Manage tasks

You accomplish work through tasks in the Content Marketing Platform (CMP). Each task moves through a workflow from creation to completion.

Create a task

Click + located at the top of the page, and select Task from the dropdown. (Note: See this guide to learn the various ways to create a task).

In the task creation screen, you can add details, including Titles, Campaign, Start Date, Due Date, Workflow and Fields. You can also apply the task to the most appropriate Campaign, and select from a drop-down of workflows. Click Create to create the task.

The new task page displays and has the following tabs:

• Brief – Upload files or enter a task description, encouraging collaborative brainstorming and ensuring creators have all necessary information before beginning work (such as Key Objectives, Audiences, Pillars).
• Content – Create, revise and optimize marketing content in support of your task
• Fields – Update or add fields.
• Publishing – Click Add Channel to select distribution channels and schedule publication for an article or social content.
• Related – Add tasks that support this task or link any related activities.
• Financials – Start and edit a budget for the campaign.
• History – Provides an audit trail of interactions within the task over time. Who took what actions when is provided in an easy-to-read timeline format that corresponds with changes made in the task over time.

Create a task in a campaign

You can create tasks from each campaign and the CMP helps reduce the amount of time it takes to set up tasks and ensure they are consistently tagged. On the Activities tab of a campaign, select Add > Task.

Enter the task title, select a workflow for the task, and define a due date for the task.

The most recently created tasks are presented at the top of the list in the Activities tab of the campaign. You may view, access, and manage all content and non-content tasks your campaign depends on directly from this view. You also can get a visual display for the timing and due dates of all campaign activity by using the visual and timeline calendars in the Plan view.

Create a task from List view and Calendar

In Plan view, the List view and Calendar let you create tasks and events to display upcoming activity dates.

To create a task in the List View, click + and select Task.

You can also add a task by clicking on a date in Planning view of the Calendar.

Create a task from Marketplace

Click on a piece of content and Create task displays at the bottom of the preview window. Click it to display the Create New Task form with the selected piece of content. Enter details and click Create.

Create a task from the Library

Select a library asset which opens a sidebar to the right of your screen. Click Create Task to display the Create New Task form with the selected piece of content. Enter details and click Create.

Add a task brief

On the Brief tab, upload files or enter a task description, encouraging collaborative brainstorming and ensuring creators to have information before beginning work (such as Key Objectives, Audiences, Pillars). You can add a brief in several ways.

• Brief Template – Click Brief Template to select from a number of saved templates.

  

  A template displays to get you going.

  

• Upload file – Select Upload. You can connect to your Microsoft 365 OneDrive Account to upload a brief from there. You can upload the following formats:
  • Word
  • PowerPoint
  • Excel
  • PDF
  • Video (MOV, MP4)
  • Image Files (JPEG, GIF, SVG and BMP)

  Unsupported files will display a "no preview" icon, but remain available to download.

• Library – Select an asset from the Library as your task brief.
• Add URL – Enter the URL to a file on Google, from Figma, Milanote or non-gated website.

  

• Write a Brief – Open a text editor for adding a brief.

  Click Write a Brief and add a brief in the editor. While you write a brief, the text editor autosaves the draft. However, if you try to go to any other module while writing the brief, an alert warns that you have unsaved changes and asks if you would like to discard the changes. Click Save when done.

Add fields to the task

Fields and field values may automatically populate from the campaign or brief. If your task has a workflow, only the fields defined in that workflow will show. You can go to the Fields tab and add new fields for the task by selecting Add Fields. You can click Create New to create a field and then add it.

For single-select fields, the window lets users keep the values that were inherited via the selected workflow or opt for the ones that were inherited via the chosen campaign. For multi-select fields, the values are merged.

You can also set up mandatory fields for their tasks – during task creation or task completion – as shown in the following images. Mandatory fields are indicated with a red asterisk (*).

Add content to the task

The content workspace is where you create content in support of the task.

