Documentation › Automations
Introduction to Automations
Automations in Aledamail let you send the right email to the right person at the right time — automatically. Instead of manually sending campaigns, you set up a workflow once and it runs in the background: welcoming new subscribers, re-engaging inactive contacts, following up after purchases, or nurturing leads through a sequence.
What is an automation?
An automation is a sequence of actions triggered by an event. At its simplest, it looks like this: someone subscribes to your list → they receive a welcome email → three days later they receive a follow-up. Each step is configurable — you choose the trigger, the timing, and the content.
Aledamail automations support branching logic (send different emails based on whether someone opened a previous email), tagging, waiting periods, webhooks, and custom event triggers from your own app or website.
Trigger types
Every automation starts with a trigger — the event that enrolls a contact into the workflow.
List subscription
The most common trigger. When someone subscribes to a specific mailing list, they are immediately enrolled in the automation. Use this for welcome sequences, onboarding drips, and lead nurture flows.
Tag-based
Enrolls a contact when a specific tag is added to their profile. Useful when you want to trigger an automation from a campaign click, a purchase event, or a manual tag you apply in bulk.
Throttled list
Drips contacts from a list into the automation at a controlled rate — for example, 100 contacts per day. Useful for large cold lists where you want to warm up gradually rather than blast everyone at once.
Custom event
Your app or website fires a named event via the Aledamail API (for example, purchase.completed or trial.started), and the automation starts for that contact. This is the most powerful trigger type for SaaS and ecommerce use cases.
POST /api/v1/automation/events with your API key.Building your first automation
- Go to Audience → Automations in your Aledamail dashboard.
- Click New Automation.
- Choose a trigger type and configure it (select a list, tag, or event name).
- Add actions using the visual canvas — drag in email sends, wait steps, conditions, and tags.
- For each email send node, open it and write or paste your email content.
- Click Activate when you are ready to go live.
Action types
Inside an automation you can chain together any combination of these actions:
Send email
Sends an email to the enrolled contact. You write the subject and body directly in the automation editor. Each send-email node can have its own design, subject line, and sender name.
Wait
Pauses the automation for a specified duration before moving to the next step. You can wait by hours or days. For example: send a welcome email immediately, wait 3 days, then send a follow-up.
Wait until event
Holds the contact at this step until a specific condition is met — for example, until they open an email or click a link — before continuing.
Condition (YES/NO branch)
Checks whether a contact performed an action (opened an email, clicked a link) and sends them down different paths depending on the result. For example: if they opened the welcome email → send the feature tour; if they did not → send a simpler re-engagement email.
Add / remove tag
Applies or removes a tag on the contact's profile. Tags are useful for segmenting your list, triggering other automations, or tracking where a contact is in your funnel.
Webhook
Sends an HTTP POST request to a URL of your choice when the contact reaches this step. Use this to notify your CRM, update a record in your database, or trigger a Zapier workflow.
Split (A/B)
Randomly splits contacts into two or more lanes by percentage. Use this to A/B test different email sequences and see which performs better over time.
Tips for effective automations
- Start simple. A 3-email welcome sequence outperforms a 10-email sequence you never finish writing. Build it, activate it, improve it later.
- Use conditions sparingly at first. Branching logic is powerful but adds complexity. Master linear sequences before adding forks.
- Test before activating. Use the manual trigger option to enroll a test contact (your own email) and confirm every step fires correctly.
- Watch your wait times. Email 1 immediately, email 2 after 2–3 days, email 3 after 5–7 days is a safe cadence for most lists. Too fast feels pushy; too slow loses momentum.
- Tag contacts on completion. Add a "completed-onboarding" tag at the end of your welcome sequence so you can track who has gone through it.
Deactivating and editing automations
You can deactivate an automation at any time. Contacts already enrolled will stop receiving emails immediately. If you reactivate, they will not restart from the beginning — only new enrollments will go through the full sequence.
To edit an active automation, deactivate it first, make your changes, then reactivate. Contacts mid-sequence will resume at their current step with the updated content.