Automations & playbooks
Active Reach unifies every “scheduled or triggered thing that touches a customer” under one Automations surface. Three domains, five types, seven lifecycle goals — covered below.
Playbooks are pre-built journey templates designed for specific business goals. Activating a playbook materialises a journey in your workspace with all nodes pre-configured. Today the workspace nav surfaces this surface at Engage → Automations (/dashboard/{ws}/automations); the legacy /playbooks and /ads/playbooks routes still resolve and redirect.
The unified automation model
Every automation in Active Reach is classified by three dimensions:
| Dimension | Values |
|---|---|
| Domain | engagement (organic channels), paid (ad platforms), hybrid (cross-domain orchestration) |
| Type | journey, campaign, ad_campaign, audience_ops, orchestration |
| Lifecycle goal | acquisition, activation, engagement, conversion, retention, revenue, measurement |
A cart-recovery playbook is domain=engagement, type=journey, goal=conversion. A Meta retargeting flow is domain=paid, type=ad_campaign, goal=conversion. A cross-domain “warm leads on email + retarget on Meta” recipe is domain=hybrid, type=orchestration.
Playbooks vs journeys vs campaigns
| Campaign | Journey | Playbook | |
|---|---|---|---|
| What | A single message to a segment | A multi-step automation you build | A pre-built journey template you activate |
| Build time | 5 minutes | 30-60 minutes | 2 minutes |
| Customization | Full control over message | Full control over every node | Customize variables (segments, channels, timing) |
| Best for | One-off or recurring blasts | Complex, custom flows | Getting started fast, proven patterns |
Playbooks are journeys under the hood. When you activate a playbook, it creates a journey in your workspace with all nodes pre-configured.
How playbooks are organized
By lifecycle goal
Every playbook targets one of the seven LifecycleGoal values:
| Goal | Examples |
|---|---|
| Acquisition | Referral program, lead magnet, first-purchase incentive |
| Activation | Welcome series, onboarding checklist, feature adoption |
| Engagement | Weekly digest, product recommendations, reorder nudge |
| Conversion | Cart abandonment, browse abandonment, checkout completion |
| Retention | Win-back, churn prevention, loyalty milestone |
| Revenue | Upsell, cross-sell, renewal reminder |
| Measurement | NPS survey, review request, satisfaction check |
By industry vertical
Playbooks come in industry-specific flavors with pre-tuned segments, timing, and messaging:
- Food & Beverage — reactivation, reorder, review-to-revenue
- Retail — browse abandonment, seasonal, loyalty tier upgrade
- Services — appointment reminder, follow-up, referral
- E-commerce — cart recovery, post-purchase, win-back
Vertical playbooks are available in the Vertical playbooks section (email required for full content).
Per-outlet execution
For multi-outlet brands, campaigns, journeys, and ad campaigns can execute per-outlet with branched targeting. The chip-strip on /dashboard/{ws}/automations carries the scope as ?location= URL state:
- chip = “All outlets” (or single-outlet brand) → brand-tier execution
- chip = a specific outlet → outlet-scoped queueing, outlet-tier override
Location context propagates through the dispatcher, event-egress, and the canonical_orders view so outlet attribution survives end-to-end.
Actii — the AI agent
Actii is the AI agent that proposes, creates, and manages playbooks on your behalf. It analyzes your data, identifies opportunities, and suggests automations — you review and approve before anything sends.
Learn how Actii makes decisions in How Actii decides.