Project Overview
A production n8n automation workflow built for Inspire London College (ILC) that fully automates the student onboarding pipeline for their custom LMS platform. The workflow reads student records from Google Sheets and orchestrates a 5-stage pipeline: account creation via LMS REST API, course enrolment, payment instalment plan setup, assignment deadline configuration, and branded welcome email delivery with login credentials.
The workflow is idempotent by design, status flags in the Google Sheet (User_Created, Enroll Status, Email Sent) ensure no student is processed twice, even if the workflow runs repeatedly. All n8n triggers fire per-minute, creating a near-real-time onboarding pipeline that processes new students as soon as they appear in the sheet. The entire workflow is exported as a single importable JSON file, making it reproducible and version-controlled.
The workflow is idempotent by design, status flags in the Google Sheet (User_Created, Enroll Status, Email Sent) ensure no student is processed twice, even if the workflow runs repeatedly. All n8n triggers fire per-minute, creating a near-real-time onboarding pipeline that processes new students as soon as they appear in the sheet. The entire workflow is exported as a single importable JSON file, making it reproducible and version-controlled.
The Challenge
Inspire London College manually onboarded each new student, creating LMS accounts, enrolling them in courses, setting up payment plans, and sending credential emails one by one. With growing student numbers, this process consumed significant admin time, introduced human error, and caused delays in students accessing their courses. Payment instalment plans and assignment deadlines were frequently misconfigured, leading to support queries and compliance issues.
The Solution
Built a 6-section n8n automation workflow connected to Google Sheets via a service account, the ILC LMS REST API via bearer token authentication, and ILC SMTP for email delivery. Each section handles one stage of the onboarding pipeline with idempotency guards, status fields in the sheet prevent reprocessing. Split in Batches nodes process students one at a time to respect API rate limits, and Merge nodes preserve original student data alongside API responses for sheet updates.
The workflow reads course names from the student sheet, looks up internal course IDs from a mapping sheet, and passes all data to the correct LMS endpoints, eliminating manual data entry entirely.
The workflow reads course names from the student sheet, looks up internal course IDs from a mapping sheet, and passes all data to the correct LMS endpoints, eliminating manual data entry entirely.
Key Features
- Automated student account creation via LMS REST API from Google Sheets data
- Course enrolment with dynamic course ID lookup from mapping sheet
- Payment instalment plan setup with amounts and due dates per student
- Assignment deadline configuration per enrolled course
- Branded HTML welcome emails with login credentials via ILC SMTP
- Idempotent processing, status flags prevent duplicate operations
- Per-minute schedule triggers for near-real-time onboarding
- Split in Batches processing to respect API rate limits
- Merge nodes to preserve student data alongside API responses
- Google Sheets service account integration for secure data access
- Single importable JSON file for reproducible workflow deployment
- Bearer token authentication on all LMS API HTTP requests
Results & Impact
Reduced student onboarding time from hours of manual admin work to a fully automated pipeline that completes within minutes of a student record appearing in Google Sheets. Eliminated manual errors in course enrolment, payment plan setup, and credential delivery. Admin team freed from repetitive data entry to focus on student support and teaching quality.
The idempotent design means the workflow can be safely re-run without risk of duplicate accounts or emails. The Google Sheets-driven approach requires zero technical knowledge from admin staff, they simply fill in the student register and the workflow handles everything else. Successfully deployed in production at Inspire London College handling real student onboarding.
The idempotent design means the workflow can be safely re-run without risk of duplicate accounts or emails. The Google Sheets-driven approach requires zero technical knowledge from admin staff, they simply fill in the student register and the workflow handles everything else. Successfully deployed in production at Inspire London College handling real student onboarding.