How flows work in crowdEngage
Read this first. Every message you send in crowdEngage is built into a flow. Once you understand this, the rest is easy!
The Four Words That Matter
- Event — the show itself. e.g Matilda,
- Performance — one showing of that event. A run of Matilda might have 30 performances. (In some screens the product calls this an instance — same thing.)
- Flow — the full set of messages sent to ticket holders for an individual performance.
A flow might be: a pre-show SMS the day before, a reminder two hours before doors, a post-show survey email the next morning. - Step — one message inside a flow. One SMS is a step. One email is a step. A flow is just a stack of steps, each with its own send time and its own recipients.
The One Rule of Flows.
Each performance carries exactly one flow. Not one message — one flow, which holds as many steps as you want. So if a performance needs a pre-show text and a post-show email, both live as steps inside the same flow. You don't attach two flows to cover two messages; you add two steps to one flow.
This is why the "add another flow" instinct is wrong. Build the flow once with every step it needs, then attach that flow to the performances it applies to.
Maybe you have one flow for music events and another flow for kids shows. This way you know when you add on a flow to an event it's exactly how you want it.
The Default Flow
crowdEngage attaches a Default Flow to every performance automatically, so nothing is ever left unassigned. Out of the box it's empty — empty means nothing sends.
Two ways to use it:
- Leave it empty and attach a specific flow to each event you actually want to message. This is the safer default — you're never sending until you deliberately attach something.
- Add steps to the Default Flow if you have a genuinely standard message that should go to every performance across the venue. Only do this once you're ready for it to send, because the moment you add a step, every performance carrying the Default Flow is live. If you're using this, make sure you remove the flow from any performance you don't want to send to!
How a Message Actually Sends to Your Customer
The full path, start to finish:
- Build a flow and add steps to it — an SMS, an email, or both.
- Set each step's send time relative to the performance start (e.g. 24 hours before, 2 hours before, 1 hour after).
- Set each step's recipients with the Criteria Builder — everyone by default, or a targeted group.
- Attach the flow to the performances it applies to, on the Events page.
- crowdEngage sends each step at its scheduled time. Done.