How to make a signed contract the trigger for your entire post-sale operation

Every time a contract is signed, someone manually creates a project, sends a Slack alert, and updates three other tools. Here's how to automate it all from a single signed contract trigger.

Start free 14-day trial

How to make a signed contract the trigger for your entire post-sale operation

Every deal closes in the same way. The contract gets signed, then someone has to remember to create the project, generate the finance code, set up the folder, alert the team, and email the customer. This takes 20-30 minutes per deal, and it only works if the right person is at their desk. Otherwise, steps are missed and the customer feels the impact.

Post-sale document workflow automation uses a signed contract as the trigger for a chain of downstream actions across your delivery stack. This includes automatically creating a project in Asana, generating a job code in Xero, building a Google Drive folder, posting a Slack alert, and sending a deal-won email. The signature event fires once, and everything else runs without anyone touching it.

This recipe will walk you through how to make a signed contract the trigger in your workflow to set the rest in motion. For the full overview of how document workflow automation works across the document lifecycle, see our complete guide.

Is your post-sale document workflow ready to scale?

You're a strong fit if:

You close 10+ deals a month, and post-sale setup touches three or more tools
The same manual steps repeat after every signature
Missed steps have already caused inconsistent onboarding
You're already using (or planning to use) PandaDoc to generate and sign contracts

Consider alternatives if:

You close only a handful of deals a month, and manual setup still takes minutes
Your delivery process varies too much for a standard template
You don't yet have the downstream tools in place to connect

Ready to automate your post-sale operation? Start a free PandaDoc trial and set up your first signed-contract trigger.

What post-sale document workflow automation gives you

Once this workflow is live, every signed contract automatically creates a delivery project, notifies the team, generates the finance codes, and emails the customer.

When a contract is signed, an Asana project is created from a template with tasks pre-assigned by role. A Xero job code is then generated with contract value and client name already populated, and a Google Drive folder is created and shared with the delivery team. Finally, a Slack message is posted to the #deals-won channel with the deal name, value, and rep, and a deal-won email is automatically sent to the customer.

These are the specific tools used in the workflow covered by this recipe, and all are verified live integrations. You can also adapt the structure to your stack. For example, you can follow the same steps if you use Monday instead of Asana, or QuickBooks instead of Xero.

How to set up post-sale document workflow automation

Step 1: Set up PandaDoc CPQ to generate the quote

Before the signed-contract trigger can fire, the contract has to exist in PandaDoc. With PandaDoc CPQ, the quote will be generated automatically using pricing rules, product catalog, and customer-specific configurations. If you already generate contracts and quotes using PandaDoc, this step is all done.

See how to auto-generate sales quotes if you don’t have CPQ set up yet. If your quotes originate from your CRM, read how to automate document generation from your CRM.

Looking to improve quoting speed? Our recipe will show you how to increase deal velocity with CPQ.

Not on PandaDoc yet? Start your free trial.

Step 2: Configure the signed-contract webhook in PandaDoc

In PandaDoc, you can configure a webhook to fire when a document’s status changes to “completed.” This means all signatures are collected. The webhook will then send the contract data (like deal value, client name, rep name, products or services, and any custom fields) to Make as a JSON payload. This is what triggers everything downstream.

This is a settings configuration, not code. So there’s no developer required. Workspace admins can access Webhook settings.

If your team is not familiar with webhooks, check out our PandaDoc API documentation page. You can also see our post-signature automation guide for more context and set up closed-won notifications alongside this step if you haven’t already.

Step 3: Build your document workflow automation in Make

The Make workflow is where most of the real work happens. It connects PandaDoc to all the apps you need.

Make receives the PandaDoc webhook and extracts the contract data. Then, it runs the following actions in sequence or in parallel, depending on your preference:

A project will be created in Asana from a pre-built delivery template. The client name and deal value will auto-populate in the project, and tasks will be assigned to the relevant team members based on the deal type or service.
In Xero, a job code is generated using the contract value and client name from the webhook payload. This gives finance a trackable code for the project before the delivery team starts work.
A Google Drive folder is created in the designated client delivery folder, and it’s named automatically using the client name and deal date. It’s then shared with the delivery team.
A message is posted in Slack to the #deals-won channel with the deal name, value, rep name, and a link to the PandaDoc document.
Finally, a deal-won notification is emailed to the customer, confirming that their contract is signed and outlining next steps.

The Make workflow is like a visual flowchart, with the contract signed in PandaDoc as a node that branches into five parallel actions triggered by a single event. The exact sequence and tools are adaptable, so if your team uses Monday.com, QuickBooks, Notion, or Microsoft Teams, you can swap individual steps without changing the entire structure.

Step 4: Pass contract data into each tool automatically

This is the core step that makes the workflow feel actually useful. The webhook payload contains the full contract data from PandaDoc, including the client name, deal value, purchased services, rep name, and any custom fields.

Each downstream system will receive the relevant subset: Asana gets the client name and deal value for the project name; Xero gets the deal value and client name for the job code; Google Drive uses the client name for the folder; and Slack gets everything to create the channel message.

The main takeaway here is that no one copies and pastes from the contract. Every downstream system is automatically populated with the deal data. The Asana project that appears just 30 seconds after signing already has the right name, value, and tasks assigned to the right people.

Step 5: Test the workflow on a real deal

Before going live, it’s time to test the full workflow using a test contract in PandaDoc. You sign it as the customer, then confirm each downstream action fires correctly: the Asana project is created, the Xero code is generated, the Drive folder is built, the Slack message is posted, and the email is sent.

This test takes only about 10 minutes and can catch most data-mapping issues, such as a custom field not passing through correctly, before the real deal goes through.

What changes when your post-sale workflow is fully automated

With this workflow, the 20-30 minutes of manual post-close admin disappears. The delivery team has a project, finance has a code, and the customer has an email before the rep closes their laptop. This means a deal that closes Friday at 4 pm can receive the same post-sale experience as one that closes on a Tuesday morning.

The rep’s job actually ends at the signature, since there is no need for manual task creation or for “did you set up the project?” messages two days later. Operations also gets visibility into every deal as soon as it closes since the Slack alert, Asana project, and Drive folder are all timestamped to the signature event.

Plus, with PandaDoc Workflow automation, any mistakes caused by manually copying and pasting data (such as the wrong client name in the project or the wrong value in the finance system) become structurally impossible.

Ready to close the loop on every deal automatically? Start a free PandaDoc trial and build your first signed-contract workflow. Request a demo here to see it in action.