Primary Workflow Triggers for Campus Automation
Triggers are the starting points of every Student Journey Workflow—the specific events or conditions that automatically enroll a campus member into an automated sequence. Understanding triggers is essential because choosing the wrong trigger means your carefully crafted workflow never reaches the right people at the right time, while choosing the right trigger ensures your automation feels timely, relevant, and helpful.
Think of triggers as the "if" in an "if-then" statement. If a campus member joins your campus, then send a welcome sequence. If someone completes a course, then send a celebration communication and suggest the next course. If a member hasn’t logged in for 30 days, then send a re-engagement message. The trigger defines the "if"—the moment your workflow springs into action.
Why This Matters for Your Campus
The difference between ineffective automation and automation that feels like magic is usually trigger selection. Send a course completion celebration too early, and students feel confused. Send a re-engagement communication to active members, and they feel annoyed. Send a welcome sequence to someone who’s been a member for months, and you damage credibility.
Good trigger strategy means your campus members receive the right messages at moments when they’re most likely to take action. A welcome communication sent immediately after signup catches members while they’re excited and engaged. A cart recovery communication sent one hour after abandonment catches people before they’ve completely moved on. A birthday message sent on the actual birthday feels personal and timely.
Mastering triggers also prevents common automation mistakes. Overlapping triggers can cause members to receive duplicate communications. Missing trigger conditions can spam your entire campus with messages meant for a small segment. Understanding how triggers work—and how they interact with conditions and filters—keeps your automation helpful rather than harmful.
Member Enrollment Triggers
The most fundamental trigger category relates to how members join your campus and opt in to communications. These triggers capture new members at their moment of highest engagement and begin building the relationship immediately.
Member Subscribed to Communications fires when someone joins your campus and opts in to receive campus communications. This is your primary welcome trigger. Every campus should have at least one workflow starting with this trigger—it’s your first impression and sets the tone for the entire student relationship.
This trigger typically captures new members regardless of how they joined—whether they purchased a course, signed up for a free account, or were added manually. The universality makes it perfect for general welcome sequences, campus orientation, and introducing core resources.
Member Added to Specific Segment fires when a campus member gets placed into a particular segment or list. Segments group members by characteristics—perhaps "Premium Members," "Course Creators," or "Completed Foundations Course." This trigger lets you create targeted workflows for specific groups.
Use this trigger when different member types need different experiences. Someone in your "New Teachers" segment needs a different onboarding than someone in your "Experienced Educators" segment. When they’re added to their respective segments (manually or via another workflow action), segment-specific workflows begin automatically.
Member Added to Specific Tag is similar to segment triggers but often more granular. Tags typically represent specific interests, behaviors, or states—like "Interested in Advanced Training," "Attended Webinar," or "Requested Callback." When a tag is applied (automatically via integration or manually by you), workflows can trigger.
This trigger excels for behavior-based automation. When someone clicks a specific link in a campus communication (auto-tagged by your system), trigger a follow-up workflow about that topic. When someone completes a quiz (auto-tagged with their result), trigger personalized recommendations based on the outcome.
Study Hall Activity Triggers
Study Halls are where your campus members gather, discuss, and engage with each other and your content. Activity triggers let you respond automatically to member actions within these spaces.
Member Joined Study Hall fires when a campus member joins a specific Study Hall. If you have a Study Hall dedicated to a particular course, topic, or member level, this trigger helps orient new joiners and set expectations for participation.
Use this for Study Hall-specific welcome sequences. When someone joins your "Advanced Teaching Techniques" Study Hall, automatically send the Study Hall guidelines, introduce the moderators, highlight the best recent discussions, and explain how to get the most value from the space.
Member Posted in Study Hall Feed detects when a campus member publishes content in a Study Hall’s activity feed. This trigger helps reward and encourage engagement, especially for first-time contributors who might feel nervous about participating.
