How Workflows Work

Every time someone submits a survey response, zensurveys checks your active workflows:

1. Does this response match the workflow's filters? (score range, specific answers, properties)

2. If yes → execute the action (send email, post to Slack, create a Salesforce Case, etc.)

You can create multiple workflows per survey, each with different filters and destinations.

Supported Integrations

Communication

CRM & Support

Marketing

Automation Platforms

Social Media

Publish customer testimonials or feedback highlights automatically via Ayrshare:

Creating a Workflow

Step 1: Choose Your Survey and Channel

1. Open a survey in zensurveys

2. Go to the Workflows tab

3. Click Create Workflow

4. Name it descriptively (e.g., "Detractor alerts to Slack")

5. Select the notification channel

Step 2: Set Filters

Control which responses trigger this workflow:

• By score: Only detractors (0–6), passives (7–8), or promoters (9–10)

• By question response: Specific answers to specific questions

• By response property: Metadata like region, product, or customer tier

• By topic: Topics that zensurveys automatically identifies from the written feedback (e.g., "delivery speed," "product quality")

All filters use AND logic — every condition must be true. Within a single filter, values use OR logic.

Example: Score is 0–6 AND Region is "EMEA" or "APAC" → triggers the workflow.

Step 3: Configure the Action

Configuration varies by channel:

Email

• Add one or more recipient email addresses

• Optionally customize the email body

Slack / Webhooks / Zapier

• Paste your webhook URL

• Choose a payload format:

  • Text — Human-readable summary (best for Slack)

  • JSON — Structured data with all response fields and metadata

  • Custom — Your own template using placeholders like {{survey_name}}, {{response.fieldName}}

• Optionally add custom headers (e.g., authorization tokens)

• Optionally set a secret key for webhook signature verification (HMAC-SHA256)

Salesforce

• Authenticate via OAuth

• Map survey questions to Salesforce Case fields

• See the dedicated Salesforce guide for full setup instructions

Zendesk

• Enter your Zendesk subdomain, admin email, and API key

• Tickets are created automatically with survey data and tagged with the survey name

Emarsys

• Enter your API key and secret key

• Choose an action:

  • Create contact — Push response data as a new or updated contact

  • Trigger event — Fire an Emarsys automation event

  • Add to segment — Add the respondent to a specific segment (contact list)

• Map survey fields to Emarsys fields

• Specify the identifier field (e.g., Email, Customer ID)

Social Media

• Enter your Ayrshare API key and profile key

• Write a post template using placeholders: {{nps_score}}, {{nps_feedback}}, {{customer_name}}

• Optionally add hashtags and configure link shortening

• We recommend using score-based filters (promoters only, 9–10) to ensure only positive feedback is published

Step 4: Activate

Toggle the workflow to Enabled. Submit a test response to verify it works.

Webhook Payload Examples

Text Format (Slack-compatible)

*Customer Satisfaction Survey*

*How would you rate us?*
9

*What could we improve?*
Everything was great, fast delivery!

_Answered | Mar 10, 2026_

JSON Format

{
  "event": "survey_response",
  "timestamp": "2026-03-10T14:30:00+00:00",
  "data": {
    "responses": {
      "nps_rating": 9,
      "comment": "Everything was great, fast delivery!"
    },
    "responses_labeled": {
      "How would you rate us?": 9,
      "What could we improve?": "Everything was great, fast delivery!"
    }
  },
  "metadata": {
    "survey_id": "abc-123",
    "survey_name": "Customer Satisfaction Survey"
  }
}

Custom Format

Use placeholders in your own template:

{
  "source": "zensurveys",
  "score": "{{response.nps_rating}}",
  "feedback": "{{response.comment}}",
  "survey": "{{survey_name}}"
}

Webhook Security

If your endpoint needs to verify that requests come from zensurveys:

1. Set a secret key in the workflow configuration

2. zensurveys signs every payload with HMAC-SHA256 using that key

3. The signature is included in the X-Webhook-Signature header

4. On your server, compute the signature from the request body and compare

Retry Behavior

• Webhooks: Up to 3 retries with increasing wait times (1s, 2s, 4s)

• Email: Single attempt; failures are logged

• Salesforce/Zendesk: Retries with automatic token refresh if needed

• Social media: Single attempt via Ayrshare

If a destination is persistently unreachable, the workflow is paused and your team is notified.

Tips and Best Practices

• Start with email alerts for quick wins — no external setup required

• Use filters to avoid notification fatigue. Alerting on every response gets noisy fast

• Name workflows descriptively so you can tell them apart at a glance

• Test with a real response before going live — use a test recipient for your filters

• Use JSON format for Zapier or custom integrations; use text format for Slack

• Set a webhook secret for any endpoint that processes data automatically

• One workflow per use case is cleaner than one workflow trying to do everything

FAQ

Can I have multiple workflows on the same survey? Yes. Each workflow runs independently with its own filters and destination.

Do workflows trigger on partial responses? No. Workflows only fire when a customer completes and submits the survey.

What if I change my survey after setting up workflows? Workflows continue to work. If you remove a question that was used in a filter or field mapping, that specific filter/mapping is skipped — other conditions still apply.

Can I test a workflow without submitting a real response? For Salesforce, you can use the Test Mapping feature to preview how a sample response would populate a Case. For other channels, submit a test response through the survey.