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We’re fresh off the plane from 3 days of exhilarating content at Conversations2019 in Austin Texas. Manychat’s second annual Conference was full of actionable insights to help drive your business forward, and in this post we review the key take outs.

Kicking off, it looks like 2020 is set to be a milestone year for Messenger Marketing. According to Mikael Yang, CEO at Manychat, monthly active chat app users will surpass the number of social media chat users for the first time. That’s more than just an interesting statistic. As marketers, we must always understand where our customers are likely to be hanging out. If you’re selling products or services to consumers, your customers are almost certainly spending time in chat apps, which means you NEED to be engaging with them there.

Aside from China where Wechat rules the roost, the majority of the western world has adopted either Facebook Messenger, Whatsapp or Instagram Messaging as their platform of choice, and many people use multiple channels simultaneously. All 3 of these channels are properties of Facebook, who have announced seamless interoperability between them will be released next year. That means that a Messenger user will be able to chat with a Whatsapp user and visa versa without leaving their app of choice. For you as a business owner or marketer it means unprecedented and seamless access to just about all your customers from one single platform!

But it gets better!

At the conference, Manychat unveiled one of the biggest advancements in the history of marketing systems. No longer confined to just Facebook Messenger, Manychat now supports engagement via email and SMS. This is exciting news because it means we’ll be able to leverage multiple channels as traffic sources to filter customers back onto our Messenger conversations. Based on either the customer data we hold, or the user’s own preferences, we’ll be able to seamlessly switch to a second or even third channel if a conversations gets dropped in Messenger. This neatly solves the challenges faced by Facebook’s upcoming messaging restrictions.

While native email messaging capability is already available for all countries, SMS integration is currently only available for US customers. Technically the implementation is done, but Manychat are working through the legal and compliance restrictions around SMS in each location. We quietly had a word to Manychat Co-Founder Anton Gorin, who let us know that they expect SMS services to be available in Australia by the end of the year (2019).

Messenger Marketing is old news. Long Live Chat Marketing!

Across the course of 3 days, we heard from a diverse set of speakers, including the ‘Queen of Facebook’ Mari Smith, Randi Zuckerberg, Neil Patel, Ezra Firestone, and many others. Topics covered everything from how to create a chat campaign to sell Girl Guides Cookies, to using Messenger and eWallet to sell $7m of training subscriptions in just 7 days. The general consensus was that Messenger funnels are out-performing other channels, often by as much as 10X.

If Messenger is the best converting sales funnel, the key question all marketers should be asking is ‘whats the best way to drive more traffic into it?’

In summarizing all the presentations, we highlight 7 key strategies you should explore.

Strategies for Customer / Traffic Acquisition

1. Facebook Ads to Messenger.

This is not new, but we start here because we consider this to be the core strategy for customer acquisition.  Send To Messenger and Comment Growth Tool strategies are the most effective overall as they offer the lest friction to user experience, therefore the lowest CPA.
You can also use the same conceptual strategy on standard Facebook posts. At the conference, Manychat announced a new ‘All Posts’ growth tool, which means you can invite customers into a conversations from any comment on any post. That’s pretty cool for organic (unpaid) traffic.

One important point about organic posts.  Both Mari Smith and Neil Patel showed statistics indicating the significant demise of organic reach.  Standard (non promoted) posts now only reach about 6% of your Audience, while post engagement has fallen consistently for the past 4 years.  Video content is most widely distributed, followed by static images, while link posts are actively suppressed (because Facebook wants users to stay on-platform).  Mari recommends about 70% video, 20% static image, and 10% link posts in your mix.

2. Facebook Live to Messenger.

A key message that came through in several presentations was that the only place ‘faceless’ brands can exist is on Amazon. Your product or service brand is heavily underpinned by your own personal brand. With the exponential growth of video in recent years, live casting has become an important strategy. Apart from being able to engage with live viewers, you’re creating video assets which can be used to generate engagement and sales long after the live has ended.

