Automated drafts

Automations create newsletter drafts on a schedule. Use them for recurring issues like a Monday roundup or Friday digest.

Automated drafts are saved to Issues. HeyNews does not send or publish them for you.

What automations do

Each automation can:

  • Pick eligible stories with Smart Select
  • Write the draft with the AI Writer you choose
  • Create a subject line and preview text
  • Save the finished draft to Issues
  • Notify you when the draft is ready or when something needs attention

Stories marked Summary only are left out. There is too little in one for an AI Writer to work from, so that call stays with you: add it by hand in Compose if you want it in an issue.

Creating an automation

  1. Go to Automations in the sidebar.
  2. Click New Automation.
  3. Choose a ready AI Writer.
  4. Select one or more Issue Days. Use Weekdays for Monday through Friday, or choose any combination such as Tuesday and Thursday.
  5. Choose whether HeyNews should create each draft on the Issue Day or up to six days before it.
  6. Set the time, timezone, and a cadence from every week to every four weeks.
  7. Check the next five draft and Issue Day pairs in the preview.
  8. Set the minimum and maximum number of stories.
  9. Choose how far back HeyNews should look for stories.
  10. Save the automation.

For schedules longer than one week, Starts anchors the cadence. For example, a two-week schedule that starts on Monday repeats from that week's selected Issue Days. The schedule continues until you pause or delete it.

HeyNews keeps the draft run and issue day separate. If you ask for a Friday issue one day early, the draft runs on Thursday but your AI Writer is told that the issue is for Friday. The calculation follows the timezone saved on the automation, including clock changes.

Story rules

Automations work best when your sources are bringing in fresh stories. You can control:

  • Minimum stories: the fewest stories needed before HeyNews writes the draft
  • Maximum stories: the most stories HeyNews should include
  • Date window: how far back HeyNews should look
  • Previously used stories: whether older stories can be reused

HeyNews picks from the eligible stories available when the automation runs. Standard automations do not lock drafts to one fixed source list. Managed Company Newsletter automations may stay tied to the sources approved during setup. If there are not enough matching stories, HeyNews skips the run and tells you what needs attention instead of creating a weak draft.

Reviewing automated drafts

When an automation finishes, the draft appears in Issues with an Automated badge. New drafts also show a New badge.

Open the draft, review it, edit anything you want, then copy it into your email platform when it is ready.

Notifications

HeyNews can notify you by email and in the in-app notification inbox when:

  • An automated draft is ready
  • An automation needs more stories or a settings change

You can turn automated draft emails on or off from Account settings > Notifications. In-app notifications still appear so you can see what happened later.

Pausing or editing an automation

From the Automations page, you can pause, resume, edit, create the next draft now, or delete an automation. Create next draft now creates a draft for the next configured Issue Day without moving future dates.

Pause an automation when you want to keep the setup but stop scheduled runs for a while. Delete it when you no longer need that schedule.

HeyNews does not create missed Issue Days later. If a temporary service problem interrupts a draft that started on time, HeyNews retries every five minutes for up to 30 minutes. Only one draft can be active for an automation at a time. Pausing or deleting the automation cancels an unfinished retry.