How to Send Emails with Gately: Campaigns, Transactional & Automation
Email is still the most direct channel you have to reach your audience. Whether you're welcoming a new member, announcing a product update, or sending a password reset — the quality and reliability of your email infrastructure matters.
Gately handles all of it in one place. You don't need a separate email tool, a third-party SMTP provider, or a complex integration. Email is built into the platform — for campaigns, transactional messages, and automated workflows.
This guide covers everything: setting up your sender identity, sending one-off campaigns with the Code Editor or Visual Builder, configuring transactional emails, and automating sequences with Workflows.
Step 1: Set Up Your Sender Identity
Before sending anything, configure how your emails appear to recipients. Go to Settings → Email in your dashboard.
| Setting | What it does |
|---|---|
| Sender Name | The display name recipients see in their inbox (e.g. "Acme Team") |
| Reply-To Email | Where replies land when someone hits reply |
| Custom Sending Domain | Send from your own branded subdomain — set a prefix and it activates immediately, no DNS setup required |
Step 2: Send a Campaign
Campaigns are one-off emails sent to a list of recipients — newsletters, announcements, product updates, promotions. Go to Campaigns in your sidebar and click New Campaign.
You'll be asked to choose your editor:
| Editor | Best for |
|---|---|
| Code Editor | Full HTML control, syntax highlighting, live split-pane preview, AI generation |
| Visual Builder | Rich-text composition, slash commands, context-aware style panel — no HTML required |
Code Editor
The Code Editor is a split-pane interface — your HTML on the left, a live rendered preview on the right. Toggle between desktop and mobile preview to see exactly how your email renders.
| Feature | Description |
|---|---|
| AI Generate | Generates a complete HTML email from your campaign name and subject line |
| Personalization tags | Use {{firstName}}, {{plan}}, {{ctaUrl}} anywhere in your HTML |
| Save Template | Save your HTML as a reusable template |
| Send Test | Send a [TEST] copy to yourself before going live |
| Schedule | Queue delivery for a specific date and time |
Visual Builder
The Visual Builder is a rich-text editor with a context-aware style panel on the right. Type / anywhere to insert content blocks.
| Slash command | Inserts |
|---|---|
| /Paragraph, /Heading 1–3 | Text blocks |
| /Bullet List, /Numbered List | Lists |
| /Image | Upload or URL — hosted by Gately automatically |
| /YouTube Video | Converted to a linked thumbnail when sent |
| /Divider, /Quote | Layout elements |
The right style panel is context-aware — click any element to see its controls: body background, container width, padding, border radius, font size, text color, image dimensions, and more.
Adding Recipients and Sending
Click Add recipients to search your members and customers by name or email, or type any address directly. When ready:
| Option | What it does |
|---|---|
| Send Now | Delivers immediately to all recipients |
| Schedule | Queues delivery for a specific date and time |
| Send Test | Sends a [TEST] copy to check rendering first |
Step 3: Transactional Emails
Transactional emails are system-triggered messages — welcome emails, password resets, magic links, email verification, and subscription confirmations. Gately sends these automatically as part of your authentication and membership flows.
To customize them, go to Settings → Email → Transactional. You can edit the subject and body of each email type, apply your saved templates, and preview before saving.
Step 4: Automate with Workflows
Campaigns are great for one-off sends. For automated sequences, use Workflows. The Send Email action supports the same templates and personalization tags, triggered by any event in your project.
| Trigger | Email action |
|---|---|
| Member signs up | Send welcome email immediately |
| Wait 3 days | Send onboarding tips |
| Payment succeeds | Send receipt and access instructions |
| Subscription cancelled | Send win-back email after 24 hours |
| Form submitted | Send confirmation to the submitter |
Email Tracking and Analytics
Every campaign includes automatic open and click tracking. After sending, open the campaign details page to see:
| Metric | How it's tracked |
|---|---|
| Total Sent + delivery rate | Confirmed delivery to recipient server |
| Opened + open rate | 1×1 transparent tracking pixel |
| Clicked + click-through rate | Redirect links that log the click before forwarding |
| Bounced + bounce rate | Failed delivery responses |
Email Templates
Save any email as a reusable template from either editor. Templates remember which editor created them. Access them at Campaigns → Templates and reuse them in both campaigns and Workflows.
Deliverability: Built for the Inbox, Not the Spam Folder
Sending an email is easy. Getting it into the inbox is the hard part. Gately's email infrastructure is built on Cloudflare's Email Service — the same network that powers a significant portion of global internet traffic — giving you enterprise-grade deliverability from day one.
| Deliverability feature | What it means for you |
|---|---|
| SPF | Authorizes Gately's servers to send on your behalf — prevents spoofing |
| DKIM | Cryptographically signs every email — proves it hasn't been tampered with |
| DMARC | Tells receiving servers what to do if SPF/DKIM fail — protects your domain reputation |
| Custom sending domain | Emails come from your domain, not a shared pool — your reputation stays yours |
| Dedicated infrastructure | Your sends don't share IP reputation with other senders |
All DNS records — MX, SPF, DKIM, DMARC — are automatically configured when you set up your sending domain. You don't need to touch your DNS manually.
Spam Score Checking
Before your email reaches a recipient, Gately runs it through spam signal checks. Common spam triggers are flagged so you can fix them before sending:
- Excessive use of spam trigger words (FREE, URGENT, CLICK NOW)
- Missing or broken unsubscribe links
- Image-to-text ratio imbalance
- Broken HTML structure
- Missing plain-text version
The result: 99.9% deliverability for well-formed emails sent to engaged recipients. Your emails land in the inbox, not the promotions tab or spam folder.
Bounce Handling
Hard bounces (invalid addresses) are automatically suppressed from future sends. Soft bounces (temporary failures) are retried. Your sender reputation is protected automatically — no manual list cleaning required.
What Makes Gately Email Different
| Feature | Gately | Typical email tools |
|---|---|---|
| Built into your membership platform | ✅ Native | ❌ Separate tool |
| Sends from your own domain | ✅ Custom subdomain | ⚠️ Shared domain or complex setup |
| Open & click tracking | ✅ Automatic | ✅ Available |
| SPF / DKIM / DMARC | ✅ Auto-configured | ⚠️ Manual DNS setup |
| Transactional + campaigns | ✅ Both in one place | ❌ Usually separate products |
| Workflow automation | ✅ Built-in triggers | ⚠️ Requires Zapier or similar |
| AI email generation | ✅ One click | ❌ Not available |
| Member-aware sending | ✅ Search your members directly | ❌ Requires list import/export |
What's Coming Next
Gately's email system is actively expanding. Here's what's on the roadmap:
- Audience segments — filter recipients by plan, signup date, activity, or custom fields and save them as reusable segments
- A/B testing — test subject lines and content variants to find what resonates
- Unsubscribe management — one-click unsubscribe with automatic suppression lists
- Email sequences — multi-step drip campaigns with delays and conditions, built directly in the campaign editor
- Inbox preview — see how your email renders across Gmail, Outlook, Apple Mail, and mobile before sending
- Custom domain sending — full custom domain support (not just subdomains) for enterprise users
- Spam score report — detailed pre-send report with actionable fixes
We're building email infrastructure that grows with your business — from your first welcome email to millions of sends. Every improvement ships directly into the same dashboard you already use.