Create workflows that privately thank first-time posters, highlight high-quality contributions to other members, or notify moderators when new discussions start. This trigger often includes conditions to distinguish first posts from subsequent activity, or to filter for specific content types.
Member Completed Course from Study Hall combines LMS and Study Hall triggers. If your Study Halls include associated courses, this trigger fires when members complete those courses while being part of the Study Hall. It’s perfect for graduation celebrations, next-step recommendations, and transitioning members to more advanced Study Halls.
Time-Based Triggers
Unlike event-based triggers that fire when something happens, time-based triggers fire on specific dates or after specific durations. These create scheduled touchpoints that keep your campus relationship active even when members aren’t taking obvious actions.
Specific Date and Time triggers fire once per year on a calendar date you specify—perfect for annual events, seasonal promotions, or curriculum updates. If you launch a new cohort every January 15th, set a trigger for that date to send enrollment invitations to eligible members.
The limitation of specific date triggers is they’re one-size-fits-all. Every member in your trigger audience receives the workflow on the same date, which works well for events but poorly for personalized experiences.
Member Birthday and Member Anniversary are personalized time-based triggers. Birthday triggers fire on each member’s birthday (assuming you collect birth dates). Anniversary triggers fire on the anniversary of a member joining your campus, purchasing a course, or reaching another milestone.
These triggers create powerful relationship moments. A birthday message with a special discount feels generous and personal. An anniversary message celebrating a member’s first year on campus and highlighting their progress builds emotional connection and encourages continued engagement.
Wait for Duration (Inactivity) triggers workflows after a member hasn’t performed a specific action for a set time period. For example, trigger a re-engagement sequence when a member hasn’t logged in for 30 days, or send a course completion reminder when someone enrolled but hasn’t started in 7 days.
These triggers often work best with conditions that check current status before sending communications. You don’t want to send "Haven’t seen you in 30 days!" to someone who logged in yesterday but whose inactivity period started 31 days ago.
Purchase and Cart Triggers
For course creators running a business campus, purchase-related triggers automate the sales process and improve conversion rates.
Course Added to Cart fires immediately when a campus member adds a course to their shopping cart but before they complete purchase. This trigger starts abandoned cart sequences and can also trigger immediate engagement—like offering a limited-time bonus if they complete purchase within the next hour.
The key with cart triggers is respecting the buying process. Don’t immediately bombard someone who just added an item to their cart. They might be comparison shopping, waiting for payday, or planning to complete purchase later today. Give them breathing room.
Cart Abandoned triggers after a member adds items to their cart but doesn’t complete purchase within a specified timeframe—typically 1 hour, 24 hours, or 3 days. This is your opportunity to recover the sale with reminder communications, urgency messaging, or special incentives.
Abandoned cart workflows often include multiple time-based steps. First communication after 1 hour (gentle reminder), second after 24 hours (urgency or benefit reinforcement), third after 3 days (last chance or discount offer). Each step should be conditional—stop the sequence if they complete purchase.
Course Purchased is a celebration moment and an opportunity to ensure successful course start. This trigger fires immediately upon successful payment and should begin onboarding workflows that welcome the purchaser, explain how to access their course, and set expectations for the learning experience.
Don’t let purchase triggers duplicate your general welcome trigger. Use conditions to distinguish brand new members making their first purchase from existing members purchasing additional courses. Each group needs different messaging.
Refund Requested or Payment Failed triggers help you maintain relationships during negative experiences. When a refund is requested, trigger a sequence that gathers feedback and potentially offers alternatives. When payment fails, trigger helpful troubleshooting communications rather than letting the member wonder why their access disappeared.
Course Progress Triggers
Learning management system triggers respond to student activity within your courses, enabling automation that supports the learning journey.
Enrolled in Specific Course fires when a campus member gains access to a particular course. This might happen automatically after purchase, manually when you grant access, or via another workflow action. Use this trigger for course-specific welcome sequences, prerequisite checks, or cohort coordination.
