Develop the Whole Sales Automation on ActiveCampaign (Week 3 - Week 4)

At week 3 - week 4, I developed the whole sales automation on ActiveCampaign. I tired to make a simplest series first and then added some conditions like "If/Else" condition. 

For example, I made a simple scenario for "New Welcome Customer" series. It starts from tagging prospects "New Welcome Series" when they click one of the button in our website and subscribe our newsletter. After then we send an welcome email, follow-up email, and more. This is the simplest scenarios for "New Welcome Series".

In reality, each customer reacts differently. For instance, someone may open our welcome email but may not open follow-up email and stops their interactions. On the other hand, someone may open both welcome email and follow-up email and want to know more about us or even desire to buy one of our products. For every scenarios, we need to make a really complicated and comprehensive automation base.

In the end, I developed the whole sales automation base (platform) with 8 conditions, 6 tags to distinguish or identify customers, 10 automation series, and many emails.

However, it is really dangerous to apply this whole automation base to the all customers. If we click "Active" button, it starts the automation no matter what it contains some error messages or error series. This is why we need to test a small version of automation base first and then expand it to whole automation. In addition, in the testing stage, we can do A B testing. Briefly, A B testing is to test two contents for small audience first and then take the winner content and apply it to the last of audience.

For example, we send an email to 10% of the audience with different subject names but with the same content: 5% of audience with Subject A and 5% of audience with Subject B. Once we find out the winning subject name (either A or B), we are going to apply it to the last of 80% audience. This technique is really powerful since we can know our customers' preference and can increase open email rates

Next time, I will post the detail of A B testing and how to use it.

Progress & Workshop Meeting

As a digital marketing intern for the Center for Digital Engagement, we need to attend a group meeting with Mr. Gibson, the director of Digital Summer Clinic, on every Wednesday evening. At the meeting, we present our progress and difficulties that we have faced at our works for the first hour and listen to the lecture or success story from guest speakers, EMU Alumni, and entrepreneurs for the second hour. 

You can find these activities at our Instagram and Blog which are created by our co-interns.
At Instagram, you also can find me!

Develop the Sales Funnel and Customer Value Optimization (Week 2 - Week 3)

During the week 2- week 3, I developed the Sales Funnel proposal and Customer Value Optimization for the company. I will summarize how the Sales Funnel works and what CVO is on this post.

Sales Funnel & Customer Value Optimization

Here is how the Sales Funnel works.

(By the way, I used "Creatly.com" to draw my sample diagram. It is very useful online software and you can draw 2 or 3 diagrams for free.)

Explanation of the diagram:

"Traffic Source" and "Offer a Lead Magnet" are the Acquisition Phase that I discussed in the last post. At this phase, we are trying to get as many prospects as possible.

"Offer a Tripwire" is the Conversion Phase where a prospect become an actual customer.

"Offer a Core Product" and "Offer a Profit Maximizer" are Purchase Phase. "Offer a Profit Maximizer" is, for example, cross-selling or bundling to maximize the profit.

"Cycling Path & Spreading the Market" is the Post Purchase Phase. This is the phase which we help customers to return to our activity and lead them to repurchase our products and/or services.

How to increase online sale transaction?

There are three ways to increase online sale transaction.

1. Increase the # of customers
2. Increase the average transaction amounts per customer
3. Increase the # of transactions per customer

"Traffic Source" and "Offer a Lead Magnet"  at the Acquisition Phase and "Offer a Tripwire" at the Conversion Phase increase the # of customers.

"Offer a Profit Maximizer" at the Purchase Phase increases the average transaction amounts per customer

Finally, "Cycling Path & Spreading the Market" at the Post Purchase Phase can increase the # of transactions per customers.

After the meeting with my CEO, we decided to edit my proposal and make it more specific to the company.
Also, I am charged to develop an automation system using ActiveCampaign and WordPress based on the sales funnel.

In next post, I will share how I improve my Sales Funnel and how to automate the system.

What is the Sales Funnel?

So what is the Sales Funnel?

The sales funnel is the purchasing process which starts from attracting customers and ends in customers purchasing and repurchasing the company's goods.
Though there are many definitions of the sales funnel, usually, there are 7 phases for the sales funnel: Awareness Phase, Interest Phase, Evaluation Phase, Decision Phase, Purchase Phase, Reevaluation Phase, and Repurchase Phase.

1. Awareness Phase: This is the process where prospects become aware of their problems and seek the solution. They will eventually learn that there are some solution products and/or services for their issues.
2. Interest Phase: Prospects shows their interests to the company's service or product.
3. Evaluation Phase: Prospects examine different products and services for the best decision.
4. Decision Phase: The final decision is made and the negotiation between the buyer and the seller begins.
5. Purchase Phase: The products or services are purchased.
6. Reevaluation Phase: Customers review their purchases and consider of buying more company's products or services.
7. Repurchasing Phase: Customers repurchase more products or services.

In my opinion, this can be summarized in 4 phases from the perspective of the marketing view.

1. Aquisition Phase: Attract as many customers as possible.
2. Conversion Phase: Conver prospects into customers.
3. Purchase Phase: Lead and help customers to purchase the company's product and/or service.
4. Post Purchase Phase: Resolve congnitive dissonance and lead customers to repurchase their products and/or services. 

The ultimate purpose of developing the sales funnel is to understand the customer behavior. Once the company knows which phase their customers are at, they can target them specifically and help them to purchase the company's product and service.

Know the Company and Initiate the project (Week 1 - Week 2)

In the first week and the second week, my co-Intern Emma and I learned a lot about our company, DistinguishMe. The company has helped students to initiate their passion projects by coaching and giving them some valuable resources. By doing this, the students will not only have an experience of initiating their passion projects and overcoming the difficulties during their tasks but also will be distinguished from the others, which make them be more applicable for the best colleges.

During the summer, Emma and I will develop an automate sales funnel for the company and analyze the website traffic as well as developing and maintaining it.
Especially, I will be charged for the content marketing to convert normal people to the actual customers by using some techniques, like a lead magnet.

Next time, I will share with you about what the sales funnel is and how it works.

Introduction to Digital Summer Clinic 2017 intern

During the summer in 2017, I am working at "DistinguishMe" in Ann Arbor as a Digital Summer Clinic 2017 intern.
But what is Digital Summer Clinic?
Bud Gibson, the director of Digital Summer Clinic, says,

"Due to high demand, The Center for Digital Engagement and Ann Arbor SPARK will be working in conjunction for Year 3 of the Digital Summer Clinic Internship Program! This program offers up to 20 part-time, paid digital clinic intern positions for EMU and other local area students. Students from a variety of majors, CIS, Marketing, SCM, etc., are encouraged to apply, as this position is not focused in just one area of study."

We are working with Ann Arbor Spark and having a weekly meeting on every Wednesday night.
At the meeting, the interns will present their progress and difficulties that they are facing at their company. Also, we are assigned to take "Google Analytics" certification or "Google Adwords" during the Internship so that we can analyze the company's web traffic.

I will keep posting my progress at DistinguisMe and share with you!