A trigger is the moment that starts an automation. Pick one that matches what you actually mean, or the automation fires on the wrong day, the wrong file, or every file at once.
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8:43Retention Moments Against Pipeline Moments
Triggers group by why they fire. Retention triggers come around on their own, whatever you do that day: a mortgage anniversary, a birthday, an equity milestone, a credit score dipping below your line, or the renewal and refinance countdowns. Pipeline triggers fire because a file moved: a deal was created, it entered a stage, a checklist step was ticked. Pick retention for outreach that has to happen on a date regardless of pipeline activity, and pipeline for anything that should follow a file's own progress.
A new deal fires its trigger however the deal arrived: one you open yourself, one a connected system syncs in, or one your assistant opens. To leave any of them out, open the trigger and untick it under Which new deals. A book you import never fires it.
A new lead only fires its trigger when the lead reaches you on its own: through one of your lead forms, a call, a text, an email, or your own website sending it in through the BrokerPlus API. A lead you add by hand or bring in with an import does not fire it, so loading your book never starts outreach to everyone in it. A new lead also has no deal type until you pick one, so leave the deal type filter empty on a new lead trigger.
Dates Against Things That Happen
Under the hood, a trigger is either scanned or matched. A scanned trigger is raised by a daily sweep reading a date column: mortgage anniversary, birthday, equity, credit rebuild, renewal and refinance outreach, and the new year check-in all work this way, and each carries its own timing slider so you can fire before or after the anchor rather than only on it. A matched trigger fires the moment an event happens: a deal created, a stage entered, a tag added, a meeting booked. Manual follow-ups are a third kind, enrolling only when you send an outreach email by hand rather than answering any trigger you pick.
What Each Trigger Asks You to Answer
Most triggers need one more answer before they can fire. "Deal moved into a stage" needs which stage, and you can pin several if more than one route into your pipeline should count. "Checklist step ticked" needs which step. "Equity milestone" needs the loan-to-value threshold, and "Credit rebuild" needs the score line. "Deal changed" can watch every tracked field or just the ones you pick. Leaving a picker open widens the trigger rather than breaking it, so an unanswered picker isn't a mistake, it's a choice to fire on anything.
Firing Once or Every Time
Every trigger also decides how often it counts a single file. "Once" fires the first time a file qualifies and never again, right for a milestone: a deal shouldn't restart its welcome sequence for reaching the same stage twice. "Every time" fires on each qualifying change, which is what "Deal changed" defaults to, since it describes something that keeps happening rather than a one-time event.
The Moments Only Advanced Offers
Advanced Pulse is on for everyone now, so every broker can also build on moments that are really bookkeeping rather than outreach: a condition ticked off, a partner added to a file, a meeting booked, or a contact added. These usually end in a task or a tag rather than a client message. Advanced also opens "On a Deal Date" and "On a Client Date," which anchor to any date column on a file, closing, funding, maturity, a rate-hold expiry, with your own offset, instead of only the anniversaries built in.
What to Do Next
- Build Your First Automation to put a trigger to work in the canvas.
- Set Up Renewal and Refinance Outreach to see a scanned trigger's countdown in practice.
- Narrow Who an Automation Reaches once you've picked the moment.