Summary
Automation Use: Automations are harnessed to optimise efficiency, ensure consistency, enable scalability, enhance accuracy, and deliver a multitude of other benefits.
Automation Templates: We provide a diverse selection of automation templates meticulously crafted to accommodate the majority of use cases.
Who is this article for?
All Planhat users.
Users seeking to leverage automations for process optimisation.
Series
When & Why Should I Use Automations? ⬅️ You are here
Article contents
Introduction
Automations wield immense power and have the potential to address myriad challenges. However, this power necessitates responsible usage. While automations offer extensive capabilities, in most cases, our meticulously crafted automation templates serve as the ideal solution you seek. To learn more about our automation templates, please take a look at this article.
Why Use Automations?
Automations are used for many different reasons, they could be used for something simple such as sending you a Slack/Email notification when your customer leaves the Onboarding phase, or perhaps you want to send data to another system when a specific event occurs in Planhat.
Automations in general are also great for the following reasons:
Efficiency: Automation can significantly reduce the time and effort required to complete repetitive tasks, leading to increased productivity and cost savings.
Consistency: Automated processes follow predefined rules and instructions consistently, reducing the likelihood of human error and ensuring uniformity in outcomes.
Scalability: Automated processes can easily handle large volumes of work without the need for additional resources, making them suitable for scaling operations as business needs grow.
Accuracy: By eliminating manual intervention, automation minimizes the risk of errors and inaccuracies, resulting in more reliable and precise outcomes.
Focus on value-added tasks: By freeing up human resources from mundane and repetitive tasks, automation allows users to focus on more strategic and value-added activities that require creativity and critical thinking.
When Should I Use Automations?
Expanding on the rationale behind using automations, they are primarily employed to enhance efficiency, bolster accuracy, and facilitate scalability.
We proudly offer dozens of meticulously crafted automation templates. If automation seems like the solution you're seeking, I highly encourage you to delve into our vast template library. With our user-friendly search functionality, navigating through templates is both quick and effortless.
In most instances, you'll find an automation template perfectly suited to your requirements. However, should you encounter a unique use case not covered by our existing templates, custom automation may be the ideal solution.
🚀 Tip
Given the remarkable flexibility of these automations, embarking on a custom build process warrants an initial consultation with your Technical Account Manager. This ensures clarity on the objectives and confirms whether a custom automation is the optimal path forward.
As you become more familiar with Planhat, it'll become clear when you should use built-in functionality (Formula Fields, Workflows, Actions module Notifications, NPS Surveys, and Portals), versus Automations.
Automation Use Cases
Most automation use cases can be efficiently addressed using templates from our extensive automation library. In this section, we will explore various types of automation templates available for your use. For a more in-depth understanding of our automation capabilities, please refer to this article.
Sections of the automation template text will be underlined, bold, and displayed in grey/black, indicating that these parts can be modified. For example:
📌 Important to note
An email address must be entered where it says "me@example.com", replacement codes cannot be used e.g. <<owner>>, <<co-owner>>.
Send a Notification (Slack/Email)
🚀 Tip
The purple message box can be fully customised to suit your preferences. To learn more about customisation options, please refer to this article.
Send an email when churn is logged: when churn is logged, it's important to notify the relevant person promptly. You can fully customise the email and modify the title to grab the user's attention with phrases like "URGENT" or "Please review ASAP."
🚀 Tip
Enter multiple recipients where it says "me@example.com" by separating the email addresses with a comma, for example: test@gmail.com,test1@gmail.com.
Send an email when an owner is assigned: when an account has an owner added for the first time or a new owner gets added, use this automation to send an email to a specific person so that they are aware of the changes.
Send a Slack message when the health score changes: when the health score of a company drops below five, the automation will send a message of your choice to a specific Slack channel.
🚀 Tip
Messages can be sent to both public and private Slack channels by simply adding the Planhat Slack bot to the channel. To learn more, please refer to this article.
Schedule an Activity
Schedule a task when the health score changes: if a customer's health score falls below or rises above a specified threshold, you can automatically schedule a task for a designated user. The following options are available for customisation:
Define the cohort of customers this automation will apply to by using a filter.
Set the trigger for the automation based on the health score exceeding or dropping below a certain value.
Select the user for whom the task will be scheduled.
Choose the Conversation Type that will be utilised.
Determine the frequency of the tasks, opting for daily, weekly, or no repetition.
Schedule a task when churn is logged: when churn is logged on any company or a specific cohort of companies, schedule a task for a specific user, select the Conversation Type and decide if the task should be repeated.
Contact Customers
Send an email campaign when an end user’s NPS changes: when an end-user's NPS score drops below or goes above a specific value you can automatically send them an email. When you select the email template it will look exactly like the one shown below. Each section that's underlined can be updated, either a drop-down list will appear or you will be able to type in a value.
For example, the automation below will send an email to an end-user that's associated with an account in the "High Touch" filter when their NPS score drops below seven.
Send an email campaign when an end user enters a filter: send an email as soon as an end-user enters a filter. For example, you may want to send an email to your main contact when an account is due to renew within the next 90 days, or when the health score drops below a specified value.
For example, the automation below will send an email to the end-users that enter the "Due to renew in the next 90 days" end-user filter. The email will be sent from the account owner, the "Renewal" email template will be used and the email won't need to be approved before it's sent.
If you can't find an automation template that suits your needs in our library, you may require a custom automation. Due to the flexibility of custom automations, the process should always start with a consultation with your Technical Account Manager. This ensures that the objective is clear and that a custom automation is the best solution.