Create 'Specific date' or 'Contact date property' contact-based workflows

Create Specific date or Contact date property contact-based workflows to center your workflow actions on a calendar date or contact date property. This allows you to schedule and execute workflow actions relative to a specific date.

Please note: Specific date or Contact date property contact-based workflows have been sunset and are being phased out. Starting 10th July 2024, users will no longer be able to create new Specific date or Contact date property contact-based workflows.

Existing workflows will still be accessible and function normally. Moving forward, you can use the Based on a schedule enrollment triggers and the Delay until date workflow action to recreate and further customize the functionalities of date-centered workflows.

Select workflow type

• In your HubSpot account, navigate to Automations > Workflows.
• In the upper right, click Create workflow > From scratch.
• In the left panel, select Contact-based as your workflow type. 
• In the right panel, under How do you want this workflow to start?, select Specific Date or Contact date property. Learn more about contact-based workflow types.
  • If you select Specific date, click the Date of event dropdown menu and select the date the workflow actions will revolve around.
  • If you select Contact date property, click the Contact date property dropdown menu and select the contact date property the workflow actions will revolve around.
• Click the pencil icon edit to give your workflow a name, then click Next. You'll then be brought to the workflow editor.

Set enrollment criteria

When a contact meets the enrollment criteria, they'll automatically be enrolled. If you only want to enroll contacts manually, leave the enrollment trigger box blank. Learn more about manual enrollment.

• In the workflow editor, click Set up triggers.
• In the left panel, select a filter type for your enrollment trigger. Set up the criteria, then click Save. 
  
  
• By default, contacts will only be enrolled in a workflow the first time they meet the enrollment triggers. To enable re-enrollment for filter-based triggers:
  
  • In the left sidebar, click the Re-enrollment tab.
  • Click to toggle the Allow re-enrollment switch on.
  • Select the triggers that you want to use for re-enrollment. Learn more about adding re-enrollment triggers to workflows.
• To enable re-enrollment for event-based filters:
  • In the left sidebar, navigate to the Should contacts be re-enrolled in this workflow? section.
  • Select Yes, re-enroll every time the trigger occurs.
• For Contact date property workflows, add [contact date property] is known as an enrollment trigger. Actions will only execute for contacts who have a value for the date property, so this enrollment criteria will ensure all contacts who enter the workflow can go through actions successfully.
• Click Save.
• Any actions in the workflow are relative to the selected date or contact date property value. To set date and time the next action will execute, click the Delay action.

Please note: the Do the next action on... delay cannot be deleted as it is used to schedule the first workflow action based on the selected date or date property.

• In the left panel, click the When will the next action execute? dropdown menu and select a date or if the action will execute before, on, or after the contact date property. Click the Time of day to execute dropdown menu and select a time.
• Click Save.

Set the workflow to recur annually (optional)

By default, date-centered workflows won't recur annually. However, you can set the workflow to re-enroll contacts based on the selected date or date property each year. For example, use this option to automatically enroll contacts in the workflow on their renewal date or birthday every year. 

Please note: the default contact property Date of birth is linked to the ads tool and has a single-line text field type that cannot be modified. To create a workflow centered around a contact's birthday, create a custom contact property (e.g., Birthdate) with a Date picker field type.

To set the workflow to recur annually:

• Click the Specify a date action.
• In the left panel, click to select the Recur annually checkbox.

• Click Save.

When setting a Contact date property workflow to recur annually, the workflow will use the day and month of the property value, ignoring the year. In other words, actions in annually recurring workflows will be scheduled relative to the day and month in the current year. 

For example, you create a workflow centered on a contact's Became a customer date property. If the first action is scheduled to happen 300 days after that date, an enrolled contact will be scheduled based on the day and month of their Became a customer date property. Even if the contact became a customer on 1/20/2020, enrolling them in the workflow in 2021 will schedule the first action 300 days after 1/20/2021. 

Add actions

• Click the plus icon + to add workflow actions.
• In the left panel, select an action. Learn more about choosing your workflow actions.
• Set up the details of the action, then click Save.
• Click the plus icon + to add more workflow actions.

• If your workflow actions include sending a marketing email, it's recommended to set a workflow goal to measure engagement with your content. Learn more about using goals in workflows.

Manage settings

In the workflow editor, click the Settings and notifications tab to manage the workflow's settings. On the General page, select days and times that you want actions to execute, enroll contacts from Salesforce, and associate campaigns with the workflow. On the Unenrollment and suppression page, set unenrollment and suppression criteria to automatically remove or exclude records from the workflow. In the Notifications page, set up notifications for when the workflow needs to be reviewed and when the workflow's enrollment change.

Learn more about managing your workflow settings.

Turn on your workflow

• In the upper right, click Review and publish.
• Choose to enroll records that currently meet the criteria or only enroll records that meet the criteria in the future:
  • To only enroll records that meet the enrollment triggers after the workflow is turned on, select No, only enroll [objects] which meet the trigger criteria after turning the workflow on.
  • To enroll existing records that meet the enrollment triggers, select Yes, enroll existing [objects] which meet the trigger criteria as of now. 

• • If you have a Marketing Hub Starter, Professional, or Enterprise account, in contact-based workflows you can view a static list of contacts that meet the criteria by clicking See all contacts in lists. The list will automatically be saved and can be accessed from your lists dashboard.

• Review workflow settings, then click Turn on.
• In the dialog box, click Yes, turn on.

After you turn your workflow on, you can view the workflow history to monitor the records that are enrolled.