Automations - GatherCRM

1. Overview

Automations lets GatherCRM respond automatically when something happens elsewhere in the CRM.

Each automation follows a simple structure:

1.When this happens
2. Only continue if these conditions match
3. Then perform these actions

Examples include:

When a specific form is completed, add the person to an email journey.
When a quiz is completed with a high score, notify a team member.
When a lead enters a pipeline stage, create a follow-up task.
When a contract is signed, create a handover board.
When a new contact is created, start a welcome journey.
When a lead is marked Won, create a project and begin onboarding.

Automations can work with Contacts, Secondary records, Forms, Quiz, Pipeline, Tasks, Projects, Contracts and Email Hub.

The available choices depend on which GatherCRM modules are installed and active.

2. Main screens

Open Automations in GatherCRM.

The module has three principal screens:

Automations — create, edit, activate and pause workflows.
Templates — start with a ready-made workflow.
Logs — review automation activity, skipped conditions and failures.

The Automations overview displays:

Total automations
Active automations
Paused automations
Total runs
Last run time

You can edit, pause, activate or delete an automation from this list.

3. Creating an automation

Select New Automation.

Enter:

An automation name.
Its status: On or Off for now.
The event that should start it.
Any optional conditions.
One or more actions.

An automation set to Off for now is saved but does not respond to events.

The builder is divided into:

Start with a simple rule
Should it run every time?
What should Gather do?

For triggers such as a specific form or pipeline stage, the optional-filter step may be hidden until another filter is added.

4. Available triggers

Contacts

A new contact is created
A contact status changes

Quiz

A quiz is completed

Use an optional Specific quiz condition when the automation should apply to only one quiz.

The Quiz score supplied to Automations is the raw points score, not the displayed percentage. For example, a score of 12 out of 15 is supplied as 12, not 80.

Forms

A form is completed

After choosing this trigger, the required Which form? selector appears.

The automation is given a fixed form-ID condition, so it runs only for the selected form. Submissions from other forms do not pass this condition.

Draft forms appear in the list with a Draft label, but cannot produce a successful public submission until made Active.

The trigger runs after a successful submission even when Log entries in Gather is disabled in Forms.

Form event data can include:

Form ID and title
Entry ID
Contact or Secondary record ID
Pipeline card ID
Name, email and phone
Validated submitted field values

Pipeline

A new lead is created
A lead is marked as won
A lead is marked as lost
A lead status changes — any status
A lead is dragged into a stage

For A lead is dragged into a stage, the builder displays a required Which stage? selector.

Only leads moved into that stage pass the built-in stage condition.

Contracts

A contract is signed

Contract event details can include the contract title, contract ID, signer name, signer email, signing time and payment terms.

Tasks

A task is created
A task is completed

Actions that require a contact need the task event to include or resolve a linked contact.

Projects

A project is completed
A project status changes

These triggers depend on the Projects module emitting the corresponding GatherCRM event.

Email Hub

Someone joins an email journey

Be careful about creating a second automation that adds the same person back to another journey, particularly where workflows can trigger one another.

5. Conditions and filters

By default, an automation runs every time its selected trigger occurs.

Choose Only run in certain cases to add filters.

Available condition fields include:

Quiz result
Quiz score
Specific quiz
Specific form
Lead or contact status
Pipeline stage
Email address
Source
Specific contract
Contract title
Contract value
Signer email

Available comparisons include:

Is
Is not
Contains
Does not contain
Is more than
Is less than
Is blank
Is not blank
Is one of
Is not one of

For is one of and is not one of, enter comma-separated values.

Example:

Lead or contact status is one of Interested, Proposal Sent, Won

How multiple conditions work

Every condition must pass.

For example:

Specific quiz is Website Readiness Quiz
AND
Quiz score is more than 10
AND
Email address is not blank

There is currently no user-facing OR-condition group. Use separate automations when different groups of conditions should trigger the same actions.

Missing event data

Not every trigger supplies every field.

For example, a task event might not contain a quiz score, while an anonymous quiz submission might not contain an email address.

If a condition uses a field that was not supplied, Automations treats its value as blank. Check Logs → Event data to see what was actually received.

Quiz result filters

The quiz result value may be an internal score-band or category key rather than the visible result title.

When creating a quiz-result condition, run a test submission first and inspect Logs → Event data so the condition uses the exact supplied value.

6. Available actions

Actions run from top to bottom.

This order matters because an earlier action can create information needed by a later one.

A good order is usually:

Add or locate the contact.
Add the person to a pipeline or journey.
Create tasks, boards or projects.
Add notes or update fields.
Send notifications.

