Engagements are how you reach out to your advocates. There are two kinds:
Missions: things that ask the advocate to take an action. Leave a review, share a post, hop on a reference call, fill out a survey, upload a video.
Send Update: one-way broadcasts. No action required. Just info you're pushing out, like a newsletter, product announcement, or heads-up.
Both live under the Engagements tab in your hub. This guide covers when to use each, how to set them up, and the workarounds for the gaps we haven't filled yet.
Quick start (TLDR)
If you need the advocate to DO something (review, video, survey response, reference call, etc.) → use a Mission.
If you just need to TELL them something (newsletter, announcement, FYI) → use Send Update.
Both can be triggered manually OR auto-fire when an advocate enters a segment.
Send Update: the one-way broadcast
Send Update is your "no action required" engagement type. Think of it like a broadcast email or in-hub announcement. You write the message, pick the audience, send it.
When to use Send Update
Newsletters and program digests
Product update or release announcements
Event invites (webinars, advisory boards, customer dinners)
Holiday or thank-you notes
Heads-up before a big mission drops
Re-engagement nudges to inactive advocates
Anything you'd normally send from your marketing tool
How to use it
Go to Engagements and click New Engagement
Pick Send Update as the type
Write your title and body copy
Pick the segment you want to send to
Send it (or schedule it for later)
Auto-trigger Send Update on segment entry
This is the powerful pattern most people miss: you can attach a Send Update to a segment so it auto-fires whenever a new advocate enters that segment.
Use cases:
New member welcome: when someone joins, they hit a "New Members" segment and auto-get a welcome Send Update
Lifecycle nudges: advocate hasn't engaged in 30 days, hits an "Inactive" segment, auto-gets a re-engagement Send Update
Tier upgrades: advocate hits 1000 points, enters the "Gold Tier" segment, auto-gets a congrats Send Update
Campaign-specific: advocate gets added to a "Beta Testers" segment via CSV, auto-gets a kickoff Send Update
To set this up: create your segment first, then create the Send Update engagement and target the segment. Anyone who enters the segment going forward will trigger the send.
Heads up
Send Update only supports a title and a description right now. No rich HTML body. If you need a fully designed email with custom layout, the workaround is to build a Mission Created template that's styled the way you want and run a custom Mission instead. Or wait for us to expand Send Update.
Missions: the action-required engagement
Missions are everything else. If the advocate has to actually do something to complete it, it's a Mission.
Mission types
We support 9 mission types. Pick the one that matches what you're asking the advocate to do.
Type | What it does | Best for |
Complete Survey | Multi-question form | Onboarding, NPS, feedback, opt-ins |
Custom Task | Open-ended ask with description + submission | Anything that doesn't fit another type |
Submit Media | Upload an image or doc | Photo proofs, branded assets, swag pics |
Submit Review | Submit a review on G2, Gartner, etc. | Review programs |
Record Video | Record a video testimonial in-browser | Video case studies, social clips |
Social Post | Share content on social | LinkedIn, X, Instagram amplification |
Be a Reference | Opt in to be a customer reference | Reference pool building |
Reference Call | Take a sales call with a prospect | Active reference workflow |
Heads up: Survey and Custom Task are the most flexible types. When nothing else fits, one of these usually works. For example, referrals don't have a dedicated mission type yet, so most customers run them as a Survey mission asking "who are you referring? (name + email)".
Mission frequency
Frequency | What it means |
Once only | Set an expiration date. Advocate can complete it once. Disappears after the end date. |
Once only, never expires | No time limit. Always available. Each advocate can complete it once and only once. (This is what we used to call Evergreen.) |
Once per week | Resets every week. Same mission re-publishes so each advocate can complete it again next cycle. |
Once per month | Resets every month. Same as above, monthly cadence. |
Once per 90 days | Resets quarterly. Same as above, quarterly cadence. |
When does the reset clock start? The clock starts the moment the mission first goes Live. So if you launch a "Once per 90 days" mission on April 15, it resets on July 15, October 15, and so on.
