It is launch day, traffic is flowing and something is not working - forms not firing, texts not sending, bookings not landing. The next 60 minutes decide whether this is a story you tell later or a client you lose. This is the triage order we run when the call comes in.
Minutes 0 to 10: scope it
One contact or every contact? One channel or all of them? Your account or the platform? Check the status page, run one test contact through the failing path yourself and read the last five entries in the automation execution log.
Resist the urge to fix before you scope. Half of launch-day disasters get worse because someone changed a second thing before understanding the first.
Minutes 10 to 30: stop the bleeding
Pause what is actively hurting: the workflow double-charging, the campaign texting a broken link. Leave everything merely suspicious running - pausing healthy automations mid-campaign creates its own disaster.
If ads are driving traffic into a broken funnel, pause spend before you debug. The money you save funds a calm diagnosis.
Minutes 30 to 60: fix or escalate, and communicate
If the cause is in your build - a bad trigger, a deleted field, a misfired publish - fix it and rerun the affected contacts. If it looks like platform behavior, open a ticket with your reproduction steps and timeline, then decide whether outside help gets you live faster.
Either way, message the client before they message you. What broke, what you did, what is next, in three sentences. Clients forgive incidents. They do not forgive silence.
Key takeaways
- Scope before touching anything - one thing changed at a time
- Pause only what actively hurts, and ad spend before debugging
- Message the client before they message you
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