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Pro plan. The manual trigger, signals, LinkedIn events and Kerux events are on every plan. Incoming webhooks (trigger URLs), Kerux forms and Facebook / Instagram lead forms are part of Pro and Agency (and the free trial). On Starter, the ones you already have keep adding contacts; adding a new one needs Pro. See Plans and billing.
A campaign’s trigger is what starts it. The first box of the Builder (the start box) has two halves: Contacts, to add contacts yourself, and Trigger. The kinds of trigger:
  • Manual trigger: the campaign starts with the contacts in its Contacts box, when you click Start on it (see Start a campaign with the manual trigger) or add contacts and click Launch. This is how every campaign works even without a trigger; choosing it just makes it clear on the start box.
  • Signal: people who react to or comment on a LinkedIn post or company page enter the campaign. See Signals.
  • Kerux event: a contact is added, tagged or changes, a date like a birthday, a schedule, a click on the campaign’s link, a score change, a contact replying on any channel, a note or task (added, done or due), a change to the do-not-contact list, a contact seeing or reacting to one of your LinkedIn messages, a contact opening or clicking one of your campaign emails, a meeting booked or cancelled, a call recorded or its summary ready, one of your LinkedIn accounts needing attention, or a WhatsApp reply (SMS replies are coming soon). In the panel, each one is its own line in its group. See Start a campaign from what happens in Kerux.
  • Incoming webhook (API): another app (Clay, Zapier, Make, n8n…) sends contacts to a link. See Trigger URLs and forms.
  • Form submission: a Kerux form, survey or quiz; whoever fills it in enters the campaign. See Surveys and quizzes.
  • LinkedIn event: someone connects, writes, follows, invites or views the profile of one of your LinkedIn accounts.
  • Facebook / Instagram lead form: someone fills in one of your lead ad forms, sent through Zapier or Make or from a Facebook Page you connected. See Facebook and Instagram lead ads.

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Add a trigger

1

Open the campaign

Click Campaigns and open the campaign. It opens on the Builder.
2

Click + Add on the Trigger half

On the start box, click + Add under Trigger. The Add a trigger panel opens on the right, under the campaign’s header (its tabs and Ask AI stay usable). (Or open the Triggers tab and click + Add.)
3

Find the trigger

Type in Search triggers (for example tag, reply or birthday), or scroll the list. Every trigger is one line with its mark, grouped by Contact, LinkedIn, Messages and replies, Meetings, Pipeline and scores, Notes and tasks, Forms and webhooks, Signals, Schedule and dates and Account. Click a group’s name to fold it. SMS reply received and Facebook / Instagram lead form are grayed out and marked Coming soon in this panel: they can’t be picked there yet.
4

Fill in its settings

Click the trigger. Its own screen opens in the same panel: its name and one line at the top, then its settings right away. Fill in what it asks and click its button (Use manual trigger, Add, Add trigger or Turn on). At the bottom, a few lines say what the trigger does, with Learn more for the full article. Back returns to the list, with your search kept.
Once added, the start box shows the trigger with its mark and its name (and, for most triggers, one line about it). The … button on the trigger’s header has:
  • Change: opens the panel straight on that trigger’s own screen. Change its settings and save, or click Back to pick another trigger. The new one replaces the old one once it is saved. The manual trigger has no settings, so Change opens the list of triggers.
  • Remove: stops it. Kerux always asks first and says what happens: the contacts already in keep going, and new people stop coming in through that trigger.
The manual trigger also shows a small Auto-start switch and, when contacts are waiting in the Contacts box, Start with how many, for example Start (12). See below.

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Start a campaign with the manual trigger

1

Click Start

On the start box, click Start (12) on the manual trigger (or its play mark; Start shows only while contacts are waiting). The Start this campaign window asks one question, for example Start this campaign for 12 contacts in the Contacts box? The Contacts box holds the people waiting for this campaign, for example the ones a signal found before it was launched.
2

Fix anything that blocks it

Kerux checks the campaign for those contacts right away. If something must be fixed first (an account that needs to reconnect, a step missing something), it is listed with its Fix button and Start now stays off until it is fixed. Otherwise it says Everything is ready.
3

Click Start now

The contacts enter the first step, within the campaign’s sending hours. A message confirms how many started (for example 12 contacts started) and the counters on the steps update. If the campaign was never launched, Start now also launches it with the steps you see.
If the Contacts box is empty, the window says Add contacts first and offers + Add contacts (the same as + Add contacts on the start box), to add them by hand, from a list or a CSV.

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Auto-start new contacts

The manual trigger has a switch, Auto-start new contacts (shown as Auto-start on the start box, and in full on its screen in the trigger panel). It is saved as soon as you switch it.
  • On (the default): every contact you add to a campaign that is already running starts right away. With nobody waiting, the start box shows only the switch.
  • Off: contacts you add to a running campaign wait in the Contacts box, and the start box shows Start with how many are waiting, for example Start (12). Each one’s history says Waiting in the Contacts box for Start, and the campaign’s Contacts tab lists them under Waiting for Start. Click Start to start them.
Switching it never starts or stops anyone by itself: contacts already waiting keep waiting until you click Start, and contacts already in the campaign keep going. It applies to contacts you add (by hand, from a list or a file, and through the API); other triggers, like signals or Kerux events, keep starting people as before. A campaign that was never launched starts when you launch it, whatever the switch says.

