Bonusly Zapier integrationAutomate Bonusly with Zapier.
The Bonusly Zapier integration gives you 2 triggers, both instant, 2 actions and 1 search. A new bonus or an earned achievement can start a Zap at once, and Zapier can give a bonus or look up a colleague in Bonusly for you.
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What the Bonusly Zapier integration is for
Zapier links your apps so an event in one sets off work in another, without anyone retyping it. For Bonusly, two moments can start an automation (a bonus is given, an achievement is earned), two jobs can be done for you (giving a bonus, in a simple or an advanced form), and one search finds a colleague by name or email.
Three results worth building, each on a real operation:
Recognition that follows a milestone. New Achievement starts the Zap when someone earns an achievement, and Give Bonus adds a bonus on top, so the milestone never goes unnoticed, even in a busy week.
Bonuses from somewhere else. When the starting point is another tool, Find User turns a name or an email into the right Bonusly user, and Give Bonus From Text (Advanced) sends a bonus whose whole reason is written as one text.
A record of every thank-you. New Bonus fires each time someone gives a bonus, which makes it the starting point for logging or announcing recognition outside Bonusly.
What Zapier does not do here: it does not pick up bonuses or achievements from before the Zap was switched on, and Bonusly offers no find-or-create, so a missing user is never created on the fly. The same app on Make is covered on the Bonusly Make integration page.
Zapier words, explained once
Seven terms carry the rest of this page. Each gets one plain line.
- Zap
- The automation you build on Zapier: one trigger, then one or more actions that run every time that trigger event happens.
- Trigger
- The event in an app that starts the Zap. Once the Zap is on, Zapier waits for it, here a new bonus or achievement in Bonusly.
- Action
- What the Zap does after it starts: the step that writes, sends or moves something for you, such as giving a bonus.
- Task
- What Zapier bills you for. One action that completes successfully equals one task, and your plan counts them monthly.
- Polling vs instant
- Polling triggers are checked on a timer. Instant triggers are reported by the app as they happen. Both Bonusly triggers are instant.
- Filter
- A step that lets the Zap go on only when what arrived meets your condition, and stops it there otherwise.
- Search step
- A step that looks up something that already exists in an app, such as a Bonusly user, so the next steps can use it.
What a Bonusly Zap costs in tasks
Bonusly is not a premium app, so the free Zapier plan can run it. What you pay for is tasks.
- Free plan100 tasks a month
- Free plan ZapsUnlimited, two steps each
- Bonusly triggersInstant on every plan
The trigger costs nothing, and neither does watching for new bonuses. Every action that succeeds is one task, and a failed action is not counted. The catch is the shape of the Zap: the free plan builds two steps only, one trigger and one action. The Zap drawn at the top, New Achievement then Give Bonus, has two steps and stays free. Add a filter, a second action or Find User and it becomes a multi-step Zap that needs a paid plan.
Connect Bonusly to Zapier
- 01
Start from Apps
In Zapier, open Apps and click + Add connection. A connection is your Bonusly account linked to Zapier once, then reused by every Zap that gives bonuses or watches them.
- 02
Pick Bonusly
Search for Bonusly in the dialog, select it and click Add connection. You need an existing Bonusly account in your company; Zapier only links to it, it never creates one.
- 03
Sign in and allow access
Sign in to Bonusly in the tab that opens and grant Zapier access. Connect the account your team expects to see recognition from, since every Zap reuses it.
First Zap: reward every achievement with a bonus
GoalWhen a teammate earns an achievement in Bonusly, the Zap adds a bonus to celebrate it.
- 01
Build: choose the trigger
Create a Zap, pick Bonusly as the app and New Achievement as the event, then select the Bonusly connection you added earlier.
- 02
Test it on real data
Run the trigger test. Zapier pulls the three most recent achievements of the account, so you can see what an achievement carries before mapping anything.
- 03
Add Give Bonus
Add Bonusly again with Give Bonus. Map the colleague who earned the achievement as the receiver, using what the trigger test brought back, and write a short reason that names the milestone.
- 04
Test, then Publish
Test the action once and check the bonus in Bonusly. Click Publish to switch the Zap on; it reacts from the next achievement onward, and as a two-step Zap it runs on the free plan.
Bonusly triggers on Zapier
2 events start a Zap when something happens in Bonusly, and 2 of them are instant: the app calls Zapier straight away, whatever your plan.
New Achievement
Instant triggerIn Zapier“Triggers when an achievement is earned.”
Kicks off your Zap whenever someone in your company earns an achievement in Bonusly, and passes the details on to the steps that follow.
New Bonus
Instant triggerIn Zapier“Triggers when a bonus is given.”
Runs each time a bonus is given in Bonusly, by anyone, which turns every thank-you into a possible starting point for something else.
Bonusly actions on Zapier
Bonusly gives you 2 actions. For each one: what it does for you, when to reach for it, and what to watch out for.
Give Bonus
ActionIn Zapier“Recognize a colleague by giving them a bonus.”
Gives a colleague a bonus from the connected account, with the receiver and the reason filled in by earlier steps or typed once.
Give Bonus From Text (Advanced)
ActionIn Zapier“Recognize a colleague by giving them a bonus. You must specify the entire bonus reason in a text field.”
Also gives a bonus, but you write the entire bonus reason in one text field.
The Bonusly search on Zapier
1 search step looks for data that already exists in Bonusly, so a later step can use it.
A search step looks up something that already exists and hands it to the next steps. In the editor, searches sit at the bottom of the Action event list, under SEARCH.
Find User
SearchIn Zapier“Find a user by their name or email.”
Looks up a Bonusly user from a name or an email, so a later step can give that exact person a bonus.
The three settings every search exposes
- Successful if no search results are found?Left on its default, a search that finds nobody stops the Zap there and the steps that depend on it are skipped. Switched on, the Zap carries on empty-handed.
- Create X if it doesn't exist yet?This box turns a search into a find-or-create. Bonusly offers no such variant on Zapier, so Find User never creates a missing user.
- If multiple search results are found?Three ways out when several users match: keep the first one, which is the default, stop the Zap, or pass all of them on at once.
When a Bonusly Zap breaks
Zapier documents no Bonusly-specific error or rate limit. The trouble comes from how Zaps behave in general.
Four cases to keep in mind before you publish. When a Zap fails and the reason is not obvious, start with Zapier troubleshooting.
The bonus loop
A Zap that starts on New Bonus and runs Give Bonus sets itself off again with every bonus it gives, and burns through the task count fast.Past bonuses stay where they are
A Zap only reacts to what happens after it is switched on. Bonuses and achievements that already existed are never picked up; moving that history is a separate job.No user found
If Find User matches nobody, the Zap stops at the search by default and no bonus is given. Check the spelling, or switch the no-result setting on.A sudden flood held back
When a trigger suddenly returns a huge batch, after a bulk import for example, Zapier's flood protection can hold the runs back instead of letting them through.
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