Send a Pilot Email Campaign and Handle Replies

Send a short announcement to two colleagues, then check that their replies reach the right Workflow or person. You will create an on-demand Routine with a Send Email Action and configure the sending Inbox to handle incoming mail.

The outbound Action sends your announcement. The Inbox's routing rules handle a new email Chat when a recipient replies; later replies stay with that Chat.

Before You Begin

• Have permission to manage Routines, send from the Inbox, and read its mail.
• Use two test Members whose mailboxes you control and whose verified Accounts are linked to those Members. Confirm they have agreed to the test and have email notifications enabled. A notification preference does not establish permission to contact someone.
• Have an Inbox and a published reply-handling Workflow that the test Members can use. For this pilot, give the Workflow instructions to answer questions about the announcement and hand requests outside its scope to your team.
• Use synthetic content. The example below contains no patient or health information.

If access is missing, have the resource owner review the required permission before continuing. See Member Roles and Notification Preferences.

1. Prepare the Inbox and Reply Routing

Open Connections → Inboxes and select the sending Inbox. If you need to create one, follow Set Up Email Inboxes.

In the Inbox's Settings, configure an AI answers routing rule for your test Members and select the reply-handling Workflow. Check its audience, schedule, and position among the other rules. Use Test to inspect rule matching; this does not send an email or demonstrate a real reply.

The Inbox walkthrough shows setup and an email Action example that stays disabled and is not saved. It does not demonstrate a completed campaign.

Setting up Email Inboxes
Create an Inbox, choose a Workflow or human reply, and see an Action that sends email. Read the transcript

For unknown senders, decide whether mail should be stored for your team. Storing unknown-sender mail does not make the AI process it. See Email Inboxes for routing, ownership, and manual replies.

2. Create a Two-Member Audience

In Members, label only your two test Members Email campaign pilot. Create and save a Member Filter for that label, then inspect the matching Members. It should contain exactly the two people you intend to contact.

See Member Filters for the filter controls. Keep this pilot filter separate from a real campaign audience.

3. Configure the Outbound Routine

1. Open Routines → New Routine.
2. Choose Actions, then add a Send Email Action.
3. Set From to your sending Inbox and To to The Current Member. Each run sends to the Member the Routine runs for.
4. Leave the Action's Workflow set to No workflow. The reply-handling Workflow belongs in the Inbox routing rule from Step 1.
5. Enter the subject and body below.
6. Choose Everyone matching a filter, select your pilot Member Filter, and set the Member limit to 2.
7. Leave the timing On-demand. Name the Routine Email campaign pilot and create it.

Field	Pilot content
Subject	Pilot: new team information session
Body	We are testing an announcement for an upcoming team information session. Please reply with a question about the session so we can check reply handling. This is a test; no registration or other action is required.

Keep the outbound Action's Workflow empty for this tutorial. Selecting a Workflow starts an email Chat and can send that Workflow's opening message. Adding custom subject and body templates as well can produce an additional email. This pilot uses one custom announcement and starts reply handling through the Inbox instead.

Use the email editor's Preview to check the template with sample data. Check the actual messages in your test mailboxes too: preview is not a guarantee that every email client will display the same layout. Add personalization only after the plain pilot works; see Template Variables and Send Email Action for the field reference.

The Routine walkthrough demonstrates the same audience and timing wizard, using its Workflow option and a single Member. This tutorial uses Actions and a filtered audience.

Creating Routines
Choose a Workflow and audience, then run the Routine on demand. Read the transcript

4. Send Once and Check the Mailboxes

Open the saved Routine and choose Run Now. Check the selected Member Filter and displayed audience count before confirming. The run dialog allows you to change the audience, so review it even if the saved Routine is correct.

Then check these separate results:

Where to look	What to confirm
Routine execution	The intended audience was processed; inspect failed or skipped Actions.
Sending Inbox	The outbound messages have the expected subject and content.
Both test mailboxes	Each received one announcement from the expected address, with readable formatting and working links.

A completed Routine or an outbound record does not prove delivery to a recipient's mailbox. If a result is failed, skipped, or uncertain, inspect it before another send. Do not rerun the whole audience to resolve uncertainty: a previous attempt may already have sent mail.

5. Reply and Verify the Handling Path

Reply from one test mailbox to the announcement. Check the receiving Inbox and Chats:

1. The reply is associated with the intended Member.
2. The email Chat uses the expected reply-handling Workflow.
3. The Agent answers the test question using the announcement's context.
4. A request outside the Workflow's scope follows the handoff you configured and is visible to your team.
5. A second reply stays with the existing Chat, rather than being treated as a new campaign response.

Inbox routing selects handling for new email threads; changing a rule does not reroute every reply in an existing Chat. If the expected Workflow does not answer, inspect sender recognition, routing conditions, the Chat's current owner, and Workflow access. A human-owned Chat waits for a person. See Email Inboxes and Chats for investigation and manual handling.

Finish the Pilot

Leave the Routine On-demand after the test. Record which Members received the announcement and whether reply handling worked before changing the audience or timing.

For a real campaign, review the audience's contact permission, notification preferences, message content, and the team's ability to handle replies. Use a separate campaign filter, inspect its membership, and deliberately choose the send time. See Routines for scheduling; this pilot does not enable a recurring send or a follow-up sequence.