How to set up a Journey

  • Updated

If you’re still using Skio's Automations feature, you’ll soon be asked to migrate to Journeys. Learn how to migrate from Automations to Journeys in our help doc here.

Before you start

Review the Understanding Skio Journeys guide to learn the basics and how each node works.

How do I set up a Journey?

Step 1: Create a New Journey

  1. In your Skio dashboard, go to Features > Journeys in the lefthand menu.
  2. Click Create new journey in the top right corner.
  3. At the top of the page, name your Journey.

Choose something descriptive for the name, like “Trial size to full size,” so it’s easy to understand what the Journey does at a glance.

You’ll find available nodes in the left-hand menu: triggers, conditions, and actions. Drag and drop any node onto the workspace to start building your Journey.

Step 2: Add a Trigger node

  1. From the left-hand menu, choose a Trigger to start the Journey, then drag it into the workspace. You can start a Journey after an order, after a product is added, after the next manual billing date change, or after you receive an SMS keyword (if you have the Postscript integration enabled).
  2. When you add a trigger, you can customize how and when the Journey starts:
  • Add a delay to start the Journey a set number of hours or days after the trigger.
  • Apply trigger filters to control when the Journey begins. Click Edit trigger filter(s) to set conditions.

See the full list of available filters in the Understanding Skio Journeys guide.

Step 3: Add a Condition node

  1. From the left-hand menu, choose a Condition to decide how orders that trigger the Journey should be filtered, then drag it into the workspace.
  2. Click Edit condition(s).
  3. Click + AND condition to add your first condition. You can use + AND/+ OR conditions to further refine which customers will go down the path.
  4. Once complete, click Apply condition(s) at the bottom of the condition modal.

See the full list of available conditions in the Understanding Skio Journeys guide.

Step 4: Add an Action node

Choose an Action from the left-hand menu to define what happens when a condition is met (or not met) then drag it into the workspace. See the full list of available actions in the Understanding Skio Journeys guide.

You don’t need to add an action to both paths (condition met/condition not met). For example, you might only “Add Product” if the subscription is active and do nothing if it’s not. You can also stack multiple actions to run in sequence or at the same time.

Step 5: Save and activate

When you’re done configuring your Journey, click Save in the top-right corner to finalize it.

If you edit an active Journey, saving will create a new version. Each version has its own analytics, so you can track changes and compare performance over time.

This is an example of what a configured Journey looks like. This journey adds a product to the customer’s order one day after their third subscription order but only if they have the VIP customer tag. If they don’t, nothing happens.

How can I analyze and improve my Journey?

Journeys include built-in tools to help you monitor performance and fine-tune your workflows. Once a Journey is saved, reopening it will display three tabs at the top for managing and reviewing your setup: Flow builder, Debug mode, and Analytics mode. 

What is the Flow builder?

The Flow builder is the workspace where you can edit the Journey’s flow, just like when you first created it.

What is Debug mode in Journeys?

In Debug mode, you can view detailed logs of the most recent Journey a specific subscription has gone through. This helps you confirm when actions were triggered, or troubleshoot if something didn’t work as expected.

To look up a Journey log:

  1. Go to the Skio dashboard > Customer Management.
  2. Search for the customer.
  3. On their profile, under Active subscriptions, copy the Subscription ID.
  4. Paste the ID into the Journey viewer to see the full path the subscription followed.

What is Analytics mode in Journeys?

In Analytics mode, you can track the performance of each node in the Journey. Each rate shows how many subscriptions experience a specific outcome as they move through your Journey.

For Trigger and Condition nodes:

  • Pass rate: Subscriptions that pass the condition check and continue through the Journey.
  • Miss rate: Subscriptions that don’t meet the condition and stop at that point in the flow.

For Action nodes:

  • Success rate: Subscriptions where the action runs and completes as expected (for example, a product is swapped or a tag is added).
  • Skip rate: The action is bypassed because it doesn't apply to the subscription (for example, we are trying to swap Product A for B, but the subscription doesn’t have Product A, so the action is skipped).
  • Fail rate: The action attempts to run but fails due to an error (for example, network issues, Shopify server errors, or a bug in the logic).

These analytics help you refine your Journeys, ensuring they perform as intended and allowing you to identify any areas for improvement.

Journeys FAQ

  • You can only link one Journey to each keyword. If you attempt to assign a keyword that's already in use, you'll receive an error message. Each keyword must be unique across all your SMS keyword Journeys.
  • Yes. The system automatically detects exact keyword matches in any SMS message, regardless of where the keyword appears in the conversation or what other text is included. The Journey will trigger as long as the exact keyword is present.
  • Nothing happens automatically. The customer won't receive any response unless you've separately configured an auto-reply or default response in Postscript for unrecognized keywords.
  • Yes. The message that customers receive depends on how you configure your Journey's message blocks. Whatever content you set up at the end of your keyword Journey—whether it's a welcome message, discount code, or product information—will be automatically sent to customers who use that keyword.
  • Yes, Journeys is designed to manage subscriptions at any stage, including recurring orders and changes made to the subscription over time.

  • In the trigger node, add a trigger filter for Order number. From the dropdown, scroll down and select Divisible by.

    Skio trigger node showing 'Divisible by' filter for order number.

    For example, if you set Divisible By = 3, the action will trigger on orders 3, 6, 9, 12, and so on. You can also add an offset to control when the pattern starts (i.e. Divisible By = 3, Offset = 2 → triggers on orders 2, 5, 8, 11, etc.)

    Example use case: Give a 10% discount starting on the second order, then again every 3rd order after that.

  • No, SMS messages sent through Journeys cannot be promotional. They must be transactional or informational to comply with regulations.
  • Each time you save changes to an active Journey, a new version is created. This resets the analytics, allowing you to compare how different versions perform over time.

  • You can trigger Klaviyo events directly from Skio Journeys to power marketing automation based on subscription behavior.

    To set it up:

    1. Go to Account > Integrations in Skio.
    2. In the Klaviyo integration, register for the Journey Notification Triggered event. See the full list of available event metrics in our help doc here.

    When a Journey reaches a Notification action, Skio will send the Journey Notification Triggered event to Klaviyo. This event includes a journey{NotificationName} property based on what you set in the Notification node.

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