigger — The event that starts the automation for a contact (subscription, tag added, site event, etc.).
- Action — Something the automation does (send email, add tag, remove tag).
- Delay — A wait period between steps (minutes, hours, or days).
- Condition — An if/else branch that routes contacts down different paths based on their data or behavior.
- Run — A single contact's journey through the automation. Each contact has their own run with its own status and progress.
Automations are one of the most powerful features in Mailnaptic. They let you deliver the right message at the right time without manual intervention.