Email template post PDF-submission

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Christopher Banks

The email template that is generated after a PDF creation has three issues: it is not very customer friendly (for customer-facing PDF/emails, like an estimate for example), it is very limited in its ability to be customized and has the GoCanvas branding all over it. Not a huge issue for GoCanvas processes kept internally to my company, but this is a big deal for processes that end up in front of a customer. 

I would like to be able to add my company logo to the top of the submission and create an email template for each app (perhaps with tokens that reference a data field from my PDF submission and a signature block unique to the person submitting that PDF) that allow me to deliver a more professional looking output for my customer(s). 

Happy to keep the "GoCanvas" ad at the bottom of the email, or perhaps include the ability to remove it for a price in the subscription, but my logo needs to be front and center at the top for this to be more useful to me. 

Thank you!

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    Keith McQuait

    Yes, definitely possible with Zapier.
    Fairly easy to setup too.

    You don't need to know any code.

    Zapier has examples/tutorials that'll help you get through writing the HTML for the body.

    Gmail is super convenient for this but not entirely necessary. This also works with Outlook 365. I suspect there are other email options too.

    There is one limitation. Despite it being an available option, you cannot use the mid workflow trigger. It causes issues with the subsequent GoCanvas Pdf output. The pdf will not contain any of the information added after the hand-off point if you do.

    Same goes for revisions. If the user realizes he/she made an error in the original report and makes an edit, the email will trigger again but the pdf will still be the old form that contains the errors.

    I think I may have (dreamed up) a work around for this but I haven't had the time to put it in place yet to see if it actually works.

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    Keith McQuait

    Chris,

    The Outlook Zap is a 'beta'. It does have some bugs and limitations but it is very much usable for sending emails.

    The Outlook Zap will only allow you to 'send' or 'reply to' from the Outlook accounts that you have connected to Zapier.

    It does not allow you to add an alias 'send' or 'reply to' like Gmail.

    However, you may have multiple Outlook accounts/email addresses connected to Zapier. Additionally, most email hosting services allow you to add 'alias' addresses that you could also connect.

    I don't know how many sales reps you have but potentially you could link the Outlook account of every rep to Zapier. You would then need to set up a Zap or Zaps with a filter that only triggers when the submitted app contains the name of the rep who submitted the App.

    Zapier "Paths" may help minimize the number of Zaps that are actually needed (counting against your limit) and "Paths" have filters built directly into them.

    One big drawback with the Outlook Zap is that it does not allow you to include attachments. You would have to include a "downloadable" link in the HTML body. I think you could add the GoCanvas Link or you could use a cloud drive service downloadable URL like Box. I think Google Drive does this too.

    Here's a little video I made that shows the differences between Gmail and Outlook 365.

    https://www.loom.com/share/54ecf40f90324977ab59151b6163d0fe

    Good Luck!

    Mark B. knows how to get in touch with me if you want to come by one day and swap GoCanvas stories. LOL 

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    Sara Kaplow, Community Manager
    • Edited

    Hi Christopher,

    This is a great request and the good news is that those things are possible through our Professional Services team. You can connect with them about a price quote by emailing proservequotes@gocanvas.com. 

    You could also do this through a Zapier integration if you use gmail to send emails. I haven't done it before, but you can choose to send an HTML email (instead of plain) when a Submission is complete: 

    Then you can design how you'd like and include fields from the Submission as well. 

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    Christopher Banks

    Keith, when you do it through Outlook 365, does the "return to sender" appear as the individual user? I want emails going to customers to come from the Sales Rep, using our domain name - one of the reasons why the gmail integration doesn't really work for me. When I get emails from companies that don't have their own domain name, it's a red flag that they aren't a very professional/reliable company. 

     

    Thank you for chiming in so quickly with the fix!

     

    Thank you!

    Chris

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    Christopher Banks

    Hi Sarah - 

     

    When I tried emailing proservequotes@gocanvas.com, I got this rejection message:

     

    Hello cbanks@banksindustrial.com,

     

    We're writing to let you know that the group you tried to contact (proservequotes) may not exist, or you may not have permission to post messages to the group. A few more details on why you weren't able to post:

     

     * You might have spelled or formatted the group name incorrectly.

     * The owner of the group may have removed this group.

     * You may need to join the group before receiving permission to post.

     * This group may not be open to posting.

     

    If you have questions related to this or any other Google Group, visit the Help Center at https://support.google.com/a/gocanvas.com/bin/topic.py?topic=25838.

     

    Thanks,

     

    gocanvas.com admins

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    Sara Kaplow, Community Manager

    In Zapier, you can set who the "From" address is, based either on someone's email address from the Submission or a standard email address for each email (you can at least do that with the Gmail integration, I assume it's that way for Outlook 365 as well). 

    Sorry about the email bounce - it looks like something's configured wrong on our end. I can ask Troy, your Account Manager, to reach out about options or you can put in a ticket with Support and they'll route things appropriately. 

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    Christopher Banks

    Thank you Keith. 

    I initially went down the path with the Outlook zap. The inability to send as an attachment is sort of a big deal. We used to send weblinks in our proposals and my sales team was overwhelmingly against it. They wanted attachments.

    So I tried gmail. Initially, I tried linking the "reply to" and display names back to the original submitter of the estimate in Canvas. No matter how many different ways I try to fiddle with the settings, the resulting email always appears as if it is coming from the gmail account that is linked in the zap. This is a deal killer for me. That said, if you reply to the resulting email, it DOES send back to the original submitter. My next thought was to create a central gmail account that has a bunch of aliases, all tied to our sales reps emails. Not sure if that will work or if it is another rabbit hole leading nowhere. All that said, the gmail approach certainly allows the custom email to be created exactly how I want it, except for who the sender appears to be. 

    Also, do you have any experience with dispatching looped data from one canvas app to another that has looped data in it? 

    Thank you!

    Chris 

     

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