The Quality Gate — Check Content Before It Goes Out

The Quality Gate checks your content before it goes out. It looks for things like broken brand rules, off-brand colors and fonts, a missing call to action, risky claims, and content that repeats something you posted recently.

It runs by itself when you move a piece of content to Review, so whoever reviews it can see the issues right away. Each issue tells you what’s wrong, so you can fix it before you approve.

It checks:

Designs
Transcripts
Marketing emails
Ideas on the Ideas board
Blogs

Documents aren’t checked today.

Quick start (5 minutes)

Open a design and go to the Info panel. See Using the Design Editor.
Set Status to Review.
A badge appears next to Status: Quality Gate: Running…. Wait a moment.
The badge changes to Pass, Warnings or Fail. Click it to see the findings.
Click a check to read what’s wrong. Fix it in the design.
Click Re-run Check to check again.

Example: a bakery moves its “Weekend specials” post to Review. The badge says Quality Gate: Fail. Missing CTA / Disclosure is marked BLOCKING, so they add “Order by Friday, link in bio” to the caption and click Re-run Check. Now the badge says Pass.

When the Quality Gate runs

The Quality Gate runs by itself when content moves to Review from any other status:

Content	Where you set Review	Where the badge shows
Design	Info panel → Status	Next to Status
Transcript	Scenes tab → Status (at the top)	Under Status
Marketing email	Configure tab → Status	Under Status
Idea	The idea’s Status field	Under Status
Blog	Moves to Review by itself when AI finishes the outline, content or design	Next to the blog title

Good to know:

It only runs on the move to Review. Saving an item that’s already in Review doesn’t run it again. Use Re-run Check after you make changes.
The badge only appears once the Quality Gate has run at least once on that item. Before that, there’s nothing to show.
A Fail doesn’t stop anyone from approving, scheduling or publishing. It’s there to help the reviewer decide.

Reading the badge

Badge	What it means
Quality Gate: Running…	The checks are running. The badge updates by itself.
Quality Gate: Pass	Nothing failed.
Quality Gate: Warnings	Some warnings, but nothing blocking.
Quality Gate: Fail	At least one blocking issue.
Quality Gate: Error	The check couldn’t finish, or it ran for more than 10 minutes. Click Re-run Check.

Click the badge to open or close the findings.

Reading the findings

The findings list one row per check, like Playbook Rule Violation or Off-Palette Color, using the same names as Brand Settings. Hover over a row to see what the check looks for. Each row has a label:

PASS: the check found nothing wrong.
BLOCKING: a serious issue. Any blocking issue makes the badge Fail.
WARNING: worth a look, but it doesn’t make the badge fail.

Click a row to see the details. A number like (3) means the check found several things. Each one has its own message.

Example: Factual / Compliance Red Flag (2) opens to show two messages. One says a claim like “clinically proven” can’t be checked. The other flags “guaranteed results”.

Whether a check is blocking or a warning depends on your brand’s settings. See Choosing how strict each check is.

Re-run Check

Fixed something? Check again:

Click the badge to open the findings.
Click Re-run Check. It shows Re-running…, then the badge shows Running….
The new result replaces the old one.

You can re-run as often as you like, on content in any status.

Overriding a Fail

Sometimes you want to go ahead despite a Fail, for example when a flagged claim is true and you have the proof. A Fail doesn’t block anything, but you can record why it’s OK.

Click the Quality Gate: Fail badge.
Type your reason in the box, “Why is it OK to go ahead? A Fail doesn’t block publishing; this records your reason.”.
Click Record Override. You’ll see “Quality gate override recorded.”.

The findings then show “Overridden — reason:” with your text, so your team knows why it went ahead. The badge still says Fail. If you re-run the check, the new result starts fresh without the override.

Example: a clinic’s post says “voted best clinic in Austin 2025”. The check flags it as a claim it can’t verify. They override with Award letter from the Austin Chronicle on file.

What each check looks for

Check	What it looks for	Checked on	Starts as
Playbook Rule Violation	Text that breaks one of your Playbook rules. Set per rule in your Playbook, not in Brand Settings.	Designs, transcripts, emails, ideas	Set per rule
Off-Palette Color	Colors that aren’t in your Brand Kit or allowed by your visual identity. Pure white and black are fine.	Designs	Warning
Off-Brand Font	Fonts that aren’t in your Brand Kit	Designs	Warning
Missing CTA / Disclosure	No call to action, like “book now”, “link in bio” or a link. If there’s no obvious one, AI decides.	Designs, emails	Fail
Topic Repeat	Text very similar to something else of the same type your brand made in the last 21 days	Designs, transcripts, emails, ideas	Warning
Platform Format Spec	A design caption longer than a platform allows, or a transcript longer than the platform’s video limit	Designs, transcripts	Warning
Factual / Compliance Red Flag	Claims that are false, made up, or risky, like guarantees, medical claims or financial promises	Designs, transcripts, emails, ideas	Fail
Pillar Coverage	No content pillar linked, or a pillar that’s already well ahead of its target	Designs, transcripts, emails, ideas	Warning
Render Font Fallback	Slides of an AI design that couldn’t use your brand fonts	Designs made with AI Design	Warning
Brand Identity: Design Code	An AI design that breaks your visual identity, like off-brand colors, fonts or text size	Designs made with AI Design	Warning
Brand Identity: Layout and Contrast	Text too close to the edge or too small, hard-to-read text, logo size and position, your color mix	Designs	Warning
Brand Identity: AI Review	An AI look at the first 6 pages: feel, imagery, hierarchy, balance and signature elements	Designs	Warning

More about some of these:

Playbook rules

Only rules are checked, not categories. A rule is checked on the content types it applies to, and its Quality Gate Severity decides if a break is blocking, a warning, or not checked. See Rules and the Quality Gate.

