Email Automation

Automate your lead nurturing with multi-step email sequences that send personalized emails based on triggers like tag assignments.

Overview

Email Automation allows you to create automated email sequences that run automatically when leads meet certain criteria. Once set up, your campaigns send the right message at the right time without manual intervention.

Key Features:

• Multi-step email sequences with customizable delays
• Advanced scheduling - specific dates/times, preferred hours, or AI-optimized timing
• Ledo AI optimization - automatically send at hours with highest engagement
• Tag-based triggers for automatic enrollment
• Header images and rich branding options
• Send test emails before activating
• Duplicate campaigns to save time
• Per-campaign unsubscribe management
• Performance tracking with open and click rates
• Personalization with lead data

Campaign Types

LeadMachine supports several campaign types to match your marketing goals:

Welcome Campaigns

• Greet new leads immediately
• Introduce your brand and services
• Set expectations for future communication
• Multi-step sequences (Day 1, Day 2, Day 3, etc.)

Nurture Campaigns

• Educate leads with valuable content
• Share tips, guides, and resources
• Build trust before the sales conversation
• Longer sequences with wider spacing
• NEW: Use WordPress blog posts as content source (see below)

Newsletter Campaigns

• Single-send broadcasts
• Company news and updates
• Automatically triggered by the "Newsletter" tag
• No sequence steps needed

Promotional Campaigns

• Special offers and discounts
• Product launches
• Time-sensitive promotions
• Event announcements

Re-engagement Campaigns

• Reconnect with cold leads
• Remind them of your value
• Offer incentives to re-engage
• "We miss you" messaging

Set Up a Campaign with Ledo

Not sure where to start? Let Ledo build your campaign for you.

How It Works

1. Open Email Campaigns in the sidebar and click New Campaign
2. Click the "Set up with Ledo" button
3. Describe your campaign goal in plain English — for example: "Re-engage leads who haven't heard from us in 3 months" or "Welcome new WordPress form signups"
4. Ledo detects the campaign type, generates a subject line, body copy, and call-to-action based on your description
5. One click creates the campaign and redirects you to the editor so you can review and adjust before activating

Supported campaign types Ledo can set up:

Ledo's draft is a starting point — you can edit any part of the generated content before going live.

Creating a Campaign

Step 1: Access Email Automation

1. Click Email Campaigns in the sidebar
2. Click the New Campaign button
3. Enter a name and select your campaign type
4. Click Create

Step 2: Configure Campaign Settings

Basic Information:

• Campaign Name - Internal name for your reference
• From Name - Who the email appears to be from (defaults to company name)
• Reply-To Email - Where replies should go (optional)

Trigger Tag (for automated campaigns):

• Select which tag should trigger enrollment
• When this tag is applied to any lead, they automatically enter the campaign
• One tag can only trigger one campaign

Branding:

• Logo URL - Your company logo for the email header
• Primary Color - Brand color for buttons and accents (hex code)
• Footer Text - Custom footer content (company address, etc.)

Step 3: Create Email Steps

For sequence campaigns (Welcome, Nurture, etc.), you'll create multiple email steps. Each step is one email in the sequence.

For each step, configure:

Adding Steps:

1. Click Add Email to add a new step
2. Configure the content for that step
3. Set the delay (how long after the previous email)
4. Click Save Changes

Example Welcome Sequence:

Step 3½: Visual Block Builder (New!)

Create professional, visually-rich emails with our drag-and-drop block builder—no coding required.

Two Email Editing Modes:

LeadMachine now offers two ways to create email content:

How to Use the Block Builder:

1. In the campaign editor, look for the mode toggle buttons above the body content field:

1. Click Block Builder to switch to the visual editor

1. The GrapeJS editor appears with:

1. Drag blocks from the panel into the canvas:

1. Click any block to edit its content:

1. Preview your email:

1. Save your changes - blocks are stored automatically

Important Notes:

• Choose one mode per campaign - Switching modes does NOT convert content between formats
• Legacy campaigns stay in Text Editor mode - Existing campaigns continue working normally
• Each step can use blocks independently - Mix and match if needed (though consistency is recommended)
• Blocks are mobile-responsive - Automatically adjust for email clients

When to Use Block Builder:

✅ Use Block Builder for:

