Send Bulk E-Signature Requests in Salesforce with Dochly
What is bulk e-signature?
Bulk e-signature combines Dochly's batch document generation with immediate signature sending. For each record in a Salesforce report, Dochly generates a unique personalised document and simultaneously sends a signature request to that record's designated signer — all in one automated operation.
Configure once — generate and send personalised documents to every record in the report simultaneously.
Each recipient receives a document personalised with their own Salesforce record data — not a generic template.
No per-record generation, no individual sending — the entire operation runs automatically after configuration.
When to use bulk signing
Bulk e-signature is the right approach when you need to send the same document type — personalised per recipient — to a large group of contacts or customers at once.
All contracts expiring in the next 60 days. Generate and send a personalised renewal agreement to each customer contact — one bulk operation replaces dozens of individual sends.
Terms of service change, privacy policy update, or compliance notice. Send to all active Contacts or Accounts who need to acknowledge the update in writing.
All new Accounts created this month. Send a personalised welcome and services agreement to each new customer in a single bulk operation at month-end.
Annual account statements or financial disclosures requiring customer acknowledgement signatures. Send to all active customers in one batch at the start of each year.
HR documents requiring signatures from multiple employees simultaneously — policy handbooks, code of conduct updates, benefit election forms — sent to all active employees.
Compliance declarations or consent forms required from a defined group of contacts. Use a filtered report to target exactly the right recipients based on any Salesforce field criteria.
How bulk signing differs from single document sending
One document, one or more signers, sent manually from a specific Salesforce record. Best for individual deals, contracts, and negotiations where you need control over each send. Each request is managed independently from the record it was sent from.
One template applied to many records, generating a unique document per record, each sent to its record's signer automatically. Best for high-volume, uniform workflows. Each request is still tracked individually per record — you can see the status of each one in its Salesforce record's tracking panel.
Bulk signature only supports single-signer workflows — one signer per document per record. For multi-party signing (customer + internal countersignature), use individual document sending. Bulk sending is designed for workflows where one person per record needs to sign a personalised document.
Step-by-step: sending bulk signature requests
Prepare your Salesforce report
Create or open the Salesforce report that defines which records should receive documents for signature. The report must:
- Use the same object type as your template's primary object
- Include the Record ID column
- Include the signer's email address column — the field Dochly will use to send each signature request
- Use accurate filters to return only the intended recipients
- Be saved in a public or shared folder
Run the report and verify the row count carefully. Every row becomes one document generation and one signature request email. If the report returns 200 rows, 200 emails will be sent.
Verify the report before sending. Unlike single document sending, bulk e-signature emails go out immediately to real recipients. There is no undo once the job starts — verify the report returns exactly the intended recipient set before proceeding.
Prepare the template
Confirm the template to be used meets all requirements for bulk signing:
- Status is Active
- Output format is PDF (required for e-signature)
- At least one Signature field is placed and assigned to Signer 1
- All merge fields are tested and verified against real records
If the template hasn't been tested with a real e-signature workflow, test it with a single send first before using it in a bulk operation. See Send a document for e-signature.
Open Bulk E-Signature in Dochly
Open the Dochly app → E-Signature → Bulk Send tab. Click New Bulk Signature Job. Give the job a descriptive name — e.g. "Annual Renewal Agreements — June 2026" or "Policy Update Acknowledgements — Q3 2026".
Select the source report and template
In the Source section, select Salesforce Report and choose the report prepared in Step 1. Dochly validates it immediately — showing row count, confirming the ID column, and checking the report type is compatible.
In the Template section, select the Active Dochly template. Only templates with signature fields configured are eligible for bulk e-signature jobs — templates without signature fields appear greyed out.
Map the signer email field
This is the most important configuration step. In the Signer Email section, select which column from the report contains the email address for each record's signer.
Typically this is the Contact's email field — e.g. Contact.Email. Dochly uses this field to address each individual signature request email to the correct recipient.