Leveraging Messenger to build an audience and remind them of the upcoming live event beforehand is a great way to gain momentum, while delivering show notes and other content using a comment growth tool is a powerful way to transition viewers into subscribers. What’s new here is that Facebook is showing significant love to Live’s, so it’s possibly the best way to get organic traffic into your Messenger channel from within Facebook.

3. Blog to Messenger.

According to Neil Patel, for many businesses the first interaction new customers have with your brand is via a blog post. Indeed, statistics show that Blog posts are generating more initial touchpoints between brands and users in 2019 than ever before.

Instead of creating a CTA at the end of the post that takes the user to a landing page or email sign-up, we recommend creating a compelling CTA that brings the potential customer into a Messenger conversation. That could be to deliver a lead magnet, take a quiz, or make a direct offer.

4. LinkedIn to Messenger.

If you’re in the B2B space, leveraging the targeting power of LinkedIn is a no-brainer. But did you realise that Messenger can form a powerful and highly engaging way to deliver content? LinkedIn has its own messaging channel, but open and action rates there are much lower than Messenger. When posting, doing live casting or contacting potential leads, providing links to Messenger (using REFURL growth tools) can give you an extra channel to communicate. Plus, it can potentially convert your LinkedIn prospects to active conversations at a much higher rate.

5. Leverage Website Live Chat

It has been shown that for eCommerce brands in particular, having a 24/7 live chat support option can deliver a 13-30% increase in website conversion. Embedding the Messenger live chat to your site enables you to deliver BOT interaction for customer FAQs. However, your goal for this service should be to handle the majority of enquiries automatically, but have real humans available to jump in and provide sales support. Be prepared though, delivering a templated ‘out of hours’ message can lead to a bad user experience, leading your potential customer to choose a competitor.

You can learn more about how to leverage Live Chat to make sales here.

Strategies for Re-Engagement

6. Optimizing funnel performance with dynamic retargeting

One of the incredible features of Manychat is the ability to dynamically add (or remove) individuals from a custom audience in Facebook depending on actions they take. This is powerful because it means that you can re-engage customers depending on very specific criteria. In this way, you can handle objections and enable customers to pick up conversations from where they left off.

The consensus among the top minds in Facebook advertising though, is that Sponsored Messages (which appear in the user’s Messenger feed) are not delivering the best results right now. Facebook is working hard to fix this, but for now we recommend using one of the traditional Ad objectives with your dynamic audiences.

7. Dynamic Cross-Channel Re-Engagement

Our modern world is full of distractions, and it’s easy for even motivated customers to lose track of a conversation before making the sale. For this reason, it’s always been good practice to include time-based reminders inside Messenger to prod the customer to the next step.

However the integration to SMS and email announced this week enables you to easily re-engage the customer across more than just the Messenger channel. For example, if 24 hours has passed since your last interaction, drop an SMS reminder through with a link back to the conversation in Messenger. Then you can revert to email for more long-term engagement, perhaps delivering some additional value to help handle any objections your customer may have.

You’ll also be able to use these other channels for when you want to send messages that don’t conform to Facebook’s Terms of Service, including promotional messages, coupon reminders and the like. This enables you to still engage on the platform without worrying about spammy broadcasts or losing your Facebook account.

Right now these features are in first release, and there are a few bugs Manychat still need to smooth out. Email formatting isn’t very rich, and there’s currently no way to adjust the sender profile (reply-to). There are also question marks around unsubscribing and whether if a person unsubscribes from email they also unsubscribe from your Messenger list. The team assures us they are working hard on all these items, and should have a resolution soon.

 

The strategies laid out above, plus the development of Manychat’s new Chat Marketing ecosystem mean there’s never been a better time to leverage Facebook Messenger as a critical part of your marketing strategy. Successful execution of an omnichannel strategy requires a thoughtful and considered approach in relation to your customer journeys. Which traffic sources will you leverage, and how will you engage a conversation? How will you re-engage, and which channel should you use?

For a free no-obligation strategy consult for your business, contact us in Facebook Messenger today.