• Product announcements with images
• Promotional emails with multiple CTAs
• Newsletters with varied content sections
• Visually-rich welcome sequences
• Brand-focused communications

✅ Use Text Editor for:

• Simple, personal-feeling emails
• Plain-text nurture sequences
• Quick broadcasts
• Text-heavy educational content

Example Block-Based Email Structure:

1. Heading block - "Welcome to LeadMachine!"
2. Text block - Introduction paragraph
3. Image block - Product screenshot or photo
4. Text block - Feature highlights
5. Button block - "Get Started" CTA
6. Divider block - Visual separator
7. Text block - Footer message

The visual builder makes it easy to create professional, on-brand emails that stand out in the inbox.

Step 3¾: Configure Send Schedule (New!)

Control exactly when your campaign emails send with advanced scheduling options and AI optimization.

Scheduling Modes:

How to Configure:

1. In the campaign editor, find the Send Schedule card in the left sidebar
2. Choose your scheduling mode
3. Configure the details (date picker, hour selection, etc.)
4. Optionally enable "Let Ledo optimize send times" (see below)
5. Click Save

AI-Powered Timing (Ledo Optimization):

Let Ledo analyze your engagement data and automatically send emails at optimal times:

• What it does: Analyzes your last 90 days of email sends, identifies hours with highest open rates, automatically adjusts send times to those optimal hours
• When to enable: After sending 50+ emails (requires enough data for patterns)
• Example: Ledo discovers your emails sent at 2 PM get 34% higher opens than average, so it shifts all sends to 2 PM
• Confidence levels:

To enable Ledo optimization:

1. Select "Send after delay" or "Preferred hour" mode
2. Toggle "Let Ledo optimize send times" ON
3. Review Ledo's suggestion in the card
4. Save your settings

Ledo preserves your date selection but shifts the time to the optimal hour. You always have final control and can disable optimization anytime.

Schedule Source Tracking:

Every enrollment tracks how its send time was determined:

• delay - Standard delay-based timing
• user_scheduled - You set a specific date/time or preferred hour
• ledo_optimized - AI adjusted to optimal hour

This lets you compare performance: "Do scheduled emails perform better than immediate sends?" or "Is Ledo's optimization actually improving my open rates?"

Step 4: Test Your Emails

Before activating, send test emails to yourself:

1. Click Send Test button
2. Enter your email address
3. Check your inbox for the test email
4. Verify formatting, links, and personalization

You can send tests for each step individually to review the entire sequence.

Step 5: Activate the Campaign

When you're ready to go live:

1. Review all settings and content
2. Click Activate
3. The system will validate:

If validation fails, you'll see specific errors to fix.

Personalization

Use merge tags to personalize your emails:

Example:

Hi {{recipient_name}},
Thanks for signing up! We're excited to have you...

Results in: "Hi John Smith, Thanks for signing up!..."

Duplicating Campaigns

Save time by duplicating existing campaigns:

1. From the campaign list, find the campaign to copy
2. Click the Duplicate button (copy icon)
3. A new draft is created with "(Copy)" appended to the name
4. Edit the copy as needed
5. Activate when ready

This copies:

• All campaign settings
• All email steps and content
• Branding and trigger configuration

How Sending Works

Once a lead is enrolled, the automation handles everything:

1. Enrollment - Lead enters the campaign at Step 1
2. Scheduling - Next send time is calculated based on step delays
3. Processing - System checks every 5 minutes for due emails
4. Sending - Emails are sent via SendGrid with your branding
5. Progression - Lead moves to the next step
6. Completion - After the final step, enrollment is marked complete

What's Tracked:

• Sent emails with timestamps
• Failed sends with error details
• Open and click events
• Enrollment status (active, completed, unsubscribed)
• Monthly usage per company

Campaign Statistics

Active campaigns show performance metrics:

View stats on the campaign edit page or campaign list.

Triggering Campaigns

Tag-Based Triggers (Recommended)

The most common way to trigger campaigns is through tags:

1. Go to Company Settings > Tags
2. Create or edit a custom tag
3. Select a campaign in the Campaign Trigger dropdown
4. When that tag is applied to any lead, they're automatically enrolled

Example: Create a "Free Trial" tag that triggers your onboarding campaign.