Does the mission get cloned each cycle? No. It's the exact same mission that re-publishes. Same title, same description, same image, same points. If you want different messaging each cycle, edit the mission between cycles or create separate "Once only" missions instead.
Common gotcha with "Once only, never expires". If you change a mission from never-expires to a fixed-date frequency, the start date can sometimes get set way out in the future and the mission will look like it "hasn't started yet". If that happens, ping our team and we'll fix the start date.
Triggers: Instant vs Scheduled vs Segment-based
Three ways to control when a mission goes out.
Instant: launches the moment you click Launch. Goes to whoever matches your audience right now.
Segment-based / Trigger-based: when you target a Specific Segment, the mission auto-fires the moment a new advocate enters that segment. Same pattern as Send Update segment triggers. This is how onboarding missions work. Set up a segment that all new members flow into, attach a mission to it, and every new member gets the mission as soon as they join.
Scheduled: pick a future date and time. The mission goes out then.
Rewards: Points, Direct Reward, or No Recognition
Every mission has a reward type. Three options:
Points: advocate earns X points on completion. Points stack toward levels, leaderboards, and reward redemptions. This is the default for most programs.
Direct Reward: advocate gets a specific reward (gift card, swag, etc.) on completion. Points are NOT deducted. This is your "surprise and delight" lever for high-value asks like reference calls or video testimonials.
No Recognition: no points, no rewards. Useful for things like onboarding surveys, opt-in collection, or any "just need this info" mission where you don't want to incentivize a specific behavior.
A mission can give Points OR a Direct Reward, never both. Pick one.
Approval rules
After an advocate submits a mission, you decide how it gets approved.
Manual approval: every submission lands in a review queue. An admin reviews and approves or declines. Best for high-stakes missions where you want to verify the work (reviews, video testimonials, social posts).
Auto-approve (instant): every submission auto-approves and points are awarded immediately. Best for trusted segments or low-stakes missions (surveys, opt-ins).
Segment-based auto-approval: only auto-approve if the advocate meets a criteria threshold. Most common pattern is "auto-approve if advocate has more than X points" or "auto-approve if advocate is in segment Y".
The onboarding mission auto-approval workaround
If you want NEW members to get auto-approval (so they can complete onboarding missions instantly without admin review), but they haven't earned any points yet, the threshold approach won't work.
The workaround:
Create a segment called "Auto-approval for missions"
Set the rule to: join date is later than the day before launch
All new members will flow into this segment when they join
Use this segment for auto-approval on your onboarding missions
This lets new members pass through immediately without meeting a point or mission threshold.
Auto-approve everything regardless of criteria
If you want to auto-approve EVERY submission with no conditions, set the points threshold rule to "greater than or equal to 0". Every advocate qualifies.
Mission Declined feedback
When an admin declines a submission, whatever they enter in the Declined Feedback field gets sent to the advocate as the reason. The advocate can then resubmit. This pulls into the Mission Declined email template as {{customText}}.
Budget caps
You can set a max budget on any mission so it auto-stops paying out after a certain spend.
How it works. Set the cap as a dollar amount (or points equivalent) when creating the mission. Once the cap is reached, the mission stops showing to new advocates. Anyone who already started the mission can still complete it. The mission stays "Live" but is hidden from view.
Heads up. The admin doesn't get a notification when the cap hits today (we're working on this). The mission doesn't fully unpublish, it just hides. If you want to bring it back, raise the cap or remove it.
Setting up a mission: the basics
When you create a new mission, you'll fill out three core fields up top:
Mission Title: a clear, action-oriented name like "Leave a G2 review" or "Share your story on LinkedIn"
Featured Image: the image that shows on the mission card in the hub
Then you'll pick a mission type which unlocks type-specific options below (Social Post Details, Survey questions, Reference settings, etc.)
Target Audience: who should see this mission?
Three options:
Anyone: open to everyone, including non-members. Best for top-of-funnel asks, public review submissions, or any mission where you want to capture people who aren't yet in your advocate program.
Registered only: only people in your advocate program can see and complete it. Default for most missions.