Contact.Email — the primary contact on the Opportunity
Contact.Email or a custom Signatory_Email__c field if contracts have a designated signing contact
Primary_Contact__r.Email — a custom lookup to the primary contact on each Account
Contact.Email directly — the Contact is the recipient
Records in the report with an empty signer email field will fail at the sending stage — the document is generated but the signature request email cannot be sent. Filter the report to exclude records with no email before running the bulk job, or use Dochly's "Skip records with missing email" option if available in your version.
Configure delivery and signing options
Set the signing experience settings for this bulk job:
The subject line and body of the signature request email. You can use merge fields here — e.g. "Dear {{Contact.FirstName}}, your agreement is ready to sign" — so each recipient receives a personalised email even in a bulk send.
Set a custom signing expiry for this bulk job — overrides the org-level default. For time-sensitive compliance deadlines, set a shorter expiry (e.g. 7 days) to create urgency.
Automatic reminders apply to each individual request in the batch — each signer receives reminders based on their own signing status, not the batch status. Configure or override the reminder schedule here.
Generated and signed documents are stored on each originating record. Both the unsigned generated document and the final signed document appear in each record's Files list after completion.
Review the summary and send
The final confirmation screen shows:
- Total records: how many documents will be generated and sent
- Template name: confirms the correct template is selected
- Signer email field: confirms which field maps to the recipient email
- Estimated send time: large batches process in the background
Review every item, then click Send All. The bulk job starts immediately — Dochly processes records in parallel, generating and sending each document. You can close the panel and continue working while the job runs.
Per-record personalisation
Even in a bulk send, each document is fully personalised. Dochly generates each document from the live Salesforce record data — every merge field in the template is resolved from each individual record, not from a shared data set.
{{Contact.FirstName}} in the email message, each recipient receives "Dear James" / "Dear Sarah" — not a generic greeting.
Monitoring bulk requests
After launching a bulk signature job, each individual request is tracked independently. There are three ways to monitor progress:
Bulk job status panel
Dochly → E-Signature → Bulk Send → [Job Name]. Shows total sent, total signed, total failed, and pending count. Updates in real time.
Individual record tracking
Open any Salesforce record that was included in the bulk job. The Dochly signature tracking panel shows that record's individual signing status — Sent, Opened, Signed, or Completed.
Salesforce Report
Build a Salesforce report filtering on E-Signature Status. Filter to "Sent" or "Opened" to see all records still awaiting signature from the batch — use for follow-up prioritisation.
Records that failed (typically due to a missing email address or a generation error) are listed in the bulk job failure log with an error reason. Fix the underlying data issue and re-run a targeted single send for each failed record — or create a new filtered report containing only the failed records and run a new bulk job.
For recipients who haven't signed after several days, use the E-Signature Status Salesforce report to identify them. Send a manual reminder from each record's tracking panel, or build a Salesforce report → list view → mass action flow that resends notifications to all "Sent" status records from the batch.
Best practices
Before running a full bulk job, filter the report to 3–5 test records (use your own email addresses for the signer field). Complete the full signing workflow on those test records, verify the document content and experience, then remove the test filter for the full run.
Before running the job, add a filter to the report: Contact.Email is not blank. This prevents the job from wasting generation cycles on records that cannot receive signature requests — and keeps the failure count clean.
Add a checkbox field (Signature_Sent__c) to your report filter — send only where FALSE, update to TRUE after sending. Prevents duplicate signature requests if the bulk job is accidentally re-run against the same records.
For very large batches (500+ recipients), consider splitting the report into smaller segments and sending in batches across multiple days — especially for time-sensitive workflows where recipient response rate matters and you want to be able to follow up before the next wave goes out.
Frequently asked questions
You can now send personalised e-signature requests to hundreds of recipients in a single bulk operation. Next in this series: Store signed documents in Salesforce with Dochly — configure exactly how and where completed signed documents are saved in your org.
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