Require task completion before progressing a Sequence

[sjudson]

Scott from the product team here. 

In Sequences today, task completion is NOT required before progressing onto the next step in a sequence.  For a sequence with multiple email steps, call tasks, and social touchpoints, this means that if a task step is not completed, future emails and tasks will still get sent or created. 

We've heard from our users that there should be an option to require that a task be completed before sending the next email in a sequence, or before creating another net new task. 

To solve this, we're evaluating support for this feature in Sequences:

If you're interested in talking with us more, or getting early access, upvote this post and we'll let you know as soon as it's available. 

[sjudson]

Hi Community! 

We've released a number of updates to sequences on March 3rd, including a new default that requires task completion before a sequence will progress. This is available now for all Sales Professional, Sales Enterprise, Service Professional, and Service Enterprise seats.

You can read more about the changes in the link to the release below:

[Now Live] Advanced Sequences

Best,

Glen

[sjudson]

This feature is soon moving to a public beta. We plan to have it completely rolled out to all Sales Professional and Sales Enterprise customers by March 3rd. 

Going forward, folks can request access directly from their customer succes rep at HubSpot! Once this is out, all tasks will require task copletion before progressing a sequence. You will still have an option to forgo completion as a requirement on each and every task step, but we have decided to change the default behavior once this goes live.

Here's an updated view for how this will look in sequences:

[sjudson]

Hi all! Sorry just now catching up after some time out. Everyone who has signed up will be receiving access to the beta today.

We are going to start opening up this beta in February. Signups will be more accessible to folks by speaking directly to their POC at HubSpot, and we'll begin providing the feature in a more systematic way. We have decided to make some tweaks to the design, and behavior. Soon, all tasks for sequences users in Sales Professional and Enterprise will have the ability to pause a sequence until the task is completed. This will be the default behavior for tasks. Checking the box (seen below) will be a way to determine specific tasks that are not required for completion. All of your current sequences will have this box checked as soon as we launch the feature, as we don't want to change the behavior of sequences you've already built! 

[sjudson]

I'll be sending out an email confirmation in the next day to all those that signed up for the beta! We hope to have this in beta within the next 2 weeks!

[sjudson]

I believe the comment with the link is now on a previous (4) page in the thread comments. Here's the link: https://docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1FAIpQLSe5prpMcY_8LrHzhx3wET1BKKm9QyBQs8r28K0rHiHopkLCDA/viewform

[sjudson]

The form link should be working now! Thanks for catching so quickly 

[sjudson]

Hi Sequences Community!

We are now collecting beta sign-ups for this feature. Please fill out this form to be part of this beta.

 - We are currently only taking Sales and Services Professional and Enterprise customers for this closed beta.

Note:

• Several dozen of you that have reached out directly and are already included, but filling out the form will be helpful for our team
• I have included a survey question to this form that again will also be very helpful for our team as we continue development
• This work is still in development, I will update here once the beta is live

Thanks everyone!

- Glen

[sjudson]

This work is currently in development. 

@OfferZenBrett  - we hope to have a closed beta ready for this in the coming weeks. I'll update the post here and create a very short sign-up form (email and HUB ID) to give early access to anyone that would like to be a tester for this feature. 

[sjudson]

Hi Community!

We are priotizing this work in the coming weeks and plan to have some prototypes ready for feedback. If anyone would like to participate in our usability testing, or provide extra thoughts and context to how this problem impacts your process, it would be great to hear from you!

Please message me directly and I will reach out when we are ready to schedule calls!

[Blaine12]

Good Morning!

I set a lot of our clients up in email sequences but I often need to see if they have read my email etc before the next email goes out and I have tasks set up but after speaking with one of your client specialists the task doesn't stop the next email.  Would you ever consider adding this feature?

Thank you for your time!

[victorialockard]

I would like to have a sequence not proceed to the next task until the current task is completed. This way, if I don't get to a task for a few days, it won't move forward to sending an auto-email I am not ready to send (because I haven't called yet for example)

[ediponc]

This would be very useful

[mwoods]

I would like the ability to set a sequence up so that the next step won't start unless the task before it is marked as complete.  For example, I have a phone call scheduled as a task and an email to go out afterwards.  If I don't get to that phone call on the date I had planned, I would like for the email to wait to be sent until after I mark that phone call as complete.

It doesn't seem like this is a feature yet, but I might be wrong.  If there's a way to accomplish this, let me know!

