When customers visit an online store, we aim to track real-time customer behavior such as browsing pages, viewing products, adding items to the cart, and placing orders. By capturing these behavior as they happen, we can trigger real-time emails or SMS messages to encourage order completion or drive return visits. Automated marketing is an effective solution for achieving this goal.
SmartPush’s automated marketing supports a wide range of scenarios with an intuitive and easy-to-use setup process. These include welcome messages triggered when a customer subscribes on the website, abandoned cart reminders when items are added but not purchased, checkout abandonment follow-ups when a customer reaches the checkout page without completing the order, and win-back campaigns sent after a purchase or a period of inactivity.
This article will cover the following:
- Overview of automation flows
- Process start (trigger, filter conditions, exit conditions)
- Trigger differences on different platforms
- Process breakdown
- Delay
- Action
- Performance metrics
- Automated data reporting
- Automated templates
1. Overview of automation flows
- Nodes included in the automated configuration: triggers, filter conditions, exit conditions, process breakdown, delay, and actions.
- Each automated task to be started contains at least a trigger and an action.
- Automated task status: draft, activated, paused (only activated and paused tasks will generate automated data reports.)
- For tasks that have been opened, every time you enter the task details page from the task list, the latest process of publishing it online will be displayed.
2. Process start (trigger, filter conditions, exit conditions)
i. Trigger
It is used to configure different trigger events, which define what kind of event will initiate each automated process.
After the trigger data is generated, the system will query the sendable information of the trigger object in real time, usually the email address or mobile phone number. If neither is found, or if the queried email or phone number is in an invalid format (for example, an email like "example@"), the sending request will fail, and the trigger will not proceed to the next step in the process.
ii. Filter conditions
- Trigger filter conditions are not required to be configured. If not configured, no filtering will be performed. If configured, only triggers that meet the configuration conditions can enter the subsequent process.
- Each trigger has its own filtering conditions, which can be used to determine whether the process can actually be entered. Take the order creation trigger as an example. The order amount is used as a filter condition, and the order amount is set to be greater than 50. It means only when the order amount is greater than or equal to 50, the process will be triggered. Otherwise, the process will not be triggered.
- Up to 3 conditions can be added to each process, and the conditions can have "and" or "or" relationships.
iii. Exit conditions
The exit condition determines when a user who has entered the process should exit without continuing to receive messages. Before each sending action is executed, the system checks whether the user meets the defined exit condition. If the condition is met, the user will stop receiving emails or text messages from all subsequent nodes and will exit the process.
3. Trigger differences on different platforms
⚠️ Note: There are differences in the triggers, filter conditions, and exit conditions supported by stores on different platforms. View the details as follows:
- Trigger for all platforms: date type, contacts enter groups.
- Applicable to stores with Admin background link: shoplienapp.com, go to view the trigger.
- Applicable to stores with Admin background link: shopify.com, go to view the trigger.
4. Process breakdown
By setting a process breakdown, you can split the flow into two branches: "YES" and "NO". If the conditions are met, the process will follow the "YES" branch; otherwise, it will follow the "NO" branch.
Split conditions
- Trigger Filtering: This works the same way as the filtering conditions in the trigger, using data generated when the trigger is activated.
- Basic Attributes of the Contact: Split based on the contact's attributes. The usage data is split to query the contact's latest status in real time when the node is executed.
⚠️ Note: If the contact or attribute does not exist, it is considered that the conditions are not met, and the "NO" branch will be entered. - Recipient Behavior: Split based on the recipient's open or click behavior from the previous message.
