Gmail Workflows
Time to complete
15–25 minutes
Difficulty
Beginner to Intermediate
Prerequisites
Gmail connection
You'll build
Assignments that triage inboxes, draft replies, and extract data from incoming emails
Why Automate Gmail?
The Problem: Most business inboxes are a source of constant interruption. Teams manually sort, classify, and respond to emails that follow predictable patterns—inbound leads, support requests, order confirmations, approval requests. This work is repetitive, error-prone, and steals time from higher-value tasks.
The Solution: Duvo assignments can monitor your Gmail inbox and take action the moment an email arrives—routing inquiries to the right people, drafting replies in your voice, extracting structured data, and logging everything to your existing systems.
What you can achieve:
Triage incoming emails by category before you open your inbox
Draft replies to routine inquiries so you only need to review and send
Extract order numbers, lead details, or approval requests from email bodies automatically
Route likely escalations to the right person without manual handling
Keep a spreadsheet, CRM, or Slack channel updated with relevant emails
Before You Start
Make sure you have these ready:
Use Case 1: Inbox Triage
Outcome: Your inbox arrives pre-sorted. High-priority emails are flagged and forwarded. Many routine requests can be handled automatically. You spend more time on what matters.
This workflow classifies incoming emails, applies Gmail labels, and routes each category based on your SOP—reducing manual inbox triage.
Step 1: Create Your Assignment
Click "+ Create Assignment" from your dashboard
Select "Use Assignment Builder"
Step 2: Paste This SOP
Step 3: Enable the Gmail Trigger
To start a Job automatically when a new email arrives:
Open your assignment settings
Go to Triggers
Select Gmail as the trigger source
Leave the "Emails from" field empty to match any sender, or enter a specific address to filter
See Event-Driven Triggers for full setup details.
Step 4: Connect Required Integrations
Under Connections, enable:
Gmail — required
Google Sheets — for logging lead inquiries
Google Drive — for saving invoice attachments
Expected Results
Incoming emails are typically labeled and routed quickly
The "Inbound Leads" spreadsheet is updated automatically for each lead inquiry
Invoice PDFs are stored in Google Drive without manual downloads
Your inbox shows mostly emails that need your attention
Use Case 2: Drafting Replies to Common Inquiries
Outcome: You arrive at your inbox to find draft replies already written for routine emails. Drafts use your preferred tone and reference information from your files, then wait for your approval before sending.
This workflow drafts replies for you but does not send anything until you review. You stay in control; the assignment handles the writing.
Step 1: Upload Your Reference Documents
Go to Assignment Settings > Files and upload:
Product or service FAQ
Pricing information
Any email templates or brand voice guidelines
These give the assignment accurate information to draw on when composing replies.
Step 2: Paste This SOP
Step 3: Connect Required Integrations
Under Connections, enable:
Gmail — required
Slack — for escalation notifications
Expected Results
Routine inquiries typically have draft replies waiting in your Drafts shortly after arrival
Complaints are flagged in Slack and queued for your personal review
Emails requiring account context are acknowledged automatically so no customer is left waiting
You send or discard each draft — nothing goes out without your approval
Use Case 3: Extracting Data from Inbound Emails
Outcome: Order confirmations, inbound form submissions, and structured notifications can be logged to a spreadsheet as they arrive, with minimal manual entry.
This is ideal for teams receiving order emails, lead notification emails from web forms, or any recurring email with a consistent structure.
Step 1: Identify the Email Source
Find the sender address for the emails you want to process. For example:
Order confirmations from your e-commerce platform:
[email protected]Lead notifications from your website form tool:
[email protected]Booking confirmations:
[email protected]
Step 2: Paste This SOP
Adapt the fields to match the data in your emails:
Step 3: Connect Required Integrations
Under Connections, enable:
Gmail — required
Google Sheets — for the tracker spreadsheet
Slack — for high-value order alerts (optional)
Expected Results
Inbound orders and form submissions are logged to a spreadsheet automatically
High-value events trigger a Slack notification
Your tracker stays current — no batch imports, no manual entry
You have an audit trail of received emails and the data extracted from them
Tips for Better Results
Be specific about which emails to act on: Filtering to a specific sender address ("emails from [email protected]") prevents false positives and makes your assignment more reliable than filtering by keyword alone.
Start with drafts, not sends: For any workflow that replies to customers, configure the SOP to save drafts rather than send immediately. Once you're confident in the output quality, you can switch to automatic sending for low-risk categories.
Upload reference documents to Files: Assignments that draft replies produce better output when they have access to your product documentation, FAQ, pricing guide, and brand voice guidelines via Files.
Use Human-in-the-Loop for sensitive replies: For complaints, billing questions, or high-value customers, add an approval step so replies require your explicit sign-off before sending. See Human-in-the-Loop.
Improve categorization over time: If the assignment misclassifies an email, use the Learning Feature to correct it. Each correction makes future categorization more accurate.
Troubleshooting
Assignment is not picking up new emails
Check that the Gmail trigger is active in Assignment Settings > Triggers
Re-authorize the Gmail connection on the Connections page if it shows as disconnected
Gmail triggers only monitor the inbox of the account you connected. Shared inboxes and delegated accounts are not currently supported as trigger sources
Replies are going out before I can review them
Edit your SOP to use "save as a Gmail draft" instead of "send" for the relevant categories
Or add a Human-in-the-Loop approval step before any send action
Emails are being categorized incorrectly
Add more specific criteria for each category in your SOP — for example, add the exact sender domain for internal emails
Include examples of emails that belong in each category directly in your SOP
Use the Learning Feature to mark incorrect categorizations and improve over time
Data extracted from emails is incomplete or incorrect
Check whether the email format is consistent. If the sender uses different templates, add instructions to handle the variations
For HTML-heavy emails, extraction may miss values formatted as images or tables. Add a note in your SOP to extract from the plain-text version where possible
Attachments are not being saved to Google Drive
Check that the Google Drive connection is authorized on the Connections page
Make sure the folder name in your SOP exactly matches the folder name in Drive
Related Resources
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