Error Handling
Part of Marketing automation error handling
Detecting failed workflow actions before they accumulate
Set up an exception view, ownership and alert rules that reveal failed marketing workflow actions before unresolved records build up.
Detect failed workflow actions by monitoring the affected action and record, assigning an owner, and reviewing unresolved exceptions on a schedule that suits the campaign.
Failure notifications alone are incomplete: some failures do not generate an individual alert. Check the platform’s own issue or monitoring view alongside your inbox.
Decide what needs attention
Prioritise actions whose failure would leave someone waiting or create a misleading campaign state: a promised message, an update needed by the next step, an audience removal or a hand-off to another system.
For each action, define the expected result and the latest useful time to detect a problem.
Watch three separate signals:
- New exceptions:
- which action failed, for which record and when?
- Unresolved exceptions:
- which records still need a decision after any retry?
- Missing activity:
- did an expected trigger or scheduled run appear at all?
A failed-run history cannot reveal a trigger that never fired. Compare expected starts with observed runs using the trigger or schedule evidence available in your setup.
Interpret the run state
HubSpot’s automation issues view lets eligible users review workflow automation issues and affected records. HubSpot distinguishes errors caused by how the workflow is set up from errors caused by enrolled records, and you can mark an issue Fixed, Ignored or Deferred.
Mark an exception resolved only after checking what happened to the record, rather than relying on a dashboard label.
Power Automate sends per-run emails for recognised failures with a specific fix, subject to a 28-day cooldown after an alert for the same flow. If the system cannot identify a specific fix, no per-run alert email is sent.
Its Monitor experience in the Power Platform admin centre tracks failures across flows and environments. An operator watching only per-run emails may miss failures where no specific fix is identified; a weekly failure digest summarises all flow failures across environments over the past week.
Monitoring failure signals across platforms
- HubSpotDistinguishes setup vs record-related errors; allows marking issues as Fixed, Ignored or Deferred
- Power AutomateSends per-run emails only for identifiable fixes (28-day cooldown); weekly digest available in admin centre
- ZapierReplay feature enables troubleshooting; custom error handling can be set up for specific workflows
Keep an exception register
Record the workflow, action, record reference, first failure, latest attempt, status, owner and next review time. Group repeated failures by cause, but preserve the affected-record list: repairing a connection does not establish that every missed action later completed.
Choose escalation from the action’s impact and useful response window. Name a backup owner and a route for urgent stops. Close an exception when the destination confirms the action or an authorised operator records a deliberate cancellation.
Treat timeouts carefully. An uncertain outcome needs a destination check before another attempt.
