Creating & sending template emails from tasks

ProcessKit enables you to create template emails—with dynamic variables—and (optionally) send them out from ProcessKit.  Sending can happen manually, or you can automate that with your processes.  This article shows you how to set this up.

• Creating an email template
• Using dynamic liquid tags in your email templates
• Sending emails from ProcessKit—manually or automatically
• Seeing when an email was sent

Creating an email template

You can create and place an email template within any process step or task using our blocks system.  Adding an email template works the same way as adding any other type of field to a task.

1. Edit or create a new process, or edit a task list on a project.
2. Edit or create a new step in the process, or task in the task list.
3. In the content panel, click "New Block", then select the "Email Template" block
   
4. Fill in the fields:
   • Field Label:  This is only used internally, not shown anywhere on the emails you send.
   • From name:  The name shown as the "From" name on the emails you send.
     • Note:  The from email address will always be support@processkit.com (this cannot be changed).  However, you do have the ability to customize the From name, as well as the reply-to email address.
   • To:  Enter the email address(s) that this email should be sent to.  You can use liquid tags to dynamically fill the To: email address.  If you want to send it to multiple people, separate the email addresses with a comma.  Note:  You can send to a maximum of 5 recipients per email send.
   • CC:  (display the CC & BCC fields by clicking "CC & BCC" link next to the "To:" field).  Enter email address(s) to be included in the public CC field.
   • BCC:  (display the CC & BCC fields by clicking "CC & BCC" link next to the "To:" field).  Enter email address(s) to be included in the private BCC field.  Other recipients of the email will not see these recipients' email addresses.
   • Reply-to:  Enter an email address where you want to receive replies to this email.  When recipients click "Reply" on the email, it will be addressed to this email address.
   • Subject:  Fill in the subject line for your email.  You can use liquid tags here, if you want.
   • Message:  Fill in your template email message.  You can use rich text formatting or include images (Keep in mind that not all recipients have images enabled in their email client).  You can use liquid tags here, if you want.

Using dynamic liquid tags in your email templates

You can use liquid tags to dynamically fill values into any of the fields in your email templates, including the "To:", "Reply-to:", "Subject", and "Message" fields.

For example, lets say you have a client attribute called "email", where you store a client's email address.  When this client is associated with a project, you can access that field's value using {{ client.email }}.  So, if you fill the "To:" field with {{ client.email }}, your email will be addressed to send to that client's email address (assuming the client's "email" field has a valid email address saved).

Learn more about how to use Liquid tags in ProcessKit here.

Sending emails from ProcessKit

You can send your template emails from ProcessKit in one of two ways:

• Sending an email manually
• Use a Task action to send an email automatically

Sending an email manually

When you're in a project and you're viewing a task that contains a template email, simply click the "Send" button to immediately send the email.  Need to make some edits to the email message before sending?  Just edit the email template's settings, make those changes and save, and then click "Send" on the email. 

If the task is still incomplete, you also have the option of clicking "Send and complete task", which will send off the email and complete this task simultaneously.

When an email was sent manually, the task's activity will display the record of this email being sent, and it will display the user who had manually clicked the "Send" button.

Note:  The email will only be sent if there is at least 1 email in the "To:" field, and no more than 5 valid emails (separated by commas) in this "To:" field.  

Sending an email automatically

You can use Task Actions to automatically trigger the sending a template email when the task is changed from incomplete to complete.

There are two ways to set this task action:

• When editing the email template's settings, check the box for "Send this email automatically when this task is completed."  This will automatically create the Task Action and add it to the list of Task Actions on this task.
  
• Navigate to the automations panel on this task > "Actions" > add a new Task Action, and select "Send template email".

Both of these will result in adding this to the Task Actions list:

Also - the email template will display this notice indicating that marking this task as complete will result in this email being sent.

Note:  If a single task contains multiple email templates, and you the task action for automatically sending email templates on task completion, then all of the template emails on this task will be sent.  It is not possible to set one email to automatically send while others not to be automatically sent.  

Seeing when an email was sent

An email that has been sent will record an event displayed in the activity feed.  This event will display in this individual task's activity, this project's activity, and if the email was manually sent by a user, then it would display in that user's activity feed.

The activity event will appear in one of two ways:

If the email was manually sent by a user

Meaning, a user manually pressed the "Send" button on an email, then the activity event will appear like this:

If the email was sent automatically via a Task Action

Keep in mind that a task action is triggered when a task is turned from incomplete to complete.  Sometimes a user checks off a task, other times an integration (such as a Zapier integration) could cause a task to be marked complete.  Either way, the task completion triggers the task actions, which could trigger the sending of an email.  In this case, the activity event would look like this: 

You can click "View details" to see the contents of the email that was sent and who it was addressed to.