Does anyone know how to create an automation rule to assign a SendBoard "Contact" when a new card?
Asked by David Ponder:

If anyone can give more clarity would be helpful so I'm not wasting my time chasing that cannot be done (yet) ;-)

Better still can someone point me to a solution, a worked exampled would be super helpful.

From what I can see when I try and configure an Automation to assign a contact, Trello does not consider or provision for alternate contact options resulting from Power-Ups that have 'Contact' options embedded that also can appear on the card like SENDBOARD.

To clarify the point further and picture being worth a thousand words, hopefully this explains it well, pls let me know if I should elaborate on anything further.

Thanks

David.

![Pasted_Image_12_03_23__16_38.jpg](/t5/image/serverpage/image-id/245111i336C5808CA12DE14/image-size/large?v=v2&px=999 "Pasted_Image_12_03_23__16_38.jpg")


Answers:
author: Christl_Email for Trello
body: Hi [@David Ponder](/t5/user/viewprofilepage/user-id/5155797)

Christl from [SendBoard](https://www.sendboard.com/) here ?

A reference number is added to a card once a contact is assigned - this is how we know it's a "SendBoard card". So you should see a reference once a contact is assigned to the card.

This is done automatically when an email is received (and a card created on the board). In your example when a card is created manually, you will need to assign a contact.

We have a nifty shortcut **@assign** you can use to quickly assign a contact. If you comment *`@assign Bob Jones <bob@example.com>`* on the card, the contact is automatically assigned with the correct name and email address.

This can be used in automation rules to automatically assign a contact. Check out this section in our article for an example: [Use Butler Automation and Custom Fields to assign a contact](https://help.sendboard.com/en/articles/5649106-manage-your-email-contacts-in-trello#h_ab9e031a56)

The question would however be where the name and email address is taken from, to include in your rule. In the example in the article it is taken from a custom field.

I hope that helps and that I have understood your question.

comments: author: David Ponder
body: Hi [@Christl_Email for Trello](/t5/user/viewprofilepage/user-id/4784982)

Many thanks for the reply and detailed answer.

Basically it looks good and I tried it but there's a slight catch, you need to be on the SendBoard - Pro Plan to allow you to access/use Bulter Automation features.

![SendBoard Bot msg - You need to be on the PRO Plan to access this feature..greenshot.png](https://community.atlassian.com/t5/image/serverpage/image-id/245238i08B18C7BFD0DD1E2/image-size/large?v=v2&px=999 "SendBoard Bot msg - You need to be on the PRO Plan to access this feature..greenshot.png")

So I will give it some thought as to what will be my best course of action, then decide whether I upgrade temporarily to test it out to see it will do what I want/expect.

Then either keep it and stay on the Pro Plan or downgrade to the Essential Plan (I assume I can downgrade my plan based on my needs?)

Thanks again for the great reply, it was very helpful and informative.

Kind regards

David.


author: Christl_Email for Trello
body: That's correct, you'll need to subscribe to the Pro plan to use SendBoard with automations <https://www.sendboard.com/pricing>

You can upgrade/downgrade at any time based on your needs.

Feel free to reach out to us at hello@sendboard.com if you have any questions about the plans/ features, if you want to trial the Pro plan or if we can help with anything else ?


author: David Ponder
body: Thanks [@Christl_Email for Trello](/t5/user/viewprofilepage/user-id/4784982)

I will keep this in mind for later, I see the pricing plan is reasonable I just don't think I need it right now but will check it out in the future.

Many thanks.

Kind regards

David


author: Dreamsuite Mike
body: Hi David

If I have interpreted your correctly, when an email comes in from Sendboard, you want to take the email address from the sendboard email and then assign the user associated with it.   
You should take a look at this article:

[Save email details to Trello Custom Fields \| Help Center (sendboard.com)](https://help.sendboard.com/en/articles/3542667-save-email-details-to-trello-custom-fields)

Wildcard 7 is the 'To' wildcard. So if an email is sent to that recipient, you can have a rules like:

1)

```
when a comment containing, "? [Email]({*}) From **{*}<{*}>**{*}------{*}------{*}To: {*} is posted to a card by @SendboardbotXXX, post comment "{wildcard7}?
```

2)

```
when a comment starting with dmponder13@email.com is posted to a card, add the member @DP13
```

comments: author: David Ponder
body: Hi [@Dreamsuite Mike](/t5/user/viewprofilepage/user-id/5153180)

Many thanks for taking the time to reply.

Apologies as I think I didn't clarify my previous answer well (or was it that I did not fully understand your explanation).

It is not when an ++email comes in++ but when I ++create a new card on the board++.

I want to have a rule that assigns the SendBoard contact and not the standard Trello Board Contact.

For additional clarification my Trello Board email and SendBoard email are the same but I think they behave differently or rather have different attributes and are recognised differently.

For example you add a SendBoard contact and you get the Reference ID (i.e. REFnn) which is what I want as I have a board (actually most boards) will have emails attached.

So I am trying to make it so that REFnn's are created automatically.

Let me know if I've explained myself, clarified the issue better?

Thank once again for your efforts to help.


author: Dreamsuite Mike
body: Okay, thanks for the clarification. I understand what you are trying to do and on the surface I don't think it is possible. Can I ask what you are looking to achieve from this?


author: David Ponder
body: Hi [@Dreamsuite Mike](/t5/user/viewprofilepage/user-id/5153180)

Many thanks for your efforts to help me out and understand this.

What I am looking to achieve is to have Trello assign my SendBoard contact as I create new cards, say for example I'm brain dumping a bunch of ideas and issue.

Or especially in the case of my Personal board, I email alot of people but I don't often start with an email, I do a braindump of topics / issues etc to capture everything, this is typically my start point.

I would like the SendBoard REF## added automatically as it is likely I will then go off and email someone. Then I will want to attach that email to the related topic card on my Trello board.

I was also just thinking now that I could also experiment and try creating a card for a topic.

Then send the email to the board, then try doing a **MERGE** and see what happens. Essentially I am not concerned what the REF## is as long as I have one, maybe this might be an alternative solution. I will give some feedback on this.

Essentially I just wanted to automate and remove several repetitive steps (I know I'm lazy, 4-5 extra clicks to assign a SendBoard contact ;-).

But also see that [@Christl_Email for Trello](/t5/user/viewprofilepage/user-id/4784982) has replied with some details of interests so I will go and explore that.


Tags: sendboard