[jennysowyrda]

Hi @mwoods, 

Sequences do not execute based on "if/then" branches of whether something is complete or not. For more information on what sequences can do, and how they will execute, click here. 

Thank you,

Jenny

[mwoods]

Hi @jennysowyrda - 

Is there another feature within HubSpot that will allow for a similar functionality?

Thank you!

[jennysowyrda]

Hi @mwoods,

The workflows tool is similar to what you are looking for. It is a feature available with sales starter and sales pro.

Let me know if you have any questions about workflows. 

[caesarpitz]

From what I understand, the Hubspot Sequences were built with the idea that they simply progress without any requirement of 'completion' that could stop progress of a sequence.  I'm sure there may be a number of companies out there that like this feature, so I'm not saying get rid of it.  BUT - 

If calls are part of a Sequence (tasks, in the Hubspot model), and my sequence is dependant on that call or voicemail before moving to the next email, right now, I can't begin a sequence because it skips the need for the task to be completed before shooting out the next email.  Many times, that doesn't make sense, because my follow up emails make reference to calls that may have been skipped.

It should be REALLY easy to add a check box that either says that the step is mandatory (and thus, can't move past that step without doing it), or that it is not mandatory and can be skipped, do not hold up the sequence.

Right now, I can't build sequences for my sales team to use because I'm afraid they'll miss a call and it will just keep blasting away emails without any sort of task completion!!

[GreggVK]

In Sequences, I would like to see more control on when a follow up email goes out by requiring a task to be marked complete.  Right now, if I create a Sequence with Email #1, followed by Task #1 to call the contact after xx days, and then Email #2 as a thank you to that call in x day, there's nothing that will prevent Email #2 from going out if Task #1 is not completed. 

I would like to see Email #2 going out if and only if Task #1 is marked complete.

[justinhaywood]

I had a sequence that looked like this:

Email 1

If no response after 1 day, call and leave a voicemail.

Email 2: if no response after 2 days

It was my understanding that the second email would not send until after I had completed the call task. However, I found out that's not the case.

I wasn't able to call all of the contacts in my sequence, yet the second email still sent whether or not I logged a call.

It seems to me that the second email should not send unless the follow up task is completed. At minimum, the follow up task should have a mandatory/optional switch. If you set the follow up as a mandatory step, the second email won't send until the follow up task has been performed. If you set it to optional, the sequence will continue running regardless of whether the task is completed (like it does now).

I appreciate any attention to this.

Justin

[marcusyoung]

This would be tremendously helpful to align with our sales process, i.e. if action 1 is an email, and action 2 is a phone call, and the agent goes on leave for a week or so, or something urgent pops up, or he doesn't complete all his tasks for the day, the second email goes out and possibly the third without adhering to the required mix of outreach methods to find the buyer's preferred medium. I get that you can pause workflows, but what happens if the workflow is left off indefinitely? Thanks Hubspot, it would be great if you could help us out here!

[marcusyoung]

https://community.hubspot.com/t5/HubSpot-Ideas/Make-Sequences-contingent-on-a-task-being-completed/i...

[ernopyykko]

We would find it very handy to have the possibility to add conditions on sequences. 

Example of a condititon that we'd like to have is:

- If no reply to previous e-mail template by the contact or the task is not in status 'completed', do not send the next e-mail. 

[Andrew3]

This is a basic feature that would make our ability ot automate so much easier.

[EliLeedy]

This function would be extremely helpful for my team as we follow up with Deals in our pipeline and inbound contacts who request information. We like rapid follow up, but if a rep is out sick 1 day and the follow up email goes out referencing a call that never happened it is unfortunate. This would streamline our process.

[wdeperi]

This is something we would love to have. Adding more hands on touchpoints to sequences would really improve our prospecting. Please bring this feature to HubSpot! 🙂

[gilldupuis]

Having sequences not auto-create tasks before the previous task is complete would change my entire team's lives.  I used sequences every day for three months in a role where I knew exactly how many tasks I'd have time to complete in a day, and the auto-creating was still a pain in the **bleep**. I've since switched to a role with a less predictable day to day workload so I've stopped using sequences entirely and probably won't use them again until the STOP auto-create feature is implemented. I'll be waiting. 

[mkt]

We would be very intrested in discussing this further and potentially testing this.

[auto_mate]

I'd beta this right now please

[jfzelley]

We should be able to edit the settings of sequences so that emails are not automatically sent until the previous task is marked completed. Tasks get backed up, sometimes I don't get to a call task, and the email will send anyway. Tasks should not execute until the previous task is complete.