Bank client requires Legal sign-off on every marketing email before send. Slack threads for approval get lost. Content Builder Approval Workflow enforces the gate in the tool itself with audit trail.
Bank client's compliance requirement: every marketing email reviewed by Legal and Compliance teams before send. Previously, marketer screenshotted the draft, sent via Slack, waited for Legal to reply. Replies got missed. No audit trail when someone asked "who approved this?"
Content Builder Approval Workflow enforces the gate in SFMC itself. Built-in notifications, audit trail, rejection reasons recorded.
Enable Content Builder Approvals in account settings (available with most editions).
Once enabled:
Email cannot be sent without approval once the workflow is active.
Approvers see the email in Content Builder, can preview with representative subscriber data, and focus on specific fields that the workflow flags:
Approver clicks Approve (or Reject with comment) directly in the UI.
Every approval and rejection is logged with:
Answers "who approved this, when, with what changes" for any past send. Regulated clients need this.
Approval can be withdrawn after email is already scheduled. What happens:
If a withdrawal should stop the send, someone must also cancel the scheduled send manually.
Process implication: "withdraw approval" is not a cancel button. Train the team: withdrawal means "approval is retracted"; canceling the send is a separate action.
An email that's approved and shared with multiple BUs cannot be edited without consequences:
Edits to an approved email invalidate the approval. Process needs to accommodate this - rushed edits to approved emails don't skip re-approval.
Banks, insurance, pharma, healthcare - compliance-heavy sectors. Typical configuration:
Multi-level approval chains in SFMC require ordering; check capabilities against client's specific process.
New engagement with a regulated client. Team assumes their existing process (Slack approvals) is fine. First audit finds sends without documented approval. Compliance incident.
Fix: enable Approval Workflow on day one for any regulated client. Non-negotiable.
Approver realizes an email shouldn't go out, clicks Withdraw Approval. Next day, email still sent. Approver surprised.
Fix: document clearly. "Withdraw = retract approval. Cancel scheduled send = separate action." Train the team.
Only one approver designated. Approver out of office. Everything backs up for days.
Fix: multiple approvers, at least two per approval level. Distribute load.
Marketer edits the subject line of an already-approved email and sends without re-approval. Compliance flags it in an audit. Claim of "it was approved" doesn't hold - the approved version differed.
Fix: any substantive edit requires re-approval. Include this in team training.
Even outside regulated industries, Approval Workflow helps:
Friction tolerance matters. For a 2-person team, the approval overhead may exceed the benefit. For a 10-person team, it's usually worth it.
For less formal review, SFMC has Content Builder Proofing - send preview to a list for review without the formal approval gate. Comments recorded but no hard gate on send. Lighter-weight than full Approval Workflow.
Use Proofing for collaborative review; Approval Workflow for compliance gates.
Some clients integrate approval notifications with tools their reviewers already use (Slack, Teams, project management). SFMC's notification system can email approvers; integrating with Slack requires middleware (Zapier, custom webhook).
For regulated clients, keep the approval record in SFMC for audit purposes. External tools are notification only.
Content Builder Approval Workflow enforces pre-send review in SFMC itself, with audit trail. Essential for regulated clients; valuable for large teams in any industry. Understand the withdrawal-doesn't-cancel behavior, set up multiple approvers per level, and require re-approval for substantive edits. Setup takes an hour; the compliance cover is worth it for the life of the engagement.
Implementing SFMC governance for regulated clients? Our Salesforce team sets up Approval Workflows and compliance frameworks on production engagements. Get in touch ->
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