What is preview mode?
Until live sending is enabled for your account, every set of follow ups runs in preview mode. The desk records exactly what it would send and to whom, but contacts nobody. Pending or paused automatic work stays queued. Once the sender is ready and you approve a campaign, the first five email messages can run as a controlled pilot. The platform master switch remains the final emergency stop.
Can I change the messages before they send?
Yes. Open your follow ups and edit any step before you approve it, including the wording, the subject line for emails, and the gap between steps. Required opt-out wording is validated, and every delivered email also receives a signed unsubscribe link and one-click unsubscribe headers that cannot be removed in the editor.
Someone replied and their follow ups stopped. Is that a fault?
No, that is the intended behaviour. When a contact replies, their remaining automated messages are held rather than sent, because a real conversation has started and a sequence carrying on over the top of it is the fastest way to annoy someone who was interested. Held is not cancelled: handle the reply, then use Resume follow up on that contact and the exact remaining steps continue. A campaign holding replies also will not report itself finished, so held work never disappears quietly. An opt-out is different: it suppresses the contact outright and cannot be resumed.
I uploaded my list and cannot start follow ups. Is that a fault?
Not always. A first upload that is very large, or that is missing where the contacts came from, is held for review rather than sent. Open the page where you uploaded the list: a held file is named there, with why it was flagged. Confirm it is your own list with a lawful basis to contact those people, or discard it. Follow-ups stay blocked while the hold is on. The list is not approved automatically.
How often can the same person be contacted?
There are limits across your whole account, not per set of follow ups, so they cannot be sidestepped by starting another set or adding another sender. By default a contact who has already been messaged is left alone for 30 days before a different campaign may reach them again, and no contact receives more than 6 messages in any rolling 90 days. Later steps of a sequence someone is already enrolled in are the agreed follow up and are exempt from the cooldown. Only messages actually sent count, because a preview run reached nobody. You can adjust these on your account page. If a contact is paused for this reason nothing is lost: the Desk records why, and the message goes out on its own once the cooldown or the 90 days have passed.
What can a recipient do about it?
Every email carries an unsubscribe link and the one-click unsubscribe headers that email apps use to show their own unsubscribe button. Both work without signing in, without payment, and without asking the recipient for anything further. The page they land on names your business, explains why they were contacted and links your privacy information, so they are never guessing who is writing to them. Opting out applies across your whole account immediately, not just the campaign that reached them.
What stops me from messaging the wrong people?
Independent gates protect live sending. Opted-out contacts are excluded, quiet hours and caps are enforced, an email sender must pass a real owner-only test message, the exact From domain must be authenticated, provider feedback must remain fresh, and the platform master switch must be on. A new automatic activation starts with a five-message rolling email pilot; excess queued email waits rather than sending. Any adverse signal pauses the tenant without affecting anyone else. Until every gate passes, automatic email stays queued and contacts nobody.