Click + Add Content to select the options to incorporate content to your task:

You can use the text editor to create original content; add an external URL as content; directly add and create Microsoft Word/Excel/PowerPoint; you can also upload content from Marketplace, Library, and Your Computer. You also can select content from the Marketplace from your desired publisher, select content from Library, select published articles for re-publishing or social share, or upload content from Your Computer.

Click Done to save your work and return to the task page. You can track changes in your content, view the versions of the content, and see comments about your content. The option menu (...) lets you preview the article, check article information and save as new draft.

Select assets to push to the library

You can select assets from the task’s Content tab to be pushed to the library upon completion, ensuring only final and approved assets become available to the wider organization.

Click Manage what goes to the Library (icon), then select the items you want.

Managing workflow dates

Forward and backward scheduling

Workflows have forward and backward scheduling logic so that when a Task Start Date, Task Due Date, or Step Due Date is changed, you can update only that date or update all subsequent dates by the same number of business days.

• Forwards and backwards scheduling triggers and automatically applies durations when due dates are assigned to steps (or if durations are already applied in the workflow settings).
  
• When you apply durations, users can click on the date to change it for the particular step or the other steps based on how many business days the date has moved forward or back.

  

• If you want to update other steps, you can also manually adjust dates or assign dates in the pop-up. You can only manually adjust dates that are in order with the rest of the workflow. The other dates cannot be edited.
  

  

• Completed or skipped steps will not have the due date impacted. If you choose to undo a completed or skipped step and that date is out of order, the original due date is removed (as in Step 5 below) so a new due date can be applied.

  

Update task start date and due date

Forward and backward scheduling applies for Task Start and Task Due Date. You can set the task start date or task due date of the task from the task window. But you can change the dates to your preference by clicking the dates located near the top of the page.

This opens a dialog box where you can set the date and time that you want the task to be started or completed. After you set the date, click Save.

Smart durations

If you activate Smart Durations for the workflow from the settings page, then due dates of subsequent steps and the task move backward or forward by the number of business days by which the previous step was delayed or completed earlier. See also Apply Smart durations in Set up workflows.

If the task has other dependent tasks then, smart durations displays a prompt to also select the date changes to the dependent tasks.

Comment on a task

• Click Comments on the task page to post comments.
  
• Click a comment icon on a Step then enter a comment in the comment box.
  

Select the option from the context menu (...) to Edit and Delete your comments in the task page.

Click Show Resolved to display the comments that were marked as Resolved.

Watch or unwatch the task

In the new task view, you can add relevant users to the tasks as a watcher or watch the task yourself. Use the eye icon located on the top right corner of the task page.

When you click the eye icon, a drop-down displays to Start Watching or search and select another watcher. Start typing for suggested watchers.

When you try to add users as a watcher that do not have access to the task, you can provide them with Edit, View or Comment access to that task.

You can stop watching a task by selecting the eye icon and clicking Stop Watching. You also can click x beside another user to remove them as a watcher.

When you are added as a watcher to the task, you can receive the following the notifications, if they are turned on. If a you no longer wans to receive email notifications on a particular task, you can click unwatch this task in the email.

Select publishing destination

After you add the content to the task, select the destination where you want the task to be published, if applicable.

For example, if you have a website configured to the CMP, select your website from the Add Channel dropdown list. You can select more publish destinations such as Feeds, Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn. To learn more about publishing, see Publishing Content to WordPress.

You can also schedule the publishing time on the publish cards.

After you selected the publishing destination, click Complete to publish the task.

View task history

Each task has a History tab that provides a detailed activity log of work that takes place in the task to maintain end-to-end visibility, displaying who made what changes, and why.

Actions captured within the History tab include:

• Changes to task title and/or brief
• Changes to workflows (such as step owner, step status, due dates, etc.)
• Added or resolved comments (withintask or individual piece of content)
• Changes to task Labels and/or Custom Fields
• Uploads, downloads, and added attachments

Delete a task

To delete a task, select the context menu (...) and click Delete. Confirm your deletion.