Specific segment: target a defined segment (by points, behavior, SFDC field, application response, etc.). This is how you do onboarding flows, tier-specific asks, and lifecycle campaigns.
How would you like to notify people?
Every mission gets a shareable magic link automatically. That link works whether you turn notifications on or off. So the question here is just: do you also want us to auto-notify advocates?
Yes, send notifications: we'll automatically email (or Slack, etc.) the targeted audience when the mission goes live. Uses your Mission Created template.
No, just give me the link: no notifications fire. You get the magic link and share it manually wherever makes sense (your own newsletter, a 1:1 email, a Slack post, a landing page).
Why this matters: the "just give me the link" option is great when you want full control over the channel. For example, if you're running a campaign through your own marketing automation tool, you don't need us to also email the advocate. You just want the link to drop into your own send.
Mission visibility recap
Putting it together, here's how an advocate can encounter a mission:
Hub: shows up in the advocate's hub if they're a registered member and they match the audience rules
Email / Slack notification: if you turned notifications on, they get a ping with a click-through to the mission
Magic link: the universal link you can drop anywhere. Works for non-members too if your audience is set to "Anyone"
Common gotchas
Why does my mission still show as Active after the end date? There's an off-by-one timezone bug we patched recently where end dates can show for ~1 extra day in the advocate's local timezone. Submissions are correctly blocked server-side, so even if an advocate tries to submit, they'll get a "mission has expired" error. The mission disappears from the hub the next day.
My mission shows as a Draft but advocates can still see it. Known edge case we've patched. If you see it again, ping our team with the mission link.
My "Once only, never expires" mission was completed twice by the same advocate. Old bug, fixed. Each advocate can now only submit once.
My mission says "has not started yet" but I set the start date to today. This usually happens after switching a mission from "Once only, never expires" to a fixed-date frequency. Ping our team to fix the date in the database.
I scheduled a mission and it didn't go out at the scheduled time. Best practice is to schedule missions a few minutes earlier than you actually want them out, and check in to confirm they fired. We're improving this.
I want to edit a question on a mission but some testers already completed it. Once anyone submits, you can't edit the question. Workaround: delete the test profiles' submissions, then edit. Or duplicate the mission, fix the question, and launch the new one.
My missions aren't showing in the hub even though I have active engagements. Known issue we've patched. If you see it again, ping our team.
My mission approvals aren't sticking (they keep re-appearing as pending after I approve). Real bug we've seen on review missions specifically. Ping our team with the mission link if it happens.
Can I delete an engagement? Yes, but for missions it will remove all submissions and points awarded. If you just want to stop it from running, set it to Inactive instead.
Can I limit how many times an Evergreen mission can be completed total (across all advocates)? Use a budget cap. Once the cap is hit, the mission stops showing.
Best practices
Use Send Update for newsletters and broadcasts, not Missions. A common mistake is creating a Custom Task mission with no actual task just to push out an announcement. That asks the advocate to "complete" something they don't need to do. Use Send Update instead.
Set a clear deadline even on "Once only, never expires" missions by using budget caps. This keeps the program feeling fresh.
Use segment-based auto-approval for onboarding missions so new members get instant gratification.
Use Direct Rewards for your highest-value asks (references, videos, customer stories). The "surprise and delight" effect is way bigger than just adding more points.
Don't stack two review sites in one Review mission. Each mission can only be completed once per advocate, so they only get points once. If you want them to review on G2 AND Gartner, run two separate Review missions so they earn points twice.
Use Survey missions as a workaround when no other type fits. Need referrals? Survey. Need a quick poll? Survey. Need an opt-in? Survey. They're the swiss army knife.
Use the magic link when you want to control the channel. Set notifications to "No, just give me the link" when you're running the campaign through your own newsletter, email tool, or a landing page. You don't need us to double-send.
Wire Send Update into your segment lifecycle. New member joins → Send Update welcome. Advocate hits Gold Tier → Send Update congrats. Advocate goes inactive → Send Update re-engagement. This is the single best way to feel like you're "always on" without manual work.
Need help?
Drop a message in your dedicated Slack channel and our team will jump in.