Disclosure: I work at Skyfall Labs, an official Zoho Partner, so I have a commercial interest. The facts below are from Zoho's own help pages, linked at the end; advice is labelled as advice. Originally published on skyfallhq.net.
Leads go cold when follow-up depends on someone remembering. Cadences are Zoho CRM's feature for sequenced follow-up. This post sets out what Zoho's help pages say about them.
What Cadences are
Per Zoho, Cadences are module-specific sequences of follow-ups, by email, call, task or WhatsApp, that adapt to how the recipient responds, and records can be un-enrolled automatically once the targeted response is reached. Zoho's FAQ distinguishes them from workflow rules: Cadences handle multi-step sequential follow-up over time, workflow rules handle single condition-based actions. Cadences do not make calls for you; the rep is shown a reminder to call manually.
Editions and limits
Zoho's page gives limits rather than a feature-by-edition list. Per module, Standard allows 20 cadences with 10 active, Professional 40 with 20 active, Enterprise 60 with 30 active and Ultimate 70 with 50 active. The maximum combined follow-ups per cadence is 18, 40, 70 and 90 respectively. Up to 10,000 records can be enrolled in one action.
Users need the Cadences Enrollment and Manage Automation permissions to access Cadences.
Setting one up, per Zoho
- Go to Setup, Automation, Cadences and click Create Cadence.
- Enter a name, select the module, and choose the audience: manual enrollment or one or more custom views, optionally enrolling new records that join the view.
- Configure the follow-ups. Follow-up 1 can fire immediately on enrollment or after a set duration; later follow-ups are triggered by the outcome of the previous step, such as an email being opened or clicked, a task changing status, or a call being completed.
- Choose how records leave the cadence, then publish it.
Exit conditions
Zoho lists four ways to un-enroll records automatically: the record no longer meets the custom view criteria, a follow-up outcome matches a criterion, a specific date is reached, or a record field meets a condition such as a Lead Status change. Without the custom-view setting, records keep going through the sequence after they stop matching the view. Zoho says some of these un-enrollment options are being rolled out in phases and may not be available to all accounts. If un-enrollment and a follow-up trigger happen together, un-enrollment wins.
Pitfalls Zoho documents
- Follow-ups cannot be removed once created, except the last one; to change a cadence substantially, clone it and rebuild. Cloning works only within the same module.
- Republishing an edited follow-up stops and un-enrolls records already scheduled for that step.
- Replies from public email domains such as Gmail used as the sender are not captured, because Cadences append a viazohocrm domain.
- If an email open is not detected, the email stays Sent and steps triggered by an open do not run.
- When a customer unsubscribes, emails stop but calls and tasks continue.
- Call follow-ups are not supported for Deals, and WhatsApp needs WhatsApp Business enabled and uses pre-approved templates only.
- Zoho's FAQ says cadences cannot currently be started from a workflow, Blueprint or Command Center.
- Cadence emails count against workflow email limits, which vary by edition.
Designing follow-up that works (practical advice)
This section is advice from experience, not vendor documentation.
- Map the follow-up you want by hand first: who, which channel, how many days apart, and what counts as a response.
- Start with a short sequence for one lead source and extend it only once it behaves as expected.
- Make sure sender addresses are on your own domain so replies are detected.
- Define the exit rule up front so a converted or lost record does not keep receiving follow-ups.
- Review the cadence reports Zoho provides before adding more steps.
