Use journeys (BETA)

Use journeys to build engaging and personalized marketing automation experiences all within the same view, instead of building across a handful of workflows. Marketers can build out marketing strategies, including lead generation, lead nurturing, or customer re-engagement campaigns.

For example, you can set up a journey with the new default Journey stage property. You can create stages for each of the Journey stage property values, then add actions to automatically execute at each stage. After creating your journey, you can analyze your journey's performance and report on your marketing automation efforts.

Create a journey

• In your HubSpot account, navigate to Automations > Journeys. 
• In the top right, click Create a journey. 
• In the right panel, configure your journey: 
  • Journey name: the unique name for your journey. 
  • Description: enter a description based on what the journey does. 
  • Who's eligible for this journey: select the contact lists with contacts eligible to enroll in the journey.
    • This does not mean that the contacts will automatically enroll. Contacts will still need to meet either the journey's starting criteria or any of the stage values in order to enroll.
    • You can select up to five lists. Learn more about using lists. 
• At the bottom, click Create journey.
   

• In the journey editor, you can review your journey as different engagement paths, or as a single journey tree. To select your view, in the top right, click the engagement path icon or the tree icon. 

Set up journey enrollment

When building a new journey, center your journey around a property such as Journey stage or lifecycle stage. This property will determine which eligible contacts enroll and the stages of your journey. After setting up your journey, it is still possible to change the property used.

Please note: you cannot select the same eligibility lists and property as another journey. To set up a new journey, you must select different lists or a different property for enrollment.

• In the Journey editor, under Starting stage, click Choose stage.
  • In the dialog box, click the first dropdown menu, then select a property. 
  • Click the second dropdown menu and select the property value to enroll contacts into the journey.
  • To enroll new contacts with no property value for the selected property, select the Enroll contacts with blank value in this stage checkbox. 
  • At the bottom, click Save. 
     

• If you've previously set up your journey with a different property, to update the property:
  • In the top left, click Settings. 
  • In the right panel, click the Contact property dropdown menu and select a new property. 
  • At the bottom, click Save. 
  • In the dialog box, select a corresponding stage value based on the new property. 
  • At the bottom, click Save updates. To select the stages' property values later, click Skip. 

Determine the success of your journey

• In the box, click the Choose stage value dropdown menu. Then, select a property value. You can only select one successful end value. 
• For each end, click + Add to list. This will add all contacts who have finished the journey to the selected static list. 
   

Configure your journey stages and actions

• To route a contact back to an earlier stage, hover over the line and click the + icon. Then, select Go to step. This option can only be selected for the steps, go to paths cannot be added between stages. 
• To end a journey, hover over the line and click the + icon. Then, select End journey. This will automatically add the Successful end. 
  
  

• To add more options, hover over the line and click the + icon. Then, select Add new stage. When adding a new stage to an unsuccessful path: 
  • If you are in the tree view, this will create a new branch. 
  • If you are in the engagement path view, this will create a new alternative path section in the editor. You can click the collapse icon to collapse and expand each section. 
    
    

• After adding a stage you can add actions to your newly added stages. In the stage, click the menu icon and select Add actions. 
  
  • You must add at least one action for each stage. 
  • You can add up to 200 actions per stage.
• Select from the following action types:
  • Touchpoint actions: select from the following touchpoint actions.
    • Send Assets: send an automated marketing email, SMS, or WhatsApp message to the contact. When setting up this action, you can trigger all three asset types to send at once. 
    • Wait: add a delay for a specified amount of time. 
    • Wait until activity: delay until a specific user activity occurs. For example, delay until the user submits a form, visits a specific page on a website, replies to an email, or more. 
  • Process actions: select from the following process actions. 
    • Create task: create and add a task to the enrolled contact. This task will also appear in the tasks page. Learn more about using tasks. 
    • Set property: set a specific property value for the enrolled contact. You can configure the stage used for the journey automation. 
    • Send notification: send an in-app or internal email notification. You can send the notification to specific users, teams, or the enrolled contact's existing owners. 
  • Go to: associate the stage with a successful or unsuccessful end. 
• After setting up your actions, in the top left click Exit to journey. 
   

