Chapter 2 — Build Your First Workflow: Capture Leads and Send Email Alerts

🚀 Why Start Here?

Every modern team collects leads. It could be from a website, a landing page, a chatbot, or a Typeform.

But manually checking for submissions and copying data into a CRM or sending alert emails? That's a productivity killer.

In this chapter, you'll learn how to build your first real-world n8n automation — a simple lead capture workflow that collects data from a form and sends an instant alert email.

It's beginner-friendly, instantly useful, and forms the foundation for bigger automations down the line.

🧩 What You'll Build

Here's the flow we'll create:

• Webhook trigger → Capture form data → Format message → Send email

You'll be able to:

• Create a trigger to catch form submissions
• Process incoming data (like name, email, message)
• Send a notification email to your inbox or team
• See your full logic visually inside n8n

This is the first automation many teams start with — because it delivers immediate value and scales easily.

🛠️ Prerequisites

• A running instance of n8n (cloud or local)
• A form tool (like Tally, Typeform, Webflow, or a custom frontend that can send webhook requests)
• An email account (SMTP or Gmail API works)

🔧 Step-by-Step: Creating Your First Workflow

Step 1: Add a Webhook Node

Start with a blank workflow. Add the Webhook node. This will generate a unique URL that accepts POST requests (i.e., data sent from your form).

• Set HTTP Method to POST
• Add expected fields (e.g., name, email, message)
• Copy the test webhook URL

Now, go to your form tool and configure the submission action to POST data to this webhook URL. Click "Execute Workflow" in n8n to start listening.

Step 2: Submit a Test Form

Fill out your form and submit it. You should see the incoming data arrive in the webhook node — name, email, message, etc. Click "Stop Execution" and save the workflow.

Step 3: Add a Set Node (Optional Formatting)

• Combine firstName and lastName into a full name
• Add a timestamp
• Format the message for better readability

This helps when passing info into emails or databases.

Step 4: Add an Email Node

• Choose SMTP, Gmail, or another provider
• Set "To" address to your team inbox
• Use dynamic fields like {{$json["email"]}} in the body

Example subject: New Lead from {{$json["name"]}}

Click Execute Node to test email sending.

Step 5: Activate the Workflow

Once it works, click "Activate" to publish. Your form → email alert is now live. No missed leads. No spreadsheets.

🎯 What You Just Learned

• Create webhook-based workflows
• Handle and format incoming data
• Send email alerts with no code

This basic flow can evolve into storing leads in Airtable, triggering Slack alerts, or enriching leads with Clearbit.

🔗 What's Next?

In Chapter 3, we'll connect APIs like Notion, Airtable, and Slack to scale your automation stack.