Add a primary contact

The action name uses your configured GatherCRM terminology. For example, it might appear as:

Add Contact
Add Client
Add Customer

Automations uses the person’s event details to find the record. It normally matches by email before creating a new contact.

You can optionally select a contact category. The category is appended without removing existing categories.

If no categories appear, create one in Contacts and then reopen the automation builder.

Add a Secondary record

This works like the primary contact action but creates or matches a record in the Secondary module.

The action:

Uses configured Secondary terminology.
Matches existing records by email.
Can assign an optional Secondary category.
Does not remove categories already assigned to the record.

Add them to the pipeline

Configure:

Lead name
Lead status
Pipeline stage
Value
Source

The action uses the contact created or resolved earlier in the workflow where possible.

The everyday action editor does not currently provide a dedicated pipeline dropdown. Check that the entered status and stage match the Pipeline configuration and inspect the log after testing.

Add them to an email journey

Select:

The Email Hub journey.
Whether the first email should be sent immediately.

The journey must still exist and be active when the automation runs.

For reliable matching, place Add Contact before this action unless the trigger already supplies a valid contact.

Email Hub can skip archived contacts or people who cannot safely be enrolled.

Remove them from an email journey

Choose:

A specific journey, or
All journeys.

Pending journey emails are stopped. If the person is not on the selected journey, the action does nothing harmful.

Send them an email

You can:

Select an Email Hub template.
Enter a subject.
Write the message.

Gather sends the email to the contact or email address supplied by the event or resolved by an earlier action.

If no valid recipient can be found, the action fails and the reason appears in Logs.

This action does not provide a user-facing sender selector. Sending uses the available GatherCRM email service or the normal WordPress email service.

Create a task

Configure:

Task title
Task notes
Task board
Assigned user
Priority
Due in days

Priorities are:

Low
Medium
High
Urgent

The task can be linked to the contact resolved by the workflow.

Use merge tags in the title and notes to include the person, stage, result or other event details.

Create a task board

A board can be:

Created from scratch.
Cloned from an existing board.
Created from a Tasks board template.

Enter a board name, optionally using merge tags.

The corresponding source board or template must still exist when the automation runs.

Create a project

Configure:

Project name
Description
Project owner
Starting status
Whether to create a linked task board

Starting statuses include Active and On Hold.

The project is linked to the resolved contact where available.

Notify a team member

Select a GatherCRM user and enter:

Notification subject
Message

Where supported, the user receives an in-app notification. An email is also sent to the selected user’s WordPress email address.

If no valid user address is available, the site administrator’s email is used as a fallback.

Add a note to the contact record

Enter the note that should be added.

This action requires a valid contact ID. Put an Add Contact action before it when the trigger does not already identify a contact.

Change a contact detail

Enter:

The contact field key.
The new value.

For example:

Field: status
Value: Active Client

This action updates the corresponding GatherCRM contact field and writes an activity note.

Use the real field key rather than only the visible field label.

7. Merge tags

Merge tags insert event information into tasks, boards, projects, messages and notes.

Available tags include:

{{lead_name}}
{{contact_name}}
{{first_name}}
{{last_name}}
{{email}}
{{phone}}
{{company}}
{{stage}}
{{old_stage}}
{{status}}
{{value}}
{{source}}
{{result}}
{{score}}
{{contract_title}}
{{contract_id}}
{{signer_name}}
{{signer_email}}
{{signed_at}}
{{payment_terms}}
{{event}}

Example task title:

Follow up with {{lead_name}}

Example notification:

{{first_name}} completed the quiz with a score of {{score}}.

A tag resolves only when the trigger or an earlier action supplies that information. Unavailable tags become blank.

Avoid relying on a quiz tag in a contract workflow or a contract tag in a form workflow unless the event data genuinely contains that value.

8. Action order and execution

Actions run in their displayed order.

If the first action creates or locates a contact, later actions can use that contact ID and its details.

For example:

When Website Enquiry Form is completed:

1. Add Contact
2. Add them to Website Leads journey
3. Create a follow-up task
4. Add a note to their contact record
5. Notify the sales manager

If one action fails, Automations continues attempting the remaining actions.

The final run can therefore be:

Success — no action failed.
Partial — at least one action succeeded and another failed.
Failed — the actions could not complete.
Skipped — the trigger occurred, but a condition did not match.

A workflow’s run count increases when its conditions pass and its actions are attempted. It does not necessarily mean every action succeeded.

9. Testing an automation

Save the automation before testing it.

The Test this automation button fires a representative event and then redirects you to review the result in Logs.