Basic attributes of a contact include the following fields:
|
Type |
Field |
Data acquisition source |
Comparison operation |
Target value |
|
Options |
gender |
Basic attributes of the contact, gender |
equal to, not equal to |
Male, female, unknown |
|
nation |
Countries for all addresses of the contact |
Drop-down country range: All countries covered by all contacts are used as drop-down options, displayed with country names, following language B |
||
|
Custom labels |
Contact tags (main site synchronized tags & SP imported tags), excluding imported batch tags |
Option range: All contacts override to label as drop down option |
||
|
Subscription status |
Get a contact’s real-time subscription status |
Subscribed email address, subscribed mobile phone number |
||
|
membership level |
Only stores whose Admin link is shoplineapp.com have this field |
All levels in the store as drop-down options |
||
|
Verification status |
Only stores whose Admin link is shoplineapp.com have this field |
Verified email, verified mobile phone number |
The "Recipient behavior" conditions include the following setup options：
| Type | Action | Result value |
| Open email | Supports selecting all email tasks upon the node. You need to specify an email task based on the email subject. | Proceed to the next step in the process based on whether the specifed email is opened by the recipient. |
| Click email | Supports selecting all email tasks upon the node. You need to specify an email task based on the email subject. |
URL supports specifying: 1. Any URL, indicating that upon clicking on any URL, customers will proceed to the next step in the process. |
| Click SMS | Supports selecting all SMS tasks upon the node. You need to specify an SMS task based on the email subject. |
⚠️ Note: Using recipient behavior judgment requires a delay node in the upstream.
5. Delay
Delay is configured based on the waiting time between the previous node and the next node. It supports two types of time settings:
i. Relative time
Based on the previous node, wait for the set relative time before entering the next node. The maximum number of days that can be entered is 60 days.
ii. Specified time
After the previous node of the delay node is triggered, if the setting of the specified time is not met, it will continue to wait until the set time is reached.
Supports setting daily, weekly, and monthly granularity
- Everyday: Set the specific time every day.
- Every Week: Select one or more days of the week, then choose a specific time. You can select up to three days. When multiple days are selected, the trigger will only occur on the nearest upcoming day, not on all selected days.
For example, if the previous node is triggered on a Tuesday and the delay is set to trigger at 10:00 AM every Wednesday and Thursday, the system will choose Wednesday (as it is closer to Tuesday) to trigger the next step. Thursday will not trigger again for the same instance. - Every Month: Select the day of each month and then select the specific time. You can select up to three dates. When multiple dates are selected, the trigger logic is the same as "Every Week."
6. Action
Supported execution action types: send email, send text message, and update contact tag.
- Sending emails through automated tasks does not occupy the contact quota of the package, but will consume email/ SMS messages.
- The object sent depends on the trigger and different triggers correspond to different objects. You can refer to the trigger rule introduction:
- Applicable to stores with Admin backend link: shoplienapp.com, go to view the triggers.
- Applicable to stores with Admin backend link: shopify.com, go to view the triggers.
- Execution actions support copying. Click ":" icon to generate copied nodes below. You can drag the newly copied nodes to any expected location.
Update contact tag
You can add an "Update Contact Tag" node to your automation flow. After dragging the node into the flow, enter the name of the tag you want to create, click + Create Tag, then select the newly created tag to complete the node setup.
You can create a segment for the contacts who have been assigned the new tag. Go to [Contacts] > [Segments] and click Create segment. When adding conditions, select "Others" > "Automation contact tag" to find the tag you just created.
7. Performance metrics
- The data displayed within the automated process only counts the data of the past 30 days, and data will be generated only for the "opened" and "paused" statuses. To view the accumulated data, you can go to automated data report for details.
- Once the process starts, the data generated by each node follows the node. If the node is dragged and adjusted, there may be a problem of top-down data funnel misalignment.
8. Automated data reporting
- Go to [Data Analysis] > [Automations] to view the data reports generated by each activated automation task.
- The data report contains 3 modules: task information, data overview, and activities in the flow.
i. Task info
Show a preview of the flows and other basic information.
Trigger count: After meeting the trigger and filter conditions, the number of triggerable users who enter the flow (triggerable means that the sending email address/ mobile phone number of the user is found).
ii. Data overview
Display real-time data generated by each automated task.
iii. Activities in the flow
Display the data of the email/ SMS nodes configured in the automation task.
Each node supports clicking drill-down to view and export user details.
9. Automated templates
Automation process setup is the most critical step in starting your automation journey. In order to simplify your setup process, SmartPush has preset multiple sets of automated processes for you to apply with one click. You only need to make simple modifications based on the actual situation of the store to publish the process.
Go to [Automations] > [Automation Templates] to browse all preset automation processes.
*Note: There are differences in the automation templates of different platforms. Please refer to the actual templates displayed in the system. The following screenshots are for illustration only.
Select the desired automation template and click Create automation to enter the editing page. After making any necessary changes, publish the automation to complete the setup.
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