Actions are commonly used for connecting forms to sequences and automatically tagging subscribers when they opt in.

Actions wait until the previous step within the automation has completed before triggering.

Within your visual automations, they're green. 🌲

Understanding how they work is important for automating effectively, so let's dig in!

In your automation, click the plus (+) sign under the node after you want the action to occur.

For example, if you want your action to occur immediately after the subscriber enters the automation, then add it right under the top entry node.

Action will be selected by default, so you just need to select what type of action you want to use.

Each type of action serves a different purpose. Here's what they're all used for, and how to set them up:

This type of action will add the subscriber to an email sequence.

NOTE: The subscriber will only move on to the next automation step once they receive the last email from the sequence.

This type of action will hold the subscriber at this step for a set duration (minutes, hours, days, or weeks).

Once the duration is up, they'll move on to the next step in the automation.

This type of action allows you to adjust which automations the subscriber is in. There are 3 sub-options:

a. Start another automation

This will add the subscriber to another automation of your choosing, while still keeping them in the current automation.

In the above example, the subscriber will be added to the 'Photography Course Pitch' automation, while continuing through the remainder of the current automation as well.

b. Exit this automation

This will remove the subscriber from this automation.

This option will be greyed out unless you're adding it at the end of an event or condition branch.

That's because an automation needs to have multiple branches in order for this to work. Otherwise, the subscriber will naturally exit the automation once they reach the end of its main/only branch (no action is required for that).

c. Remove from another automation

This will remove the subscriber from a different automation of your choosing, while still keeping them in the current automation.

This can be useful for making sure subscribers are not in two overlapping automations at once when moving them around.

This action type will add or remove a tag to or from the subscriber.

After selecting this action type, use the toggle to indicate whether you want to add or remove a tag:

Once added to your automation, the action will look like this:

After receiving the tag (or having it removed), the subscriber will move on to the next step in the automation.

This allows you change the value of subscribers' custom fields.

Select your custom field then add the value you want to change it to.

For example, the configuration below will set the value of the 'Photography Experience' custom field to 'Beginner':

NOTE: You can now create new custom fields right in the Visual Automation interface, but if you want a refresher on other ways to create custom fields, check out our tutorial here!

Once added to your automation, it'll look like this:

This type of action allows you to unsubscribe subscribers from directly within an automation! This type of action can only be used at the end of an event or condition branch, so you might see it greyed out if any of the above conditions are not met.

Any subscriber who reaches this step will be unsubscribed from your email list.

☝️ This is helpful when it comes to cold subscriber pruning, since you can now fully automate the removal of cold subscribers from your list!

Here's what it'll look like in your automations:

To edit an action, simply hover over it and then click 'Edit step':

Be aware that modifying an action will not reset its stats within your automation. Stats are cumulative, they will include subscribers of the previous action in addition to the new version.