Compliance

The compliance check is stricter when your brand’s Industry or Sub industry contains a regulated word, like health, medical, finance, insurance, legal, law, crypto, investment or banking. Whole words count, so “Lawn care” isn’t treated as legal. Then it flags any claim it can’t verify. For other brands, it only flags clearly risky language. Everyday marketing words like “the best” are fine. Every brand gets checked for made-up facts, like fake statistics or awards.

Pillar coverage

A design, transcript or email gets its pillars from the idea it’s linked to. An idea uses its own sub-pillars. With no pillar, you’ll see “No content pillar tagged — this content won’t count toward any pillar’s target coverage.” See Content Pillars.

Format spec

For a design, the check uses the platforms of the content schedules linked to the design. For a transcript, it uses the transcript’s platform. For designs it counts only the caption against the platform’s caption limit. For transcripts it checks the target length against the platform’s video limit.

Brand identity checks

The three Brand Identity checks only run once your brand has a visual identity. What they flag, and how to avoid it, is explained in How it keeps designs on-brand. For designs made with AI Design, Brand Identity: Design Code checks the design as the AI first made it.

Choosing how strict each check is

Brand Owners and Admins can choose how each check behaves for the brand.

Open the brand’s Settings tab.
Scroll to Quality Gate Checks.
Hover over a check’s name to see what it does. The table in What each check looks for covers them all.
Pick a mode for each check:
- Fail: issues count as BLOCKING and make the badge Fail.
- Warning: issues count as WARNING only.
- Exclude: the check doesn’t run at all.

Changes apply the next time the Quality Gate runs. Results that already ran don’t change. Re-run the check to see the new setting.

Playbook rules aren’t in this list. You set those per rule in your Playbook.

Good to know:

Platform Format Spec starts as Warning for both captions and video length. Set it to Fail if you want either to count as BLOCKING.
Text in a platform’s covered area (where the app’s own buttons may sit) is always a warning, even if Brand Identity: Layout and Contrast is set to Fail.

Example: a law firm keeps Factual / Compliance Red Flag on Fail, sets Missing CTA / Disclosure to Warning because not every post needs a call to action, and sets Pillar Coverage to Exclude because they don’t use pillars yet.

Ideas for using the Quality Gate

Make Review mean “checked”.

A two-person team agrees that nothing is approved until the badge says Pass or Warnings. The designer moves posts to Review, and the owner only looks at ones that passed.

Catch repeats in a busy month.

A gym posts daily. Topic Repeat warns them when this week’s “Leg day tips” carousel reads almost exactly like one from two weeks ago, so they change the angle.

Keep regulated claims in check.

A financial advisor’s brand has Industry set to Financial services. The compliance check flags “guaranteed 10% returns” as BLOCKING, and they rewrite it before it goes out.

Track your pass rate. Brand Pulse shows how often published content passes each check.

Tips for the best results

Fill in your Brand Kit, Playbook and visual identity first. The color, font, rule and identity checks can only compare against what you’ve set up. See Brand Kit, Playbook and Visual Identity.
Put a call to action in the caption. Words like “shop now”, “book now”, “link in bio” or a link pass Missing CTA / Disclosure straight away.
Link content to an idea with a pillar. That’s how designs, transcripts and emails pass Pillar Coverage.
Set your industry correctly. It decides how strict the compliance check is. See Brand Info and Locations.
Re-run after every fix. The Quality Gate doesn’t run again by itself while the content stays in Review.
Tune the modes once, early. If a check keeps failing content you’re happy with, set it to Warning or Exclude instead of overriding every time.
Use your real fonts and logo files. Add fonts to your Brand Kit with the exact name you use in designs, and add logos from your uploaded files.

Common questions

I don’t see a Quality Gate badge. The check hasn’t run on this item yet. Move it to Review from another status. Documents don’t show a badge, because they aren’t checked.

The badge has said “Running…” for a long time. The badge updates by itself when the checks finish. If a run crashes or takes more than 10 minutes, the badge switches to Quality Gate: Error. Click the badge and then Re-run Check.

A finding says “Check errored”, “response was truncated” or “Could not parse”. That check couldn’t finish this time. Click Re-run Check.

My content failed but I can still approve and publish it. That’s expected. The Quality Gate advises, it doesn’t lock anything. Fix the issue, or record why you’re going ahead with Record Override.

I don’t see Record Override. It only shows when the result is Fail and hasn’t been overridden yet. Warnings don’t need an override.

A brand color is flagged as off-palette. Check that it’s in your Brand Kit with the exact same color code. A slightly different shade counts as a different color.

A font is flagged as off-brand, but it’s my font. The name in the design must match the name in your Brand Kit. Add the font to your Brand Kit under the same name.

Missing CTA fails on a post that doesn’t need one. Ask a brand Owner or Admin to set Missing CTA / Disclosure to Warning or Exclude in Settings.

Topic repeat flags a design I duplicated on purpose. Duplicates are very similar by nature. Change the text, or treat the warning as a reminder. It never blocks unless your brand set it to Fail.

I can’t find Quality Gate Checks in Settings. Only brand Owners and Admins see the Settings tab. See Team Roles and Permissions.

I changed a setting but the result didn’t change. Settings apply to new runs. Click Re-run Check.