Manage your journey's entry and exit conditions

• In the top left of the journey editor, click Entry conditions. 
• To edit the contacts eligible to enroll, click the Who's eligible for this journey dropdown menu, then select the checkboxes next to the lists of contacts that you'd like to set as eligible for the journey. 
• To allow contacts to exit the journey early, click Early exit conditions to expand. Then, select from the following checkboxes:
  • Are removed from the entry list: remove contacts from the journey if the contacts are no longer in any of the lists selected. 
  • Match an end stage value early: remove contacts for this list if the contacts match an end stage value early. This applies to both successful and unsuccessful end stages. 
     

Turn on your journey

• After setting up your journey automation, in the top right, click Review and publish.
• In the right panel, you can review the number of contacts eligible for the journey. Then, at the bottom, click Turn on journey. 

Manage your journeys

• In your HubSpot account, navigate to Automations > Journeys. 
• To edit an existing journey, click Edit. You can only edit journeys that are turned off. 
• To see which assets were used in a journey, such as emails or SMS messages, click More and select See assets used. The assets will appear in the right panel. 
• To delete a journey, click More and select Delete. 

Review your journey’s performance

After turning on your journey, you can analyze the enrollment history and individual performance of each journey. This includes the journey’s metrics, reporting, and details such as conversion metrics. 

Review your journey’s metrics and reporting

From the journey editor, you can review your journey’s conversion metrics and reporting for each stage: 

• In your HubSpot account, navigate to Automations > Journeys. 
• Click the name of an existing journey.
• To review your journey metrics, in the top right, click Performance and select Metrics. From the metrics page, you can review the following: 
  • The total enrollment count for the journey.
  • The percentage and count of enrollments that reached each endpoint.
  • For each stage, the percentage of enrollments that continued along each path.
     

• To review your journey reports, in the top right, click Performance and select Reporting. 
  • To create a journey dashboard and reports:
    • In the right panel, enter your Dashboard name.
    • Click the Which stages do you want to create reports for dropdown menu and select the stages that you want to create reports for. By default, all stages will be selected. 
    • Click Create dashboard. 
       

• After creating your dashboard and reports, to review reports for each stage:
  • To review the overall journey dashboard, click Go to dashboard. 
  • In the Stage reports section, click Preview report for the section you want to preview. 
  • To review the report in the reports editor, click Go to report. 

Please note: you cannot edit journey reports. 

Review your journey’s details 

• In your HubSpot account, navigate to Automations > Journeys. 
• To review the performance of a journey, click More and select View details. 
• In the left panel, review the journey's details.
  • To edit the journey, at the top, click Actions. Then, select Edit. 
  • To delete a journey, at the top, click Actions. Then, select Delete. Then, select Delete.
     

• To analyze the performance of a journey, at the top, click the Performance tab. Review the following performance reports. The reports will show data from when the journey was turned on. 
  • Top metrics: this report displays the total number of enrolled contacts out of all eligible contacts, the number of successful contacts, and unsuccessful contacts. 
  • Successful conversions: the percentage of successful conversions with the count of eligible contacts, enrolled contacts, and contacts that reached the journey with a successful end.
  • Unsuccessful conversions: the percentage of successful conversions with the count of eligible contacts, enrolled contacts, and contacts that reached the journey with an unsuccessful end.
     

Review your journey enrollment

To review a list of contacts that have enrolled in your journey: 

• In your HubSpot account, navigate to Automations > Journeys. 
• To review the performance of a journey, click More and select View details. 
• At the top, click Action and select enrollment logs.

Please note: each contact can only enroll in a journey once. Contacts cannot re-enroll in a journey.