Automations: how they work

An automation is a short list of things Churchday does for you when something happens. A first-time guest checks in, so two days later they get a text from you. Someone submits your prayer request form, so the person who prays gets a note. You set it up once in the Automations tab, turn it on, and Churchday takes it from there.

Before you begin

Automations is rolling out gradually. If you don't see Automations in your sidebar, it isn't turned on for your church yet.
Anyone with access to the tab can see your automations. To create or change one you need permission to manage automations. To add a text or email step you also need permission to send messages.
Text steps only work once your church has its own text number. See Automatic texts and keyword replies.

What can start an automation

Every automation begins with one trigger:

Someone joins the church: a person adds themselves, for example through the Join form on your church page, at check-in, or by texting a keyword. People your staff add by hand are left out unless you pick or staff add them. Spreadsheet imports and children added at kids check-in never start it.
Someone checks in: their first time ever, their second time, or every time, at any event or at one event you choose.
Someone submits a form: any form, or one form you choose.
Someone is added to a tag or Someone is added to a group: any tag or group, or one you choose.

What an automation can do

Steps run in order, top to bottom:

Wait: at least a number of minutes, hours, or days, and optionally until a time of day, such as "Wait 2 days, then at 9:00am".
Send a text or Send an email: written like a personal message, with fields like the person's first name filled in for you.
Only continue if: the person matches filters you choose. Anyone who doesn't match stops here.
Add tag, Remove tag, and Add to group.
Notify someone: a message to one or more staff members.

The rules Churchday follows

Once per person. Each person goes through an automation once. The one exception is the Every time check-in trigger, which runs once per check-in.
Texts go out between 9am and 8pm in your church's time zone. A text that comes due overnight waits for the morning.
Opt-outs are respected at every step. If someone has opted out of texts or unsubscribed from email, that message step is skipped and the rest of the automation continues.
Nobody gets a step twice. If you edit an automation while people are in it, the change applies from their current step forward.
New people are picked up every minute. After you turn an automation on, it looks for people who match its trigger about once a minute. It doesn't go back and add people from before you turned it on.

Good to know

The Email and Text pages each have an Automatic view that lists messages sent by automations, so you can see them next to your campaigns.
Built-in texts, like the welcome text and keyword replies, live on the Text page, not in Automations. See Automatic texts and keyword replies.
If a step could not finish for someone, the automation shows a Needs attention count. See Following an automation.