Using the Wait Action in Workflows

What is the Wait Action?

The Wait action is a powerful tool within your CRM's workflow builder that allows you to pause a contact's journey through an automation. Instead of proceeding immediately to the next step, you can delay the workflow until a specific time, date, event, or condition is met. This ensures your communications and actions are timely and relevant.

Key Benefits

Using the Wait action provides several advantages for managing your automations:

• Precise Timing: Ensure messages, task assignments, and other actions occur at the most appropriate moment.
• Contextual Communication: Trigger follow-ups based on contact replies, email engagement, appointment times, or custom data.
• Scheduling Flexibility: Choose from various delay types, including fixed durations, specific dates, recurring schedules, and event-based triggers.
• Dynamic Personalization: Use data from a contact's record to dynamically set wait times and dates.
• Controlled Delivery: Restrict when a workflow resumes to specific days of the week or times of day.
• Clear Organization: Give each Wait step a descriptive name to make your workflow logic easy to understand and maintain.

Wait Action Configuration Options

The Wait action can be configured in several ways to suit your needs.

Wait for a Set Period of Time

This option pauses the contact for a fixed duration. You specify the length of time using units like seconds, minutes, hours, or days. The value can be a standard number or a dynamic value pulled from a custom field. You can also set an advance window to only resume the workflow on specific days or within certain hours.

Wait Until a Specific Date and Time

This holds the contact until a precise moment. You can enter a fixed date and time or use a dynamic value from a contact field. You can choose if the workflow should proceed on that exact date and time, before it, or after it. If the specified date has already passed, you can configure the workflow to continue, exit the automation, go to a specific step, or skip outbound communication actions.

Wait for a Recurring Schedule

This pauses the contact until the next occurrence of a repeating pattern. You can set a frequency of weekly, monthly, or yearly. For weekly, you select the days of the week and a time. For monthly, you choose a specific day of the month or a particular weekday occurrence. For yearly, you select a specific date each year. A live preview shows the next five scheduled occurrences.

Wait for an Upcoming Appointment or Booking

This option delays the workflow relative to a scheduled event, such as a calendar appointment, service booking, or invoice due date. You specify whether the workflow should proceed at the scheduled time, or a certain amount of time before or after it. You can also define what happens if the event date has already passed.

Wait for the Contact to Reply

This pauses the workflow until the contact replies on a selected communication channel, such as SMS or email. You can optionally set a timeout period, after which the workflow will continue even if no reply is received.

Wait for the Contact to Take an Action

This holds the contact until they perform a specific action, like clicking a trigger link or interacting with a sent email (e.g., opening it or clicking a link within it). You can also set a timeout duration for this option.

Wait for Specific Conditions to be Met

This pauses the workflow until a custom set of conditions, built from your contact fields, evaluates as true. You can create segments using AND/OR logic to define these conditions. A timeout can be applied here as well.

When to Use the Wait Action

Incorporate the Wait action into your workflows to create intelligent customer journeys. Use it to send a reminder email a day before an appointment, to pause for a week after sending a proposal, to send a monthly newsletter, or to wait for a customer to click a link before sending a follow-up. By controlling the timing of your automations, you make every interaction count.