Tags can be applied via:

• Manual tagging on lead details
• Bulk tagging from leads list (campaign enrollment works correctly for bulk tag operations)
• Import with tags column
• Form submissions
• AI actions (Ledo)
• Shopify customer sync
• Facebook Lead Ads

Newsletter Tag (Automatic)

The default "Newsletter" tag has special behavior:

• Automatically enrolls leads in your active Newsletter campaign
• Works across all touchpoints
• No additional configuration needed

Manual Enrollment

You can also manually enroll leads:

• From lead detail page (coming soon)
• Bulk enrollment from leads list (coming soon)

WordPress Blog Posts as Content Source

For Nurture campaigns, you can automatically use your WordPress blog posts instead of manually writing email content. Ledo AI summarizes each post into an engaging email.

How It Works

1. Sync posts from WordPress - The LeadMachine WordPress plugin syncs your blog posts and categories
2. Select content source - When creating a Nurture campaign, choose "WordPress Posts" instead of "Manual"
3. Choose categories - Select which blog categories to include
4. Automatic delivery - Posts are sent sequentially (oldest to newest) on your schedule

Setting Up WordPress Content Source

Step 1: Sync Your WordPress Posts

In your WordPress admin:

1. Go to LeadMachine > Post Sync tab
2. Enable Post Sync
3. Select which categories to sync
4. Click Sync All Posts Now

Posts are automatically synced when you publish new content.

Step 2: Create a WordPress Nurture Campaign

1. Create a new Nurture campaign
2. In Content Source, select WordPress Posts
3. Choose which categories to include
4. Optionally enable Loop content to restart from the beginning when all posts are sent
5. Set your email frequency (e.g., every 7 days)
6. Configure branding (logo, colors, footer)
7. Activate the campaign

What Gets Sent

For each blog post, Ledo AI generates:

• Subject line - Engaging subject based on the post title
• Headline - Featured headline in the email
• Summary - 2-3 paragraph summary of the post
• Featured image - Post's featured image (if available)
• Call-to-action - "Read Full Article" button linking to the original post

Best Practices

• Categorize strategically - Use categories to segment content (e.g., "Tips", "Case Studies", "Product Updates")
• Quality posts - AI summarization works best with well-written, substantive posts
• Featured images - Add featured images to posts for better email engagement
• Weekly cadence - 7-day delays work well for blog digest emails

Requirements

• LeadMachine WordPress plugin v2.3.0 or higher
• Posts synced via the Post Sync tab
• At least one post in the selected categories

Email Engagement Automations

LeadMachine responds to real-time email engagement signals — clicks, opens, bounces, and spam reports — with automatic actions so you never miss a hot lead or waste time on a dead address.

Real-Time Click Actions

When a lead clicks a link in any campaign email, four things happen immediately:

This means a clicked link is treated as a strong buying signal — LeadMachine acts on it instantly without waiting for your next review.

Smart Campaign Pausing

Sending emails to disengaged leads wastes deliverability budget and trains spam filters to ignore you. LeadMachine monitors engagement per enrollment:

• If a lead receives 3 consecutive campaign steps with no opens or clicks, their enrollment is automatically paused
• The lead owner receives a task prompting them to try a different approach (call, SMS, or personalized outreach)
• The enrollment stays paused until the owner manually resumes it or re-enrolls the lead

This keeps your sender reputation clean and focuses effort on leads who are actually reading.

Owner Notifications for Hot Leads

A and B-grade leads (score ≥ 60) trigger instant owner notifications when they open or click a campaign email:

• In-app notification in your notification bell
• PWA push notification if you have the mobile app installed

Lower-grade leads do not generate notifications on opens/clicks — only score changes and task assignments do. This prevents notification fatigue from cold list activity.

Bounce Handling

When SendGrid reports a hard email bounce:

1. The bounced email address is deactivated on the lead's contact record
2. A note is automatically added to the lead explaining the bounce and which address failed
3. The lead is tagged needs-re-enrichment so Ledo can attempt to find a new valid address during the next enrichment run

The lead stays active in your pipeline — only the bad email is deactivated. Once Ledo finds a replacement address, it's added and the tag is cleared.

Spam Report Handling

When a lead marks your email as spam:

• They are immediately unsubscribed from all campaigns — not just the one they were in
• Their email address is deactivated on the lead record
• A note is added to the lead recording the spam report date and campaign

Spam reports are a hard signal of unwanted contact. Re-enrolling a spam-reporting lead requires a valid business reason and a clean contact address.