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Removing the manual trigger while contacts wait

If contacts are waiting in the Contacts box when you pick Remove in the manual trigger’s … menu (or replace it with another trigger with Change), Kerux asks first, for example 12 contacts are waiting. Start them or remove them?
  • Start them: they start the same way as with Start (Kerux checks the campaign first), then the manual trigger is removed. If something blocks the start, nothing changes and Open Start shows what to fix.
  • Remove them: they are taken out of this campaign (they stay in your contacts, and each one’s history says Removed from the Contacts box), then the manual trigger is removed.
  • Cancel: nothing changes.
Through the API, turning manual_trigger off while contacts wait needs waiting_leads_action (start or remove); without it the request is refused with WAITING_LEADS_NEED_CHOICE.
Any member who can edit can add the manual trigger, a signal or a Kerux event. Trigger URLs, forms, LinkedIn events and lead forms are for workspace owners and admins (the panel shows them grayed out, marked Admins, for other members).

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More than one trigger

A campaign can start from several triggers, for example a signal and a Kerux event. Once the first one is added, a grayed, dashed box Trigger 2 appears to the right of the start box: click + Add in it to add another one from the same panel. Each trigger you add shows as its own box, with Change and Remove in its … menu, and the next empty box (Trigger 3, and so on) comes after them. Every trigger feeds the same first step. Someone who comes in through two triggers (or that you also add yourself) is in the campaign once; with Allow re-entry on in Settings, they can go through again after their last run ended.

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The Triggers tab

Every campaign has a Triggers tab next to Builder and Contacts. It is grayed out while the campaign has no trigger, but you can still open it to add the first one. It lists:
  • Manual trigger, when you chose it, with Remove.
  • Signals: the post or page, the LinkedIn account that reads it, the last read, how many contacts it added, the next read and the list they go into. Use Pause, Resume or Remove, or All signals for the overview in Contacts > Signals.
  • LinkedIn events: each event, its accounts, and whether the ideal customer check is on. Turn off stops it.
  • Kerux events: each event and what it listens to (for example the tag, the field, the date, the schedule or the link). Trigger links have Copy variable; Remove stops it.
  • Lead forms: the Facebook Page or Any page (every contact that comes in), Every form of this Page (Every form with Any page) or the forms you picked, when it was last used, and Remove.
  • Trigger URLs and forms: the link, when it was last used, Copy link, Open and QR code (forms, see QR code for a form) and Remove this trigger.
A campaign can have up to 5 trigger URLs and forms, up to 5 LinkedIn events, up to 5 lead form triggers and up to 10 Kerux events.

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Add contacts

+ Add contacts on the Contacts half opens a panel on the right: From a list (a list you imported or saved), From a segment, Pick contacts, Add contacts by hand, All my contacts or Upload a new file. Lists a signal made for itself (“Signals: …”) aren’t offered there: those people come in through the signal, the campaign’s trigger.

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Start a campaign from LinkedIn events

In the LinkedIn group of the panel, pick the event (in the Triggers tab: choose LinkedIn event, then When this happens):
  • New connection: someone becomes a 1st-degree connection of the account. People who connected because a running campaign invited them stay in that campaign and don’t start this one.
  • Message from someone new: someone who isn’t a contact yet writes to the account.
  • New follower: someone starts following the account.
  • Invitation received: someone sends the account an invitation. Their note is available to the campaign’s steps as {{trigger.invitation_note}}, and every invitation also shows in the inbox’s Invitations tab. Kerux checks every 15 minutes from 7 AM to 10 PM in the account’s time zone (every 30 minutes on weekends), once an hour from 10 PM to midnight, and once every 2 hours from midnight to 7 AM.
  • Profile view: someone views the account’s profile. Kerux checks on the same schedule as invitations received. LinkedIn shows the full list of viewers only with Premium. Anonymous or private viewers (“LinkedIn member”, no name) are never added as contacts and don’t start the campaign; every viewer who does becomes a contact with their LinkedIn profile link, so {{contact.linkedin_url}} is never empty for them.
New connections and followers arrive as LinkedIn reports them (sometimes up to 6 hours later). See How fast Kerux sees LinkedIn activity. On the start box and in the Triggers tab, an Invitation received or Profile view trigger shows when Kerux last checked and when it checks next. To look right away, click Check now on it in the Triggers tab (3 times a day per trigger). Then choose On these accounts (All LinkedIn accounts or Only these accounts) and, if you want, Check them against your ideal customer profile first (set it up in Contacts > Signals). Click Turn on. A person who isn’t a contact yet is added as a contact (with their name when LinkedIn gives it) and enters the campaign. Each event starts the campaign once per person. When you turn on invitations or profile views, the people already there are only remembered: only new ones start the campaign. Mentions, events and groups aren’t available.

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A campaign that isn’t launched yet

You can add triggers to a campaign before you launch it. People they find wait in the campaign’s Contacts tab under Waiting for launch, with what they did and which signal brought them. They enter the campaign when you turn it on.

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Common problems

These are for workspace owners and admins (marked Admins in the panel). Ask one of them, or add a signal.
Type part of its name in Search triggers: every word you type must start a word of the trigger’s name, its line or its group. Clear the search to see every trigger again.
Remove one you no longer use in the Triggers tab, then add the new one.
If the campaign was never launched, they are under Waiting for launch in the Contacts tab. Turn the campaign on and they enter it.
Lists a signal made for itself are left out of Add contacts: the signal is how those people enter. Pick the signal as the campaign’s trigger instead, or move the people into a list of your own in Contacts.