Send a template from an automation

The bridge between Email Studio (where templates are designed) and Automation Rules (where sends are triggered). Once a template is in Active status with category Automation, you can pick it as an action in any rule.

Before you start

• The template exists in Settings → Email Studio with status Active and category Automation (create one)
• A working automation rule, or willingness to create one (see Create your first automation)
• Admin permissions on Automation Rules

Steps

1. Open the rule in Settings → Automation Rules.
2. In the relevant branch, click Add action.
3. Pick Send Email Studio template.
4. Configure the action:
   Template — pick the template by name from the dropdown. Only Active Automation-category templates appear.
   Version (optional) — pick a specific template version, or leave on latest to always use whatever’s current.
   Language strategy — pick one:
   Match the inbox language — use the language attached to the email channel that the conversation came in on. Falls back to the template’s default language if no translation exists. This is the right default for customer-facing emails.
   Pick a specific language — explicitly set a language code (e.g. en, no, de). Use when you need a deterministic language regardless of the inbox.
5. Save the action. Save the rule.

How merge tags resolve

The action runs in the conversation context that triggered the rule. So:

• {{contact.name}} resolves to the conversation’s contact’s name
• {{conversation.human_id}} resolves to the triggering conversation’s ID
• {{custom_fields.<key>}} resolves to the triggering record’s custom field value

If a merge tag references something that’s not in scope (e.g. a case field on a conversation-triggered rule), the merge tag renders empty.

The X-Email-Template header

Every email sent via this action carries an X-Email-Template header containing the template’s ID. Useful for:

• Diagnostics — when investigating “which rule sent this email?”, grep the delivery logs by template ID
• Filtering at the customer’s mail provider — if you want to surface a specific category of email
• Analytics on email performance — counting sends per template

What this action is good for

• Confirmation emails (see the recipe)
• Follow-ups some time after a conversation closes
• Escalation notifications when an SLA is at risk
• Digest emails summarizing case state to internal stakeholders

What this action is NOT for

• Marketing emails. Atender’s email send is for transactional / support content. Marketing belongs in a marketing tool with proper unsubscribe management.
• One-off agent replies. If an agent is composing a personalized response to a single conversation, they should write inline, not invoke a template. Templates are for repeatable, predictable sends.

Verify it worked

1. Build the rule with the action set up.
2. Trigger the rule deliberately on a test conversation.
3. Check the conversation timeline — the outbound message should appear with the rendered template content.
4. Open Manual Executions for the rule. The action should show success and include the delivery details.
5. Open the recipient’s inbox (your test inbox). The email should have arrived in the language matching the email channel’s configured language.

Troubleshooting

• Symptom: Template doesn’t appear in the picker. Fix: Status must be Active (not Draft or Archived) and category must be Automation. Check both in Settings → Email Studio.
• Symptom: Email goes out in English even though the inbox is configured for another language. Fix: Either the template doesn’t have a translation for that language (it falls back to default — which is likely English), or the channel’s language attribute is unset. Both are configurable.
• Symptom: Merge tags appear as literal {{...}} in the delivered email. Fix: Path is wrong, or the merge tag references a field that’s not in the trigger’s context. See Use merge tags for personalization.

See also

• Confirmation email recipe
• What are Automations?
• Confirmation emails recipe (Automations)