Managing Active Campaigns

Pausing a Campaign

Click Pause to temporarily stop a campaign:

• No new emails will be sent
• Active enrollments are paused in place
• Click Activate to resume

Editing an Active Campaign

You can edit campaigns while leads are enrolled:

• Changes to steps affect future sends only
• Already-sent emails are not affected
• Be careful with major content changes

Deleting a Campaign

Deleting removes:

• The campaign and all steps
• All enrollment records
• All send history

This cannot be undone. Consider pausing instead.

Unsubscribes

Every campaign email includes an unsubscribe link. When clicked:

• Lead is immediately unsubscribed from that specific campaign
• They won't receive any more emails from that campaign
• They can still receive emails from other campaigns
• A confirmation page thanks them

Important:

• Unsubscribes are per-campaign, not global
• Re-applying the trigger tag won't re-enroll an unsubscribed lead
• Respect unsubscribes - it's required by law (CAN-SPAM, GDPR)

Best Practices

Email Content

Subject Lines:

• Keep under 50 characters
• Be specific about the value inside
• Avoid spam trigger words (FREE, ACT NOW, etc.)
• Personalize when possible

Body Content:

• Focus on one message per email
• Use short paragraphs (2-3 sentences)
• Include a clear call-to-action
• Keep it scannable with headers

Header Images:

• Use 600px wide images for best display
• Keep file size under 200KB
• Ensure images look good on mobile
• Don't rely on images for critical info

Timing

Welcome Emails:

• Send immediately (0 delay)
• Strike while interest is hot

Follow-up Emails:

• Space 1-3 days apart
• Don't overwhelm with daily emails
• Consider your audience's inbox habits

Re-engagement:

• Wait at least 30 days of inactivity
• Space emails 5-7 days apart

Strategy

Start Simple:

• Begin with 3-4 step campaigns
• Test before adding complexity
• Monitor unsubscribe rates

Segment Your Audience:

• Different campaigns for different lead types
• Tailor messaging to their interests
• Don't send the same campaign to everyone

Review & Optimize:

• Check which steps have high engagement
• Update underperforming content
• Remove or revise low-performing steps

Troubleshooting

Emails Not Sending

Check these items:

1. Is the campaign status Active?
2. Does your company have Email access enabled?
3. Does the lead have a valid email address?
4. Is the lead unsubscribed from this campaign?
5. Has the scheduled time passed?

Lead Not Enrolled

Verify:

1. The trigger tag has a campaign assigned
2. The campaign is active (not draft or paused)
3. The lead isn't already enrolled or completed
4. The lead hasn't previously unsubscribed

Wrong Content Showing

If email content seems wrong:

1. Make sure you clicked Save Changes after editing
2. Check you're editing the correct step
3. Refresh the page and verify the save worked

Test Email Not Received

1. Check your spam folder
2. Verify the test email address is correct
3. Check that SendGrid is properly configured
4. Try a different email address

Requirements

To use Email Automation, you need:

• Email access enabled for your company (contact support)
• At least one lead with a valid email address
• A trigger tag configured (for automated campaigns)

FAQ

Q: Can I pause a campaign? A: Yes, set the status to "Paused". Active enrollments will pause and resume when you reactivate.

Q: What happens if a lead is already enrolled? A: They won't be re-enrolled. Each lead can only be in a campaign once.

Q: Can I edit a campaign while leads are enrolled? A: Yes, but changes only affect future sends. Be careful with major changes.

Q: How do I see who's enrolled in a campaign? A: Click on the campaign to see enrollment counts. Detailed enrollment list coming soon.

Q: Are there sending limits? A: Based on your plan and SendGrid limits. Usage is tracked per company per month.

Q: Can leads be in multiple campaigns? A: Yes, they can be enrolled in different campaigns simultaneously.

Q: What happens when a campaign is completed? A: The lead's enrollment status changes to "completed". They can be enrolled in other campaigns.

Q: Can I resend to someone who completed the campaign? A: Not automatically. You would need to manually re-enroll them (feature coming soon).

Getting Help

Need assistance with Email Automation?

• Check this documentation first
• Contact support via the in-app support ticket system
• Email [email protected] for technical issues