Automation

By Maildesk Team ·

Create a Welcome Sequence (End-to-End Recipe)

The complete recipe: a tag, a sequence, a signup form, and an automation working together to welcome every new subscriber automatically.

This is the single highest-leverage automation in email marketing: every new subscriber gets a warm, well-paced introduction to you — automatically, forever. It combines four Maildesk features, and this guide wires them together step by step.

The architecture: Form applies tag → tag triggers automation → automation delivers sequence.

Step 1: Create the tag

Tags are used to categorize contacts and trigger automations.

  1. Navigate to Automations > Tags.
  2. Click Add Tag.
  3. Name it Welcome Sequence (or any name you prefer) and save.

More on tags: Organize subscribers with tags.

Step 2: Create the email sequence

  1. Go to Automations > Email Sequences and create a new sequence.
  2. Add your first email:
    • Subject: Welcome to [Your Brand]!
    • Content: introduce your brand and set expectations — what you’ll send and how often.
    • It sends immediately on enrollment.
  3. Add two or three more emails with Send After delays of a few days each — your story, your best content, a soft ask.
  4. Make sure each email’s Published toggle is on, and save.

Full details and a proven 4-email structure: Build an email sequence.

Step 3: Create the signup form

  1. Go to Forms and create a form.
  2. In Automation Tags, select your Welcome Sequence tag — this is the crucial wiring: everyone who submits the form gets the tag.
  3. Keep the fields minimal: email plus First Name (so you can write Hi {{firstName}}).
  4. Style it, save it, and embed it on your site with the copy-embed-code button.

Full details: Create an embedded signup form.

Step 4: Create the automation

  1. Navigate to Automations > Automations and click Create draft.
  2. Select your welcome Email Sequence and your From Email Address.
  3. Add a trigger: When tag is added → Welcome Sequence.
  4. Leave re-enrollment off — people should get a welcome once.
  5. Check the “How this works” summary, tick Active, and click Update automation.

Full details: Set up your first automation.

Step 5: Test the whole loop

  1. Open your website (or the form’s embed URL) and subscribe with your own email address.
  2. Confirm the subscription from your inbox — only Confirmed contacts are enrolled.
  3. The first welcome email should arrive right away.
  4. Check the automation’s analytics: you should appear under Entered and Active.

If the email didn’t arrive: confirm the form applies the tag (check your own contact’s tags under Subscribers), the automation is Active, the sequence emails are Published, and your domain is verified.

Prefer to enroll via the API?

If signups happen in your product rather than a form, you can create contacts through the Maildesk API with the tag attached — fetch the tag’s ID, then create the contact with that TagId. Set isConfirmed: true when creating the contact, since only confirmed contacts are enrolled in sequences. Your API keys live under Settings > API Keys — see Team, webhooks, and the API.

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