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Trigger a Process by Email

Learn how to trigger an automation process run by email.

You don’t have to trigger every automation manually. Kognitos lets you trigger automations by email — a powerful way to automate tasks like onboarding or invoice processing.

How Email Triggers Work

A unique email address is generated for every Kognitos process. An email sent to the address of the process will trigger a run and pass the contents of the email to the automation, including:

  • Subject line

  • Sender address

  • Body (plain text or HTML)

  • Attachments (files, spreadsheets, images, etc.)

How to Trigger a Process by Email

1

Navigate to Processes

Navigate to the Processes tab via the left sidebar.

2

Select a Process

Click on the Process you want to trigger by email.

3

Open Email Trigger Settings

Click the menu ⋮ button on the right, then select Configure Email Trigger.

4

Configure Permissions

Choose who can trigger this Process by email:

  • Department Members: Only members of the agent can trigger this process by email. This is the default for new processes. Note: For processes created before July 3, 2025, the default setting is "Anyone".

  • Restricted: Only users listed under "People with permission to trigger" can trigger the process by email.

  • Anyone: Anyone can trigger this process by email, including non-Kognitos members.

People with permission to trigger lets you specify additional users who can trigger the Process by email, regardless of the general permission setting.

5

Copy the Email Address

Copy the Email Trigger address.

6

Save Your Changes

Click Done to save your configuration changes.

7

Trigger a Process Run by Email

Emails sent to the email address from Step 5 will initiate a new process run.

Troubleshooting

If your process isn’t triggering by email as expected:

  1. Ensure the sender has adequate permissions to trigger the process by email.

  2. Double-check the trigger email address — did the email go to the correct address?

  3. If you're using an email forwarding rule, verify that it's active and correctly configured.

  4. Confirm the automation is a published process. Email triggers do not work with Playground automations.

Best Practices

Managing Trigger Permissions

Use the most restrictive permission setting that meets your needs:

  • Members: Best for internal-only workflows.

  • Restricted: Ideal when only a specific set of users should trigger the Process.

  • Anyone: Use with caution & ensure the automation includes validation steps to prevent misuse.

Validate Incoming Emails

Add logic in your automation to validate the email content, such as checking for specific subject lines, senders, or attachments. For example, to access the attachments of an email that triggers a process, we would write:

get the email's attachments
process each attachment as follows
    ...

This statement grabs each attachment from the email in order to take further action. You can also use the following phrases to get details about the email to use in your automation:

  • get the email's text

  • get the email's sender

  • get the email's recipients

  • get the email's date

  • get the email's subject

  • get the email's hyperlinks

  • get the email's attachments

  • get the email's body as text

  • get the email's body as html

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