For form workflows, the test data includes:

The selected form ID and title
Example contact information
Example entry, record and pipeline-card IDs
Example submitted values

For quiz-specific workflows, the test data includes the selected quiz ID and title.

Important testing warning

Test this automation is not a dry-run preview.

It executes real configured actions. A test can:

Send an email
Add someone to a journey
Create a contact
Create a task
Create a task board
Create a project
Add a note
Notify a user

The test event can also be seen by other active automations using the same trigger. Review or temporarily pause related automations before testing.

A paused automation will not run because only active automations respond to events.

Use safe internal email addresses, test journeys and test boards until the workflow is confirmed.

10. Templates

The Templates screen provides ready-made workflows including:

Quiz Completed → Add Hot Lead to Pipeline
Quiz Completed → Add to Email Journey
Quiz Completed → Notify Staff
New Lead → Send Welcome Email
Lead Status Updated → Create Follow-Up Task
Lead Marked Won → Start Onboarding Journey
Lead Marked Lost → Send Feedback Email
New Contact → Welcome Journey
Contract Signed → Create Handover Task
Contact Status Changed → Notify Account Manager
Task Completed → Log Activity

Selecting Use template creates a paused automation.

Nothing runs until you:

Review the trigger.
Check every condition.
Select the correct journey, category, board, user or other destination.
Review the actions and merge tags.
Save it.
Turn it On.

Some templates contain example values that must be replaced before activation.

11. Logs

Open Automations → Logs to inspect recent activity.

The log shows:

Time
Automation name
Trigger
Status
Message
Number of actions run
Event data

Up to 200 recent log entries are displayed.

Expand Event data to see the payload received from the originating module. This is the most useful place to diagnose:

Missing contact or email information
Unexpected quiz result keys
Incorrect status values
Wrong form IDs
Missing pipeline stages
Conditions that did not match

Log statuses

Success

The automation passed its conditions and no action reported a failure.

Skipped

The trigger happened but a condition did not match.

This is often expected. For example, a high-score automation should be skipped for lower-scoring submissions.

Routine mismatches for stage-specific automations may be suppressed to avoid filling the log every time a lead enters another stage.

Partial

Some actions ran but one or more failed.

Open the message and event data to identify which action failed.

Failed

The workflow could not successfully complete its actions or encountered a broader execution error.

Clearing logs

The Logs screen includes Clear logs.

This permanently removes all automation logs, not just the currently displayed entries. Use it only after any troubleshooting information has been saved elsewhere.

12. Example workflows

Form enquiry follow-up

Trigger:
A form is completed

Which form:
Website Enquiry Form

Actions:
1. Add Contact — Website Leads category
2. Add them to Website Enquiries journey
3. Create task — Follow up with {{first_name}}
4. Notify sales manager

High-scoring quiz lead

Trigger:
A quiz is completed

Conditions:
Specific quiz is Website Readiness Quiz
Quiz score is more than 10
Email address is not blank

Actions:
1. Add Contact — Hot Leads category
2. Add them to the pipeline
3. Create a high-priority task
4. Notify a team member

Remember that Quiz score is raw points. If the quiz maximum is 15, “more than 10” means 11–15 points.

Pipeline stage follow-up

Trigger:
A lead is dragged into a stage

Which stage:
Proposal Sent

Actions:
1. Create task — Follow up with {{lead_name}}
2. Add note — Proposal follow-up task created
3. Notify account manager

Contract handover

Trigger:
A contract is signed

Actions:
1. Create task board from the Client Handover template
2. Create project
3. Add note to contact
4. Notify project owner

Place actions that establish the contact or project before actions that depend on them.

13. Top tips

Start with the smallest reliable workflow and add actions gradually.
Keep a new automation Off until every selector and field has been reviewed.
Remember that all conditions must match.
Use separate automations when you need OR-style logic.
Use a Specific quiz condition when multiple quizzes are active.
Always choose the exact form under Which form?.
Use the dedicated stage trigger instead of typing a stage condition manually.
Put Add Contact before journeys, notes and contact updates when appropriate.
Put record-creation actions before actions that depend on the created ID.
Treat Test this automation as a real execution, not a preview.
Check Logs immediately after testing.
Expand Event data before guessing why a condition failed.
Remember that Quiz score means raw points, not percentage.
Use consistent status and stage spelling.
Review automations after renaming or deleting forms, journeys, boards, categories or stages.
Avoid multiple active automations that create the same task, project or pipeline entry from one event.
Use Email Hub journeys for delayed email sequences; Automation actions themselves run immediately.
Pause an automation before making significant changes.
Keep automation names specific, such as “Website Enquiry → Sales Follow-Up”.
Review Partial and Failed logs regularly rather than relying only on the run count.