Just a few months ago we reviewed a round of sweeping changes to the rules of engagement on the Facebook Messenger Channel (see the last post here). This week, Facebook have updated their policies even further. The short story is that Facebook are taking increasingly strong moves to ‘protect’ their users from being spammed (and finding ways to make more money while they do that).

In this post we analyse what these latest changes mean, and how they might change your thinking regards marketing your eComm business.

Let’s take a look at what’s changing…

Here’s what a spokesperson for Facebook had to say…

“At Messenger, we want to help people and businesses connect in meaningful ways. We remain committed to helping businesses continue to grow and thrive on our platform. That’s why we are making updates to our platform to improve the user experience for people, and to help businesses drive more effective outcomes on Messenger. ManyChat has been a valuable partner in business messaging and we look forward to growing our partnership with them.”

– Ze’ev Rosenstein, Head of People to Business Messaging, Messenger

You can read the policy change log here (check out the August 29/2019 post), but let’s take a quick look at what’s changing effective January 15 2020:

• Revised Standard Messaging Window Policy: Going forward the previous 24+1 window will be changed to just a 24 hour window. Brands that wish to re-engage after the 24 hour window has passed should use Sponsored Messages.
• Introducing More Streamlined Message Tags: The original set of messaging tags that described what type of messaging you were sending is being sliced down from 17 to just 4: post-purchase updates, event reminders, account updates, and human agent (basically customer service)
• Subscription Messaging: Will be restricted only to News organisations going forward. Presumably that means brands who have applied for and received subscription permissions to date will be revoked come January 15 th .

What these changes mean..

If marketers were up in arms about the last changes, this round like likely to cause a ‘sky is falling’ type reaction! Basically, Facebook have taken a careful look at how marketers had adjusted to the last round of changes and found that too many people failed to adjust their practice, resulting in a bad customer experience.

Honestly, from what we’ve seen we tend to agree. Even high-profile businesses failed to abide by Facebook policy (often completely ignoring) the 24+1 rule.

You know who you are!

From 15 th January 2020, eComm brands & Amazon sellers (and just about everyone else for that matter) will simply be restricted to messaging within 24 hours each time a customer engages with your Bot (except for order and event updates).

This set of changes really shakes things up. For savvy marketers, that’s GOOD! Here’s what you should be thinking about….

Double Down on Your Messenger Sales Funnels

Yes, these changes mean that Messenger won’t be the starting point for customer re-engagement, but it also means that the channel will be kept uncluttered for consumers. Less noise on the channel means it will continue to outperform all other channels for open rates and action rates.

It’s still the BEST performing sales funnel tool. We recently conducted some funnel conversion research on the typical techniques used by eCommerce sites to generate sales.

As you can see from the industry averages, compared to the average performance on most eComm funnels, Beyond Points Messenger funnels are at least 2X as effective as Clickfunnels, 8X better than Google Shopping and a massive 32X better than email to website funnels.

Messenger still knocks it out of the park in terms of sales funnels, and these changes give us confidence that it will continue to do so!

Focus on Omni-Channel Re-engagement

Rather than reaching out to customers inside Messenger, Facebook want you to re-engage customers through Sponsored Messages (basically, these will be paid ads that appear inside the users’ Messenger feed).  The good part about this is that, having built an audience and done all the smart stuff like tagging we advised previously, you can be sure to create super-targeted audiences using your Messenger subscribers. You can then use these as the basis for your Sponsored Messaging campaigns (of course, if you don’t know how to do that, we’re here to help!).

However, effective marketing is always about getting in front of your customers in the right place at the right time. For that reason, its going to be more important than ever to leverage other channels for re-engagement.  We have always advocated multiple channels of engagement during our sales calls as well as in the strategies we develop for our clients. Going forward you’ll need to take this to the next level and think about this as transitioning from a ‘push’ message from within Messenger to a ‘pull’ strategy to get people to open the 24 hour window again.

If you don’t do this already, consider developing the following strategies:

1. Use Messenger to acquire and convert customers, but make sure you’re capturing emails inside your Messenger funnels.  That way you can send email broadcasts to bring people back to Messenger. After all, it’s the platform that’s proven over and over again to convert better into sales.
2. Capture mobile numbers wherever possible and incorporate SMS marketing into your mix.  SMS has a much higher open rate than email, but still nothing beats Messenger for action rates and funnel conversion, so make sure your SMS entices users back into a conversation designed in Messenger
3. Make sure you’re elevating as many customers as possible into an ongoing Loyalty system based around eWallet (for example, Beyond Points Amplifier).  From there you can send broadcasts direct to the users’ mobile phone lock screen, and encourage them to come back to your site directly or once again re-engage on Messenger.  This was always a killer strategy, and its only going to grow in power through 2020.

Facebook will continue to make changes, and you can be sure that with integration to Whatsapp and Instagram Messaging coming later next year we’ll see many more policy and platform announcements. Follow us on Facebook or LinkedIn for no-nonsense updates and the business implications of these changes as they come available.

Chat marketing can help you to transition a customer from enquiry to purchase in a single (automated) conversation.  In this article we discuss some of the key reasons why the channel continues to gain momentum.

Imagine for a moment the following real-world scenario of an online shopper with an urgent problem to solve.

Brazilian belly dancer Lígia needed to find a dress for an upcoming performance.

But she also had a problem. Not only did the dress need to look the part, but she also needed to have it by the very next day.

She began her search on Facebook and eventually came across a local dressmaker that she liked.

So, she sent a message:

“How fast can you make a custom outfit for me?”

The reply came back instantly and she outlined all of her requirements in a matter of minutes via chat.

It was that chat that secured the sale for the dressmaker. It allowed them to create a concierge-esque experience that offered instant gratification. That’s the key for providing services to customers in today’s market.

They don’t want to go on a journey with you.

They want to get what they need as fast as possible.

Why is Chat Marketing so Effective?

It’s not just the instantaneous nature of the technology that makes chat marketing so effective.

The strategy also allows you to reach customers in the places that they spend the majority of their time. According to Gartner, that’s the reason why 20% of brands will give up on their mobile apps in 2019. Apps require constant support and updates. They also require the customer to open the app before the brand can interact with them. 

Chat marketing gets around those barriers to entry and allows you to speak to consumers on platforms that they use every day.

There’s also the convenience factor to consider. According to Ipsos’ Global Trends 2017 report, 60% of customers will pay more for a convenient experience.

There’s nothing more convenient than having an instant chat to get to the root of an issue.

We’re also seeing a shift away from traditional methods of communication. According to Facebook, 55% of people feel more comfortable messaging a business than emailing it. That number rises to more than 58% when comparing chat messaging to telephone calls.

The message is simple.

Chat marketing isn’t just here to stay. It’s gaining momentum and is on its way to becoming the primary way to communicate with customers. Here are the six reasons why.

Reason #1 – The Continuing Trend Towards Online Shopping

We Are Social’s Digital 2019 report says that consumers spent US$1.78 trillion online in 2018. And according to Facebook, more than half of connected consumers will use the web to make purchases in 2020.

There’s a clear trend towards buying online. Now, combine that with the desire for instant gratification and convenience mentioned earlier. It’s clear that social shopping is on the rise, which makes chat marketing a key strategy.

Reason #2 – Improved Customer Service

Coming back to Lígia’s example, we can see that she had a clear need for fast and effective responses.

Now, think back to the last time you called a business on the phone. The odds are pretty high that you ended up on hold listening to muzak. You might spend what feels like an eternity waiting just to ask a question that takes a minute or two to answer.

According to a Zendesk report, 89% of people rate the speed of response as a key factor in customer service. Providing that speed via chat messaging reduces customer friction. This creates a more satisfactory experience.

Reason #3 – Monitoring Data and Tracking Purchases

Utilising a chatbot in chat messaging allows a business to collect targeted data about their customers.

The bot can gather a range of insights, including:

• Location
• Browser
• Device
• Product preferences
• lifestyle choices

These insights tell you where the customer comes from and how they access your services.

More importantly, chatbots interact directly with the consumer. This means you’re collecting customer data from the directly. The data from these interactions may highlight common queries and purchasing trends. You can then use this data to create targeted marketing campaigns, as well as providing immediate suggestions that meet the specific needs of your customer.

Reason #4 – It’s Ideal for Remarketing Campaigns

Over 75% of online shoppers will abandon their shopping carts before making a purchase.

All these people were interested enough in your product to reach checkout, and form an excellent group to target through remarketing. Beyond that, you have the opportunity to make upsells and cross-sells to existing customers.

Facebook allows you to create custom audiences using both standard & custom attributes. You can use these attributes to segment your audience. This opens the door for targeted remarketing via chat.  

Even more powerfully, you can reach out to people who came through you chat funnels inside Messenger to remind them that their cart is still waiting for them.  While email cart abandonment campaigns convert at around 15-20%, our experience shows Messenger cart reminders convert at 35-50%.  

Reason #5 – It’s Great for Lead Nurturing

We saw this in action with Lígia.

In her case, the instant responses she received via chat quickly pushed her through the dressmaker’s sales funnel. She went from becoming aware of the seller to making a purchase in a matter of minutes.

Compare that to the traditional sales funnel, which can take days, or even weeks, to achieve the same result.

Chat marketing allows you to nurture leads from the moment they show an interest in your service. And in some cases, you can turn those leads into customers in the space of a single conversation.

The true power of Chat sales funnels is they allow the consumer to control the chat. Traditional sales funnels force the customer to follow a linear progression, and compensate for that with retargeting ads.  Chat funnels allow the consumer to choose the fast route to checkout or more exploratory conversations, depending on how ready they are to make a purchase.  

Reason #6 – Growing Use of AI

Chatbots use artificial intelligence to learn about customers. And in many cases, this can lead to chatbots making offers based on the data that they gather.

Take Amazon as a huge example. The company says that 35% of its total revenue comes from cross-sells and upsells. It makes these sales thanks to in-built AI that makes recommendations to customers as they shop.

Chatbots offer similar capabilities on a smaller scale, though a conversation. 

Gartner predicts that we won’t need humans for 85% of customer interactions by the end of 2020. Chat marketing allows you to leverage AI, thus saving money on human resources.

The Momentum of Chat Marketing

Combined, these six reasons show us why chat marketing continues to gain momentum. There are increases in the use of AI in business to consider. Plus, more people than ever use the web to shop.

But most importantly, people want instant gratification from their online experiences. That’s what chat marketing provides – instant answers to customer questions that can result in sales.

It’s time for you to leverage chat marketing for your ecommerce business.

That’s where Beyond Points comes in. Schedule your strategy session with us today to find out more.

Beyond Points officially partners with NSW Government to Support NSW Small Business Month 2019. Delighted to get involved and support business success and growth, Beyond Points will run a series of 3 information sessions throughout October. Ideally suited for business owners and brands seeking effective profitable strategies to grow online and leverage their Digital Future.

Beyond Points values NSW Government commitment to support small business through a range of programs, policies and initiatives. 

Together, we can:

• Connect government, industry, the small business community and the public with the products, services and thought leadership they need to thrive
• Connect small business owners in NSW to each other so they can tap into a support network and knowledge base to help them build stronger businesses
• Highlight NSW as a small business friendly state, where it’s easier to start, grow and run a resilient small business

These discussions will take place in Sydney, NSW home to 765,000 small businesses, where businesses will learn how to build and secure an ecosystem to support growth and make sales.

Overview

The world of marketing is constantly changing, but right now we are in the early days of the biggest shift in digital marketing since email replaced print.  Buyer behaviour has shifted, and now more than ever your digital presence impacts not only your online but also your offline business.

Join us in October on a journey from understanding high-level strategic observations on how marketing has changed and the impact for businesses if they don’t evolve, to exploring the fastest growing and most effective channels for digital marketing leading into 2020. In each session, we explore this transition and how YOU can benefit it from many different angles, so there will be something new and interesting shared in each event!

You will leave with valuable insights on how easy it is to use more automation to your advantage. It’s easier than you will think! Leave with ideas for your entire business that will motivate and excite you to the possibilities that you otherwise are leaving on the floor.

Don’t put your future on hold, time spent in any of these Beyond Points Small Business Month sessions will return you implementable and actionable value that any small business should be doing to remain visible and competitive in today’s economy.

There are 3 event sessions to benefit any small business throughout October. These are listed below.

Sessions are easily reserved right below in Messenger or on Eventbrite.

Lessons learnt building business online from Zero to 7 Figures in 2 years. Fast track your success!

When: Wednesday 9th October 7am to 9am 
Secure Your Seat: $32.99  with a freshly brewed coffee on arrival.
Limited to 50 people only. 

Where Harbord Diggers – 88 Evans Street, Freshwater, NSW, Freshwater 2096

Fast Track Your Digital Marketing success – get insights from the  macro-changes in buyer behaviour to the fastest growing Marketing Channel in decades. 
If you’re considering third-party platforms to help grow your sales such as Amazon or need to demystify what’s working now online to attract and convert customers, you won’t want to miss this jam-packed session that could impact your bottom line.

We want you caffeinated and BUZZING, so entry includes a delicious Barista made coffee of your choice to start the morning off!

Limited to 50 people only.

Register Here on Messenger so you get the reminder and updates on your mobile in a message.

Book in Messenger Book On Eventbrite

How to Find Customers & Drive Growth in Your Business Using AI & Chatbots

Artificial Intelligence (AI) and Chatbots are no longer just for big business. Discover how small businesses are using automated conversations to beat the competition and build meaningful customer relationships to make more sales both online and offline. 

When: Thursday 17th October 12.30pm to 2.30pm
Where: Stanton Library, 234 Miller Street, North Sydney, 2060
Secure Your Seat: $29.99

Limited to 50 people only. 

Technology is so fast moving and hard to keep up with. What you need is the nuggets, not the noise. In a short few hours, you will understand how to leverage Online Automation to grow your loyal customers and grow sales.  Whether you’re just getting started out or making a transition from ‘bricks to clicks’, we’ll show you how to leverage Messenger Marketing using chatbots to build your business and exponentially grow your customer list.

A high energy session to rocket your business growth, we want you to arrive caffeinated and BUZZING, so entry includes a delicious Barista made coffee of your choice!

Limited to 50 people only.

Register Here on Messenger for convenient updates on your mobile in a simple message.

Book in Messenger Book On Eventbrite

Discover How to Leverage the Fastest Growing Marketing Channel Since Email

 

Breaking down the barriers between traditional business models and the digital Future. End the week understanding how consumers are buying right now, where to reach them and how do drive more sales online.

When: Friday 25th October 3-6pm Diggers

Secure Your Seat: $29.99  with a freshly brewed coffee on arrival.

Where Harbord Diggers – 88 Evans Street, Freshwater, NSW, Freshwater 2096 

Cut through the noise. Get real insights that will Fast Track Any Business. Learn Why Digital Marketing is just marketing – You’ll be staggered by the insights shared in a powerful few hours that illustrate macro-changes in buyer behaviour and discover the fastest growing Marketing Channel in decades.  Attending this session will empower you with take home strategies to give your business unique competitive edge utilising a ground floor opportunity together with unique insights learned building a 7-figure online business in just 2 years. 

Kick back with us and network with like-minded entrepreneurs and business owners from around the beaches. Your first drink is on us, it’d be un-Australian not to!
Limited to the first 50 people only. 

Register Here on Messenger so you get the reminder and updates on your mobile in a message.

Book in Messenger Don’t have Messenger? Reserve your seat here

Beyond Points is proud to support Australian Business in collaboration with NSW Government. We look forward to meeting you during October.

You’re probably familiar with the use of website chatbots to answer pre-sales questions and improve conversions. What might surprise you is that the strategic use of Messenger Marketing throughout the customer journey can help elevate your eComm brand.

The goal with automated Facebook Messenger marketing is to build meaningful relationships with customers – and the best way to do this at scale is through the use of bots. It’s essentially a decision tree. The person your bot talks to writes a message and the bot provides a response based on the content of that message and its own programming.

