Create workflows

With the workflows tool, you can automate your marketing, sales, and service processes to make your team more efficient. Set enrollment criteria to automatically enroll records and take actions on your contacts, companies, deals, quotes, and tickets. You can also take actions on associated records, such as updating the company associated with a contact enrolled in the workflow.

Please note: contact-based workflows have been migrated to use the same system as all other objects. There are still some differences between workflow types, such as settings. Learn more about the workflow migration.

Sequences are another automation tool which rely on one-to-one emails and follow-up task reminders to help sales reps nurture prospects and automate their sales processes. When a contact replies or books a meeting, they'll unenroll from the sequence. Learn more about using sequences.

To get started creating a workflow:

• In your HubSpot account, navigate to Automation > Workflows.
• In the upper right, click Create workflow.

You'll then be asked to select the type of workflow you want to create.

Select workflow type

You can create workflows for the following objects:

• Contacts
• Companies
• Deals (Sales Hub Professional or Enterprise)
• Quotes (Sales Hub Enterprise)
• Tickets (Service Hub Professional or Enterprise)
• Custom objects (Enterprise only)

To select your workflow type:

• In the left panel of the workflow setup page, choose whether you want to start your workflow from scratch, or from a template.
  
  • Start from scratch: to begin with a blank workflow, click the Start from scratch tab. Then select Contact-based, Company-based, Deal-based, Ticket-based, Quote-based, or Custom object-based as the workflow type. If you select Contact-based, you can choose to continue from scratch or center your workflow on a date or date property.
    
    
  • Templates: to start with a default set of enrollment triggers and actions, click the Templates tab. In the left panel, search or click the Type dropdown menu to file by template type. Select a template to preview the enrollment triggers and actions on the right.
    
    
• Click the pencil icon edit to give your workflow a name, then click Create workflow.

Set enrollment criteria

Once your workflow has been created, set the enrollment criteria. When a record meets this criteria, they'll automatically be enrolled. If you only want to enroll records manually, leave the enrollment trigger box blank. Learn more about manual enrollment.

• In the workflow editor, click Set enrollment triggers. Learn more about setting enrollment triggers in workflows.
• In the right panel, select a filter type for your enrollment trigger. Set up the criteria, then click Apply filter.

• By default, records will only enroll in a workflow the first time they meet the enrollment triggers. To enable re-enrollment:
  • In the right sidebar, click the Re-enrollment tab.
  • Click to toggle the Re-enrollment switch on.
  • Select the triggers that you want to use for re-enrollment. Learn more about adding re-enrollment triggers to workflows.
• Add more enrollment triggers if needed.
• When you're done, click Save.

Add actions

• Click the plus icon + to add a workflow action.
• In the right panel, select an action. Learn more about choosing your workflow actions.

Please note: the actions available to you depend on your subscription. Locked actions locked require an account upgrade to use. 

• Set up the details of the action, then click Save.
• Click the plus icon + to add more workflow actions.
• If you're creating a contact-based workflow to send marketing emails, it's recommended to set a workflow goal to measure engagement with your content. Learn more about using goals in contact-based workflows.

After adding an action, you can clone or move it to streamline the workflow building process.

If you'd like to leave a note on a workflow action for you or your team's reference, learn how to add comments to workflow actions. 

You can also connect apps to your HubSpot account through the workflows tool, which will allow you to use any available workflow actions provided by the app. Learn more about using connected apps in your workflows.

Manage settings

Click the Settings 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.

Learn more about managing your workflow settings.

Turn on your workflow

• In the upper right corner, click Review.
• 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 Use lists to see these contacts. 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.