What separate means in practice
Think of each sub-account as its own business inside your agency. Its contacts, its conversations and its automations stay with it. A workflow built in one location acts on that location's records, not on another's.
In our builds, that means every location gets its own workflows, its own custom fields, its own calendars and its own pipeline rules, even when the logic is the same everywhere. Our older notes went further and said automations are never shared at all. HighLevel's help pages describe two ways across the line, and both are useful as long as you know what they carry.
Bridge one: copy the workflow
An agency admin can copy a single workflow into any sub-account they can access, without building a full snapshot. The copy can bring tags, custom fields, custom values, pipelines, stages and text templates along with it. Anything the workflow refers to outside that list is cleared from the copy.
The copy also lands in draft. Nothing runs in the destination until someone reviews it and publishes it.
- As an agency admin, choose Copy to Sub-Account for the workflow you want to reuse.
- Use Select Sub-Account to pick the destination.
- Open Copy Workflow History and check the copy for errors.
- In the destination, open the draft and reconnect anything the copy removed.
- Test it on a test contact in that location, then publish.
Bridge two: copy the contact
When a contact needs to move, use Copy Contact to Sub-Account, a native workflow action that targets another location. Its options include Copy Tags, Copy Custom Fields and Update Contact if it Already Exists.
Custom fields copy only when the destination has matching fields of the same type, so build those first. The action doesn't bring conversations, activity, notes, tasks or appointments. And it's a premium action: LC Premium Triggers & Actions has to be turned on before it works.
A copied contact arrives with no history. Whoever picks it up starts from the record, not the conversation.
What to check after a copy
HighLevel's page on copying workflows is older than its page on copying contacts. Treat its list of what comes across as a guide, and look at the destination yourself.
- Every trigger and action in the destination draft still points at something that exists there.
- Fields used by the workflow exist in the destination with the same type.
- Templates and custom values carry the destination business's details, not the source's.
- The draft has been tested in the destination before it's published.
Rather have it set up for you?
We'll build the automation once, copy it into each sub-account and test every copy in its own location, beginning with a 30-minute 1:1 with Rob to map your locations.
Mistakes that cause trouble later
Expecting a copied contact to bring its conversation history. It won't, so whoever picks it up can't see what was said.
Assuming a copied workflow is live. It's a draft until someone publishes it.
Treating a copy as permission. Moving a contact into another business's sub-account doesn't mean that business may message them. That depends on what the contact agreed to, and this isn't legal advice.