With external approval, people such as an agency's clients or the legal department of a large company can review and approve scheduled posts without needing a direct Swat.io login.
Info: This feature is part of our Custom and Agency packages. You can find more details on the packages and the features they include here.
Setting up reviewers in your workspace
Only users with permission as "workspace manager" can manage the list of reviewers. If you don't have this permission, please contact a workspace manager or Swat.io admin in your organization. Here's how to open the review list:
Open the calendar in Publisher view and click the "External approval" icon in the toolbar at the top right;
The side panel with the overview of external reviewers opens on the right side;
Enter the email address of each person who should be given access to the reviewer's portal. Up to 10 reviewers can be added per workspace;
For each person, use the dropdown right below the email address to choose the right role: "Can approve" or "Read-only" (more on this in the next section);
Reviewers can be removed from the same side panel at any time using the bin-icon.
These people then get direct, secure access to the external review portal as soon as the first post lands in their queue. The list of reviewers is valid per workspace and is therefore clearly separated from other Swat.io workspaces.
Quick Tip: Using the "Copy portal link" button in the "External reviewers" side panel, you can try out the external review portal yourself without involving an external person. Just add yourself briefly to the reviewer list, copy the link, and open it in a separate browser or incognito window. You can then remove yourself from the list again, this has no effect.
Assigning roles in the side panel
When adding reviewers in the side panel, you can determine which role the person is equipped with:
Can approve: The person can comment on posts in the external review portal, approve them individually and also manually set a post's final status. They are counted in the approval counter.
Read-only: With this role, the assigned person sees the same posts, comments and details as other reviewers and also gets the same email notifications, but cannot take any approval actions. Reviewers with this role are not counted among the approving people in the approval counter.
A reviewer's role can be adjusted at any time in the "External reviewers" side panel.
Sending posts for external review
You can send posts for external review in two ways:
In the calendar view, by selecting one or more upcoming posts and clicking "External Review" in the top menu bar;
Directly in an open post in Swat.io composer via the "External Review" button in the top menu bar.
Note: To send a post for approval, you need the Swat.io permission "Full" or "Assigned Full". With "Assigned Full", you can only send posts for approval that are assigned to you personally.
A post that has already been sent can also be sent again. Doing so restarts the entire review process: All reviewers are notified again and any previously set final status is reset as well. This is recorded in the post's activity log.
Choosing reviewers per post
In both cases mentioned above, a list of all reviewers registered in the workspace opens for selection. Choose the people you want and send the request. If confirmed, the request is sent directly by email to the selected people.
Using the "Add by email" field, you can also add a person who is not yet on the list as a new reviewer directly in the same step. This person is then automatically added to the workspace-wide reviewer list as well.
Only the selected people receive a notification and see the post in their external review portal. The approval counter in the composer always only reflects the people actually selected.
Note: If a person is removed from the workspace's reviewer list, they also lose access to posts already assigned to them. The posts remain active for the other assigned reviewers and past decisions from this user will also remain in the activity log.
Restarting or retracting a review
A post that has already been sent for approval can also be retracted at any time or its review restarted. To do so, open the post in post composer and click the "External Review" button in the menu bar. If the post has already been sent for review, you'll find the options "Restart review" and "Retract from review" to choose from.
"Restart review" resets any previously set final status as well as all individual approvals so far and notifies all reviewers again, without removing the post from the queue.
Clicking "Retract from review" clears all individual approvals collected so far and resets the post to its original state.
Retracting is only possible per individual post in the post composer and only while the scheduled publishing date is in the future. This action is also recorded in the activity log and triggers an email notification to all previously selected reviewers.
Approval status in Swat.io
For every post sent for external approval, you'll see the external review status with a counter in both the calendar view and the post composer in Publisher, as long as no final status has been set. Hovering over it shows you an overview of the current state of the review and of each individual reviewer.
Anyone with the "Can approve" role can approve posts individually. This does not yet automatically change the post's overall final status. It automatically switches to "Approved" once all assigned reviewers with approval rights have approved the post.
Independent of this process, anyone with approval rights can also manually set the final status in the portal to "Approved" or "Rejected", even if not everyone has approved yet. Reviewers who have not reacted yet can still submit their individual approval after a manual status change.
Note: The external status is for guidance only. It does not change the post's internal approval status in Swat.io and does not automatically publish the post as a result. Internal approval and publishing always remain additional, separate steps for registered Swat.io users.
Details in the activity log
In the activity log in the post composer, right next to the post preview on the right side, you'll see every event related to the external review: Being added to the queue, each individual approval with the name of the relevant person, every manual change to the final status and all comments, whether they come from Swat.io or from the external review portal, are visible.
Note: To be notified by email or in-app notification about new comments and approvals from the external review, the "Activity log comments" option must be enabled in your Swat.io notification settings.
Limitations
Reviews always run in parallel. There is no fixed order and no multi-step review processes;
The magic link to open the external portal expires after 7 days. An expired link automatically leads to re-authentication of the portal access. The session in the external review portal expires after 30 days;
The external review status does not change the internal post status, publishing only happens through Swat.io users and never automatically;
@mentions in portal notes are not possible;
A review is always only possible per individual post, not for multiple posts together.
Frequently asked questions
Do reviewers need a Swat.io account or login?
No. They open the magic link from the email and are logged directly into the external review portal. No password, no account, no login needed. Their email address does, however, need to be on the workspace's reviewer list.
How does the "Read-only" role affect the review?
Reviewers with this permission see the same posts and comments as everyone else and get the same email notifications. However, they can neither approve posts nor set the final status. They can still leave comments in the activity log.
Can an order be set for approvals?
Individual approvals always happen in parallel and there is no set order. The final status automatically switches to "Approved" once all reviewers with approval rights have agreed. However, it can also be set manually at any time by anyone with approval rights, regardless of the state of the individual approvals.
Can I also add a person who is not yet on the reviewer list for a specific post?
Yes, directly in the send dialog via the "Add by email" field. This automatically adds the person to the workspace-wide reviewer list as well.
Can a post be retracted from external review again?
Yes. Using the "External Review" button in the post composer, a post that has already been sent for review can be retracted via the "Retract from review" option, as long as the scheduled date has not passed yet. This clears all individual approvals collected so far.
The post was approved, was it automatically published as a result?
No. The final status is shown on the post, but publishing remains a separate, manual step in Swat.io for users with Swat.io access.
Interactive demo
Right now, our interactive demo is only available in German. Feel free to check out the German walkthrough to get a general idea of the process: