In your email promoting a new product, you conveniently included a link to an order form to inspire on-the-spot purchases. A customer read the email. She clicked to place her order.  And then…no sale.

That scenario often plays out: Studies suggest two-thirds of online shoppers abandon shopping carts. Maybe the customer decided not to buy. But maybe she wasn’t ready—or got distracted and forgot to complete the purchase.

Either way, don’t give up. When automation software detects that a customer visited an order form without making a purchase, it can remind customers to follow through. You can schedule one reminder email 30 minutes later, with another reminder sent the following week.

If you were ever one click away from buying shoes before you had second thoughts, you know that big retailers always employ this strategy. And for a good reason: According to tech research service BI Intelligence, 63% of abandoned merchandise may  be recoverable.

Could you stay on top of failed billing charges?

When a customer changes or loses a credit card, your business might have yet to make its list of records to update. Billing charges that don't clear, even briefly, can harm your bottom line.

Be proactive about collecting payment by establishing automated processes. For subscriptions and other fees collected repeatedly, set up a trigger for the software to notify you when a billing charge fails. Just so you know – the notification prompts you to call the customer, allowing you to collect payment as soon as possible.

Set up an automated process in which the software scans contact records for credit cards that expire in 30 days, triggering a reminder to call customers about updating their cards.

Prevent some failed charges from happening in the first place by catching credit cards on the verge of expiration. Set up an automated process in which the software scans contact records for credit cards that expire in 30 days, triggering a reminder to call customers about updating their cards.

Customer Service and Engagement

Automation allows you to treat customers as you would if you had more time. Help customers immediately, respond to their feedback and even send wishes for a happy birthday.

Make it easy for customers to ask for help.

Nothing is more frustrating when a customer needs help than a hard-to-find contact link and a slow-to-respond company. According to a report prepared for American Express, six in ten consumers have decided against an intended purchase or business transaction because of poor customer service. Ensure your company meets—and exceeds—the customer’s expectations every time by automating a process for responding to help inquiries.

Include a “contact us” link in every email to spare customers the task of locating it on your website. When a customer clicks the link, automation software tells a predetermined staff member to follow up.

With an automated process, the customer receives a better, faster and more personalised answer than she would have by contacting an available phone number or email address. In the software, employee names can be added to a contact drop-down menu to ensure tasks are routed to the appropriate people. By assigning certain staff members to certain types of requests—a support rep for a technical issue, a salesperson for a prospect inquiry—you immediately connect the customer to the person who can help the most.

Send appointment reminders.

In our overscheduled world, customers need reminders about appointments—and reminders of reminders, too. Forgotten appointments translate to wasted time and money for your business, but you and your staff members can’t afford to spend hours playing each customer’s personal assistant. While you’re responsible for booking appointments, the software can handle things from there.

With automation software, customers can receive appointment reminders via email after you or a staff member completes a web form containing the customer’s name, email address and appointment date and time. The form prompts a sequence of emails: an appointment confirmation followed by reminders in the days or hours before the appointment.

Along the way, a customer can ask to change or cancel an appointment by clicking a link within the email. That action alerts a staff member to follow up with the customer to reschedule.

Still, comparing calendars and manually scheduling appointments can consume hours of your day. To take automation a step further, consider integrating your automation software with something like Google Calendar. Using your business calendar, the app allows customers to view available times and book a slot—completely automating the appointment process.

Gauge customer satisfaction 

Positive or negative, the results from a customer satisfaction survey can give you the information you need to improve your business.

Is the customer not happy?

Find out what went wrong or what you could have done differently. Does the customer love your product? To replicate your success, find out why the product resonated with her.

Using automation software, email a survey link to customers who recently purchased. The survey, a web form, can be as simple as one question—“How satisfied were you with your recent purchase?”— with three multiple-choice answers: “not satisfied,” “neutral”, and “satisfied.”

Find out what went wrong or what you could have done differently.

Automate your follow-up accordingly. Set up the software so that a negative response triggers a task to contact the customer via phone or email. Reaching out quickly can prevent further damage. Most consumers give companies another chance after an initial poor customer service experience. Still, according to a report prepared for American Express, nearly 60% will switch companies after a second or third negative experience.

If the response is positive, send an automated email to thank the customer and ask if she will tell you more about her experience. A story from a happy customer can be rewarding—and not just emotionally. A customer testimonial shared on your website (with permission, of course) can be a personal, powerful way to convey the value of your product or services.

As a small business, you might need more company resources to facilitate hiring, like an online job portal or a human resources team. Simply collecting job applications via email works perfectly for your purposes. But once it's time to review applications and schedule interviews, you can manage the process without personally managing it.

Employ software to automate the early tasks involved with hiring. On the webpage where you posted a job description, ask interested candidates to submit names and contact information via a web form. When the form is completed, the software sends an email requesting the applicant to confirm his email address.

Once the email address is confirmed, the candidate is directed to a second web form, where he’s asked to write responses to a handful of preliminary interview questions about his strengths and work experience. At that point, the software calls in the boss, creating a task for you to review the application.

Besides saving time, an automated application process has another advantage.

Sending one email to apply for a job is easy. Following this process is easy, too, but you might lose a few applicants along the way—and that’s OK. If candidates can’t follow a few simple directions, they’re probably not the people you want to hire. 

Conclusion

So much to automate – but where to begin? Let us help! Speak with an automation consultant to see how automation can work for your business and where to start.

Leads

1. Automate contact requests
2. Inbound call sales rep assignment
3. Call back every customer
4. Mobile networking
5. Capture leads with a free newsletter

Sales

6. Sales pipeline starter kit
7. Focus on your hottest leads
8. Long-term prospect nurture
9. New customer welcome & wow

E-Commerce

Customer Service and Engagement

13. Contact me bubble up
14. Appointment reminder
15. Satisfaction survey
16. Refer a friend
17. Clean your contact list
18. Easy password recovery
19. Birthday reminders
20. Grow your social following

Events

21. Event registration & follow up
22. Facebook event promotion

Office Management

23. Automate a task-driven process
24. Timesheet collection
25. Easy hiring

It's the oldest marketing strategy in the world. According to Nielsen, word-of-mouth is the most trusted form of advertising, with 84% of people saying they completely or somewhat trust recommendations from people they know.

But sometimes, customers need a little reminder (or an incentive) to spread the word. Could you ask customers to give referrals by sending an automated email? To encourage them to take action, you might offer a small gift or coupon as a token of appreciation.

When the customer enters a friend's name and phone number into a web form, your software will issue a task for you or a staff member to call the referral. Why the old-school call? Emailing contacts without their direct permission puts your email at high risk of being flagged as spam, which could lead to your messages being blocked by inboxes. Pick up the phone, then ask about opting in to
your emails.

Could you clean up your email list?

"The more, the merrier" doesn't apply to email lists. All subscribers initially said they
wanted your emails, but over time, some changed their minds and became uninterested in reading them. Continuing to email them, anyway, can hinder you from reaching the people who want to hear from you.

That's because email providers like Gmail measure engagement—how often people
open, click and otherwise interact with emails—to detect spam. High engagement tells Gmail that people want your emails. Low engagement suggests they don't—especially if some mark your emails as spam. If that trend continues,  Gmail might label you a spammer and block all your emails from inboxes.

With automation software, you can prune your list by targeting inactive subscribers.
Because software tracks engagement metrics like opens, clicks, orders and web form opt-ins, you can single out subscribers who have been M.I.A. (120 days is a good measure).

Once the low-engagement crowd has been identified, schedule three automated emails asking, "Do you want to keep receiving my emails?" Because you're targeting known non-responders, use an arresting subject line like, "Hey!" (It worked for President Obama's re-election campaign). In the email, give readers the choice of two links. If they click "yes," the software will remove the "inactive" label.

If the answer is "no," they'll no longer receive your emails. Because software tracks

engagement metrics like opens, clicks, orders and web form opt-ins, you can single

out subscribers who have been M.I.A.

For some reason, email list hygiene is essential for your marketing efforts.
Realistically, your target demographic is only some people on the planet. Paring down your list lets you understand your customer's needs and interests, helping you craft more precise messages.

Retrieve lost passwords.

If customers need a password to access areas of your website, they'll inevitably forget it at some point. Locating passwords should be different from digging through a lost-and-found bin. With automation software, the process takes only a moment.

To retrieve a password, a customer types her email address into a form on your
website. The form syncs with her contact record, which includes a password field. The customer then receives an email containing her password and a link to your login page. Once you've set up this automated sequence, she can forget her password as often as possible.

Hosting an event keeps you busy enough. Let automation handle some details, like registrations, confirmations and promotions.

Could you make the event registration process easier?

If you're planning an event, your to-do list can quickly grow into a to-do book. Focus on the big picture by automating some of the most time-consuming tasks of event planning: sign-ups, confirmations and reminders.

On your website, take RSVPs in the form of a ticket purchase or, for a free event, through a simple web form that collects the attendees' names and email addresses. With automation software, the purchase or completed form triggers a confirmation email that includes a thank you for signing up and crucial event details like the date and time, location and schedule.

Are you having no-show nightmares? Could you schedule an automated email to send the week or the day before the event as a reminder?

Could you promote Facebook events?

A Facebook event is a great way to share an event with your followers—and, ideally, for your followers to share the event with their followers. But creating a Facebook event isn't an "if you build it, they will come" situation. Attracting attendees requires continuous promotion.

Drive more traffic to the event page by sending automated emails to your contacts. Make it personal:

"Hi [First Name],

We'd love for you to attend our upcoming event."

Provide a brief description of the event, but save some details for the link to the Facebook page. Ask the reader to click to find out more. If she clicks, you might gain one more attendee. If she doesn't click, try the last-minute approach by scheduling an automated email sent the day before the event.

Office Management

Hire automation software to do the office work you need more time for, like doing repetitive tasks, handling paperwork and managing the job application process.

Make routine tasks more efficient.

Automation can only partially replace every task people perform. But it can improve repetitive processes that require the human touch, helping you and your staff members save time and stay organised.

For example, send a handwritten thank-you note to every new customer. Ultimately, the task can only be achieved with pen and paper. To get there, you can set up an automated process to help you complete and track the job.

When you apply a tag to a new customer, automation software can issue a task reminder to write the note. Could you set up the reminder to pull the customer's address from your contact records so you don't have to look it up? The software also helps you keep track of these tasks to ensure you get everyone on your list.

Send and receive important documents.

Whether sending contracts or collecting tax forms, documents play a critical role in many businesses. That doesn't make them worthy of your time. Leave the paper-chasing to your software by setting up automated processes.

Say you hired several freelancers to launch a new project and must collect their timesheets for your records. Apply a tag to each contact to tell the software whom to target with an automated email asking for the form to be completed and returned to you. Include a link to download the form on the administrator website page.

When a completed form arrives in your inbox, make a note in the system so the software knows that the freelancer is off the hook. If the link goes unclicked, the software automatically follows up with reminders.