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New labeled email triggering on all replies even with filter

  • 2 August 2022
  • 4 replies
  • 319 views

Hello, I've seen parts of this issue described in the community forums but not my problem exactly so I'm stuck on what to do. 

My goal with this Zap is to create a new row in a google sheet for every new thread that I label with "SW". I originally tried doing this with the "new labeled email" trigger, but the issue was that a new row would be created for every reply on that thread, whereas I only wanted one row per email thread. 

Then I tried the "New thread" trigger with the "SW" label specified. The issue there was that the emails do not come in with any standardized format that allows them to automatically be labeled with "SW". So I go through and manually label the relevant new threads as they come in. But they then don't show up on my spreadsheet. I think this is because by the time I label them, they are no longer "new threads." It's not realistic for me to label them immediately upon arrival because I get many in the middle of the night or weekends. 

So then I went back to the "New labeled email" trigger and put in a search step with a filter. For every new email that I label with "SW" I have the Zap search the google sheet to see if the Thread ID from the email is already in the spreadsheet. Then the filter specifies to only continue to the next step (which is create a new spreadsheet row) if the search step returns a finding of false. In theory I thought this should work, but for some reason it is still triggering on every reply and adding in multiple rows with the same Thread ID. 

Sorry for the lengthy explanation but if anyone has any ideas on what I can do here, I would very much appreciate it!

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Best answer by Troy Tessalone 4 August 2022, 16:31

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4 replies

Userlevel 7
Badge +14

Hi @IDKAYBIF22 

Might be best to check your Zap Run history details to better understand why your Search step and/or Filter step are not behaving as you expect: https://zapier.com/app/history/

 

You may also want to try this Zap trigger: Gmail - New Starred Email

 

Userlevel 3
Badge +3

Hey there @IDKAYBIF22 

+1 to what @Troy Tessalone said, it does sound like New Starred Email could be a neat solution.

 

That said, I would be happy to take a look at your Filter to see if we can see any issues which could explain the unwanted Zap runs.

 

Could you provide a screenshot of that step so we can see what you are seeing?

Hey Paul and Troy,

 

Thanks for the response! I also send this over to Zapier support and I think they just identified the problem. After creating the initial search step that goes right before the filter, I added in more columns to my google sheet. Although the search step was still showing it was mapping to the correct column (Thread ID) it must have still been mapping to where that column was previously located before I added in more columns. I cleared out the selection on “Lookup column” on that step and re-selected and so far things seem to be working!

Userlevel 7
Badge +14

@IDKAYBIF22

Yes, there are many things to be aware of when using GSheets in Zaps as documented in the help articles: https://zapier.com/apps/google-sheets/help

 

Making the following changes to your spreadsheet while the Zap is turned on can cause errors:

  • Deleting existing rows or columns.
  • Adding rows anywhere other than to the bottom of your sheet.
  • Resorting the sheet.
  • Renaming/adding/rearranging columns.
  • Renaming the sheet.
  • Filtering the sheet.

 

If you need to make any of those changes to your Google Sheet, turn your Zap off while you work on the spreadsheet, and then turn it back on again.