You are correct. Unfortunately, automations can not trigger any apps/blocks. It’s one of the many disconnects in the Airtable platform.

For an automated routine, you can either use the “send email” functionality of automations (which doesn’t format line breaks properly, and also includes Airtable advertising in the emails), or you can write your own JavaScript routine. Otherwise, you’d need to use Integromat or Zapier to automate emails.

However, you can manually click on a button field to open the SendGrid app for you, and here’s the cool thing: It will automatically populate the SendGrid app with only the record you just clicked on. Then you can manually click on the “Send” button. So this is a manual process, but it still works “relatively well”.

The only problem here is that it might require up to 7 clicks to accomplish this (depending on how wide your apps panel is, and whether it’s showing or not): You have to click the button to open the SendGrid app, then you might have to click on a button to make the SendGrid app go full screen (or widen the apps panel), then you have to click on a button to “preview” the email, then you have to click on a button to “Send” the email, then you have to click on the “Done” button after it has finished sending, then you have to click on a button to make the SendGrid app exit full screen mode, then you have to click on a button to hide the apps sidebar.

Hi Scott,

Thanks for your thorough explanation, at least I know two things

1- To stop pulling my hair out about this

2- The button workaround is in fact beautiful, and does the job for me, I never thought it would open the app ONLY for that record ! Many many thanks

@Esfandiar_Khoram

You’re welcome! Glad I could help!

Yeah, it’s a little hidden trick that most people don’t know about!

If you don’t mind, could you please mark my comment above as the solution to your question? This will help other people who have a similar question in the future.

And for anybody who needs to hire an Airtable consultant, feel free to reach out to me through my website at scottworld.com.