Build an onboarding journey

Email each new user about what they have and haven't done yet. Test it on real people, then switch it to live.

About 20 minutes, then a few days of testing · Admins · Once per product

Before you start

Your product connected, with onboarding steps in its catalog
To go live: email sending set up

This unlocks

A welcome, reminders and tips for every new user
Journeys that follow on from another, or start when someone goes quiet

Publish it before your developer starts sending sign-ups. A journey only takes people who signed up in the last 72 hours. To reach further back, raise Ignore events older than (hours) on its Settings tab, up to 720.

Build it from the 7-day template

Open Journeys and press New journey. A product journey needs a connected product or a sandbox first.
If it asks who enters it, choose Users of a connected product.
Pick your Product. Keep Start from on 7-day onboarding (splits on progress).
Press Create draft.

The template sends a welcome 15 minutes after sign-up. Then it emails the next business morning, and on about days 3, 5 and 7. People who have finished onboarding get an education email. The rest get a reminder.

Change the words on the Content tab and the timing on the Canvas tab. Press Save draft as you go. Timeline preview shows when each email would arrive.

Publish it in test mode

A new journey starts in test mode: only the test users you list join, and they get real emails.

On the Delivery tab, under Test users, add your own user id or email address in your app, one per line. A sandbox's test users are already there.
Press Save delivery settings.
Press Publish and confirm. If it lists things to fix before publishing, fix those first.
Sign up to your app as a test user. Or enter someone by hand with Enrol someone now on the People tab.

Then try Shadow on the Delivery tab. Everyone moves through the journey, but every email goes to your Shadow inbox instead, saying who it was for.

Switch it to live

Live sends real emails to everyone who signs up. First, check that:

Your From address is on a verified sending domain, in Settings › Sending.
Your postal address is saved there too. Marketing emails are held without one.
Your app sends consent with each sign-up. Without it, only the welcome email goes out.

On the Delivery tab, choose Live.
Press Save delivery settings.

People already in the journey keep the mode they started in. Changed an email? Press Publish again. People already in it stay on their version.

Follow-on journeys and quiet users

These two start without a sign-up. If you can't see their options, whoever runs your YouGrow hasn't switched them on.

A journey that continues from another

Press New journey and pick the first journey under Starts after another journey?
Keep Follow-on sequence (4 emails, 3 days apart) and press Create draft.

People join when they reach the end of the first journey, and its waits count from then. Nobody finishes the first journey until it's live.

A journey for people who go quiet

Your catalog needs a date fact, such as when someone was last active. Your developer sends it.

On the journey's Settings tab, under Starts when, pick the date in Or when a date passes.
Set Start when it was at least (days ago). The default is 14.
Leave Stop when the date moves on ticked, so people who come back get no more of it.

A daily check from 07:00 UTC lets people in. Check now on the People tab runs it at once. In a sandbox, try it with Went quiet 15 days ago on the Sandbox tab.

Check it worked

Under the journey's name, the badges say active and test, then live.
The People tab lists everyone who has joined.
On Home, Onboard & retain says "In test mode", then "Live".

If you see this

If you see	What to do
"An email shows the onboarding checklist or next step, but this product has no onboarding steps yet."	Add steps with Learn from repo, then make a new journey from the template.
"Add at least one branch."	The journey was made before your product had steps. Add them, then make a new journey from the template.
"The journey must be published and active."	Press Publish. If it's paused, press Resume.
"In test mode only listed test users can be enrolled."	Add them under Test users on the Delivery tab, or switch to shadow.
"Live sending needs a From address on a verified sending domain."	Finish email sending, then choose Live again.

Next: Review and approvals