Imagine waking up every morning to an email that neatly lists all your new subscribers from the previous day.
If this sounds awesome, then this guide will help you set up exactly that.
Before we begin, there are a few things to note:
This method is thanks to our integration with Zapier, which helps you set up automated workflows (or “Zaps”) without the need for code.
For this guide, we’ll be assuming that you want to be notified of new subscribers. But if you want to be notified of new purchases or unsubscribes instead, you can easily set this up by changing the trigger for your Zap.
To set this daily digest, you’ll need to be on a paid Kit plan as API access is needed.
You will also need to be on a paid Zapier plan. This is because the Zaps that you set up will have multiple steps, and only paid Zapier plans support multi-step Zaps. If you don’t have a paid Zapier plan, then check out this alternative method for setting up email notifications for new subscribers.
There is a limitation to this method of setting up your daily email digest. More info on this below, but your setup should work fine 99% of the time!
NOTE: If you have Zapier’s paid Professional plan or higher, you will be able to avoid the limitation by setting up your Zaps differently. Read more about this below.
Alright, let's get started.
How to set up a daily email digest of new subscribers
To set up this daily digest, you’ll be creating two different Zaps:
One to send you a digest of all new subscribers the previous day
One to notify you if there were no new subscribers the previous day (feel free to skip the setting up of this Zap if you don’t need this notification!)
We’ll go through each in turn.
Setting up a daily digest of all new subscribers the previous day
1. Trigger: New Subscriber in Kit
In your Zapier dashboard, make a new Zap with your preferred Kit Trigger Event—for example, New Subscriber or New Unsubscribe.
Go through the steps for testing your trigger to ensure that your Kit account is connected to Zapier properly.
2. Action: Digest by Zapier
Select Digest by Zapier as the first action in your Zap, with the Action Event being Append Entry and Schedule Digest. Then, fill out the form fields to set up the digest. In particular, set the digest frequency to “Daily.”
The time of day of the digest should also be set to “Midnight.” This is so that you get a digest of all new subscribers that you’d gained between 12:00:00am to 11:59:59pm the previous day.
☝️ Test the action to check that it’s set up correctly.
3. Action: Delay by Zapier
With the current setup, your digest will be sent out at midnight every day—which you might not want. So we’re going to delay the sending of the digest to a time of your choice.
Add a new Delay by Zapier action to the Zap, using Delay For as the Action Step.
Then, set the amount of delay that your digest should be delayed by.
For example, if you want your digest to be sent out at 9:00 am, then set up a delay of nine hours (midnight + nine hours = 9:00 am).
4. Action: Gmail
Finally, it’s time to set up the email notification itself!
Add a new action for Gmail (or another supported messaging app, such as Outlook or Slack) and select Send Email as the action step. Connect your Gmail account, then fill out the form for building the notification.
In particular, be sure to map the “Current Digest” field of the Append Entry and Schedule Digest action to the body of the notification.
Test the action when you’re done. And if all is good, name this Zap and turn it on!
Setting up the notification about getting no new subscribers the previous day
Next up, we’ll be setting up a second Zap that notifies you if you hadn’t gotten any subscribers the previous day.
As mentioned, feel free to skip the creation of this Zap if you don’t need this notification!
1. Trigger: Schedule by Zapier
Make a new Zap with Schedule by Zapier as its Trigger. Set the Trigger Event as Every Day.
When setting up the trigger, key in “2359” in the “Time of Day” field. Do not key in “0000” or this can cause conflicts with your first Zap.
Then, test the trigger to make sure it works.
2. Action: Digest by Zapier
The second step in your Zap uses the Digest by Zapier action, with the Action Event being Find Digest. When filling out the “Digest” field for setting up this action, use the exact name of your daily digest as created for the previous Zap.
For example, if you had named your digest “Daily Kit subs” in the previous Zap, then fill out “Daily Kit subs” in the “Digest” field.
The 'Should This Step Be Considered A "success" When Nothing Is Found?' field should also be set to True before you test the action.
3. Action: Filter by Zapier
We want this Zap to send a notification only if there were no subscribers the previous day. To achieve this, add a new action for Filter by Zapier. The Filter should be set up such that the Zap will continue only if the text in the Count (i.e. number of items in the digest) exactly matches zero.
During the test, Zapier may report that your step has failed (i.e. your Zap will not continue) if the digest finds that you had gained at least one new subscriber the previous day—but this is normal!
After all, this Zap should notify you only if you hadn’t gained any subscribers the previous day.
4. Action: Delay by Zapier
The Zap is currently set up to notify you at 2359 hours, which again might not be what you want. Add a Delay by Zapier action that delays the notification to your preferred time (scroll up if you need a refresher on this!)
5. Action: Gmail
Finally, set up the notification itself for this Zap as well!
Check out the instructions above on how to build this notification. The notification body could be something as simple as “No new Kit subscribers yesterday.”
However, you can still map in the info in the “Current Digest” field of the Find Digest action if you’d like.
Test this action to check that it works, then name this Zap and turn it on as well.
Aaaand you’re done! Phew!
Possible limitation for setting up a daily email digest
There is one small limitation of this method to set up your daily subscriber digests—which is that the second Zap will incorrectly trigger if a subscriber happens to sign up between 11:59:00 pm and 11:59:59 pm.
This is because the second Zap checks for new subscribers for the 24-hour period before 11:59:00 pm. If you didn’t get any new subscribers during these 24 hours, but one subscriber signed up between 11:59:00 pm and 11:59:59 pm, then the second Zap will incorrectly send you an email stating that you had no new subscribers the previous day.
The first Zap will also correctly send you an email that lists this new subscriber, resulting in you receiving two separate emails.
NOTE: If you have Zapier’s paid Professional plan or higher, you can overcome this limitation by having the first Zap purely for setting up your digests for manual release. Then, have the second Zap send the correct notification by using the Paths by Zapier action. Consult a Zapier Expert if this is something you’d like to set up.
That said, the chances of users signing up within this one-minute window will usually be quite low. So in most situations, the two Zaps will work as intended.
However, this method can be quite complex to set up. So if you think it isn’t for you, no worries!
Click the link below to learn a simpler method for setting up email notifications of new subscribers as and when they occur. 👇