Send email and SMS notifications to internal staff from a workflow
This article explains how to configure a Send Email or Send SMS workflow step to notify internal staff — the employee assigned to a lead — instead of the lead or guest. It also covers how to add copy recipients, understand delivery outcomes, and review credit usage.
Overview
When a lead is assigned to a sales representative, the team needs to know immediately. With internal staff notifications, you can configure a Send Email or Send SMS step to send the message to the assigned employee instead of the lead. You can also copy additional employees on the same message. This allows sales teams to stay informed about lead activity without relying on manual follow-up or separate notification tools. The internal staff option applies only to steps where you explicitly select it.
Prerequisites
AI Lead Manager must be enabled for your organization.
The Internal Staff option applies to Send Email and Send SMS nodes only. Other action nodes are not affected.
The Internal Staff option applies to Send Email and Send SMS nodes only. Other action nodes are not affected.
Key Terms
Recipient type
Determines who receives the message from a workflow step. Options are Lead / Guest or Internal Staff. Recipient type is set per node. One step can send to the lead while another step in the same workflow sends to internal staff.
Assigned employee
The employee assigned to the lead at the moment the workflow step runs. When Internal Staff is selected, this employee is always the primary recipient. The assigned employee is resolved automatically per lead when the step executes — you do not select a specific person when configuring the node.
Copy recipients
Additional employees who receive the message alongside the assigned employee. Copy recipients are optional. For email, they are added to the CC field of a single message. For SMS, each copy recipient receives an individual message.
Delivery ribbon
A coloured banner displayed in the workflow instance detail view for each staff recipient the message could not reach. A red ribbon indicates a failed delivery. An amber ribbon indicates the recipient was excluded, for example because they are not opted in to receive messages.
Configure internal staff notifications
Perform the following steps to configure:
Select Internal Staff as the recipient
In the workflow builder, open a Send Email or Send SMS node.
In the properties panel, locate the Choose recipient section at the top. Select Internal Staff. The panel expands to show the staff recipient options.
The Assigned employee option is selected automatically. The message is sent to the employee assigned to the lead when the step runs.
Configure the message template.
Click Save.
Add copy recipients
To add copy recipients:
In the Send Email or Send SMS node, select Internal Staff as the recipient.
Turn on the Send a copy to others toggle. A Select employees dropdown appears.
Search for and select employees from the dropdown. Each selected employee appears as a chip below the dropdown.
To remove a copy recipient, click the remove icon on the chip. Click Save.
Note
If you switch the recipient type back to Lead / Guest, or turn off the copy toggle, all copy recipient selections are cleared. This prevents unintended messages from being sent to stale recipients.
Supported copy recipients by workflow level
The employees available to select as copy recipients depend on the level at which the workflow is built.
Workflow level | Employees shown |
|---|---|
Center | Employees belonging to that specific center. |
Organization, Zone, or General | Employees across all centers where AI Lead Manager is enabled. |
Edge cases
No assigned employee If the lead has no assigned employee when the step runs, the assigned-employee message is not delivered and appears as a red ribbon in the instance view. Copy recipients, if any, are still messaged and the workflow continues to the next step.
Copy recipient cannot be reached If a copy recipient has no email address or mobile number on file, or is not opted in to receive messages, that recipient is skipped and appears as a red or amber ribbon respectively. All other recipients are still messaged and the workflow continues.
All staff recipients fail If all staff recipients fail to receive the message, every recipient appears as a ribbon and the step records a partial outcome. The workflow continues to the next step regardless of delivery failure.
Recipient type changed after configuration If the recipient type is switched back to Lead / Guest after copy recipients were configured, all copy selections are cleared and the step sends to the lead only.
Existing workflow steps with no recipient type Existing workflow steps with no recipient type set are treated as Lead / Guest. Existing behaviour is preserved.
Send Email and Send SMS delivery outcomes
The following table describes what happens for each combination of recipient and copy settings.
Recipient | Copy toggle | Outcome |
|---|---|---|
Lead / Guest | Not applicable | Message is sent to the lead's email address or mobile number. This is the default behaviour and is unchanged. |
Internal Staff | Off | Email: one message sent to the assigned employee. SMS: one message sent to the assigned employee. |
Internal Staff | On, employees selected | Email: one message sent with the assigned employee in the To field and all copy recipients in the CC field. SMS: individual messages sent to each recipient — one per employee. |
Internal Staff | On, no employees selected | Behaves the same as copy off. Only the assigned employee receives the message. |
Credit usage
Internal staff email and SMS notifications are sent as transactional messages. They consume your core Zenoti SMS and email credits, the same credits used for other transactional notifications.
SMS: Each recipient uses one credit. The assigned employee and each copy recipient are counted individually.
Email: The single message, including all CC recipients, counts as one email and uses one credit.
Limitations
The primary recipient for Internal Staff is always the assigned employee. Targeting by job role is not supported in this release.
The Internal Staff option applies to Send Email and Send SMS nodes only. Other action nodes are not affected.
Copy recipients must be individual employees. Group or role-based copy lists are not supported in this release.