Each course can have its own enrollment workflow. Your beginner course might trigger a "What to expect" sequence, while your advanced course triggers a "Let’s set advanced learning goals" sequence. The content and tone should match the course level and subject.
Course Lesson Completed detects when a member finishes a specific lesson. This granular trigger enables encouragement at key moments—celebrating completion of difficult lessons, introducing supplementary resources after foundational lessons, or checking comprehension before members move forward.
Use conditions with lesson completion triggers to avoid spam. Trigger only on specific important lessons, or create digest-style communications that summarize progress weekly rather than celebrating every single lesson.
Course Completed is a major milestone trigger. When a member completes all lessons in a course, celebrate their achievement, request testimonials while success is fresh, offer certificates, and guide them toward the next course in their learning path.
Course completion workflows should feel like graduation ceremonies. Make members feel proud of their accomplishment, share their success with the broader campus (with permission), and help them see how this course connects to bigger goals.
Course Progress Stalled triggers when a member enrolls in a course but hasn’t completed a lesson in a specified timeframe—perhaps 7, 14, or 30 days. This trigger enables gentle re-engagement that addresses common barriers like overwhelm, confusion, or life getting in the way.
These workflows should be helpful, not guilt-inducing. Ask if the member needs support, highlight how other students overcame similar challenges, offer office hours or Q&A sessions, or suggest breaking the course into smaller goals.
Integration and Webhook Triggers
Advanced triggers connect your campus to external systems and enable sophisticated cross-platform automation.
Webhook Received triggers when an external system sends data to your campus platform via webhook. If you use external tools for webinars, payment processing, or content delivery, webhooks let those tools trigger campus workflows.
For example, when someone attends your Zoom webinar, Zoom can send a webhook to your campus platform, triggering a workflow that thanks attendees, shares the recording, and invites them to a related course. This creates seamless experiences across tools.
External Form Submitted triggers when someone completes a form on your website, landing page builder, or survey tool. If you collect leads via external forms, this trigger brings those leads into campus workflows immediately—sending welcome communications, nurturing sequences, or application processing workflows.
Payment Processor Event triggers based on events from payment platforms like Stripe or PayPal. Beyond simple purchase triggers, these might include subscription renewal, subscription cancellation, payment dispute, or dunning management for failed recurring payments.
Integration triggers require technical setup—API keys, webhook URLs, and field mapping. However, once configured, they eliminate manual data transfer and enable real-time automation across your entire tech stack.
Combining Triggers with Conditions
Triggers determine when workflows start, but conditions determine who actually proceeds through the workflow. This combination creates precise targeting.
A "Member Subscribed to Communications" trigger might start a workflow for everyone who joins your campus, but a condition immediately after checks if they purchased a premium course. Members who purchased receive one path (premium onboarding), while those who didn’t receive a different path (free tier orientation).
Similarly, a "Course Completed" trigger might start for everyone who finishes any course, but conditions branch based on which specific course they completed. Foundations course completers get routed to intermediate recommendations, while advanced course completers get routed to certification or teaching opportunities.
This trigger-plus-condition strategy keeps your workflow count manageable while still delivering personalized experiences. Instead of creating 20 separate welcome workflows for 20 different member types, create one workflow with branching conditions that route members appropriately.
What to Do Next
Now that you understand the triggers available for campus automation, explore how to use them effectively:
- Creating Student Journey Workflows and Using the Editor – Learn the visual workflow builder and see how triggers combine with actions and conditions to create complete automation
- Campus Communication Actions in Student Journey Workflows – Master crafting automated communications that trigger at the right moments and drive member engagement
- Abandoned Cart Recovery for Course Sales – Deep dive into cart abandonment triggers and recovery sequences that convert browsers into buyers
Start by identifying your highest-impact trigger opportunity. For most course creators, that’s the "Member Subscribed to Communications" trigger powering a welcome sequence. Build that workflow first, refine it based on analytics, then expand to other trigger types as you see results.