Actions, searches and multi-step Zaps

After the trigger you can add as many action steps as you need. They run in order, top to bottom, every time the Zap runs.

Example: when a new order arrives in your shop,

• 1. Trigger: New Order in Shopify
• 2. Action: Create Contact in your email marketing app
• 3. Action: Add Row in Google Sheets
• 4. Action: Send Channel Message in Slack

Actions come in a few flavours:

• Create actions add something new (a contact, a task, a row).
• Update actions change something that already exists, so they need to know which record (usually by its ID, a unique number or code the app gives each record).
• Search actions ("Find Contact", "Lookup Spreadsheet Row") look for an existing record. Many have an option to create the record if nothing is found, which prevents duplicates.

A common pattern is search, then update: find the customer by email, then update that customer. Without the search you would create a new duplicate customer every time.

Each step needs its own app connection and its own settings. A Zap can hold up to 100 steps, but long Zaps are harder to read and test. If a group of steps is reused by several Zaps, later lessons show how to package it as a Sub-Zap.

Every action step that succeeds normally counts as one task. Built-in logic steps such as filters and paths do not.