Just to be clear, Messenger Marketing involves engaging with your customers and prospects through Facebook Messenger, or, in fact, any of the main messenger channels, such as Whatsapp, Instagram, WeChat, etc. Chatbots are extremely handy for automating this process, by running through a pre-script, which basically means you’re having a one-to-many conversation. You create natural conversations that guide the user towards a sale or service. Of course, this includes the option of bringing a human into the loop when needed.

There are all sorts of ways to use bots to automate your Messenger marketing. We cover five of them in this article.

How Can Bots Elevate an E-Commerce Business?

Let’s say that you’re running an e-commerce business that sells thousands of products every month. You’re probably familiar with the standard chatbot experience, where you are asked a series of questions, designed (hopefully) to guide you to a purchase. 

The chatbot basically fills an automated customer service role.

Most online ecommerce businesses stop there, but it’s really just the tip of the iceberg in terms of the potential you have to develop a much deeper and more profitable relationship with your customers.

With good scripting, you can build and engage your audience a LOT more effectively, convert more sales, and perhaps most importantly, drive lasting profit growth with repeat business. 

Let’s dig into the 4 surprising ways that you can use bots in your e-commerce business.

Method #1 – Automated Product Help Guides

Up to 83% of people require assistance when making a purchase online, according to a “LivePerson’s Connecting with Consumers” report, which was based on a survey of more than 5,700 online consumers from the UK, USA, Australia, France, Germany and Italy.

That’s where product help guides come in. A surprising and generally underutilised benefit of using bots is that they can reduce confusion and guide your customers to make exactly the right purchase for their needs – this not only increases website conversion, but also reduces returns and refunds. 

For example, a bot may ask for a customer’s height and measurements for a clothing purchase. It will then guide them through the ordering process to ensure they get the exact product they’re looking for.

Method #2 – Product Pre-Ordering

You may have products in the pipeline that already have a little bit of buzz surrounding them. This opens the door for a pre-ordering system, such as the one that Burberry uses.

Originally, Burberry used their automated Messenger marketing to provide behind-the-scenes access to their September 2016 collection of clothes.

As their automation technology evolved, they started to add ordering functionality into the bot. This included a pre-ordering system that took advantage of the anticipation they built with the insider information they previously provided.

Now, Burberry doesn’t have to wait until it launches a product line before it starts making sales. Using this bot, it drives revenue before the launch and creates additional demand for their products upon launch.

Method #3 – Warranty Bots

The most important thing a warranty bot does from a customer perspective is provide that all-important reassurance and peace of mind that their product is covered by warranty.

But from a business owner point of view, it opens the door to re-engage with the customer and offer a unique customer experience, as well as the potential for an upsell or cross sell. 

Smart Warranty bots, such as the one we’ve developed at Beyond Points, capture the registration, assigns a unique warranty number, integrates with the CRM, provides instructional videos and content on how to get the most out of the product the customer has purchased, and THEN cross sells or upsells more product. 

Talk to Beyond Points to implement Warranty Automation into your Messenger marketing.

Method #4 – Loyalty Programs

So many loyalty programs sit inactive – that is, without members regularly re-engaging and repurchasing, or redeeming their point.

This happens principally because of a lack of any strategic communications follow up. 

To remedy this, you can use a Messenger bot to provide updates about how many points the customer has, reminders about rewards, and various other enticing bonuses designed to get your customers buying more.

The loyalty program provides the ideal framework for you to communicate with your customers and stimulate more purchases from them, by heavily incentivising through loyalty rewards.

More importantly, loyalty programs help you to retain existing customers for longer periods of time, which means you can spend less money on attracting new clients. This is where the Beyond Points Amplifier can help you. It combines Facebook Messenger and an eWallet loyalty scheme to help you lock in repeat business over time.

Use Bots To Power Your Messenger Marketing E-Commerce Sales

As you can see, there are a lot of reasons why Messenger Marketing and “Bots” are the most talked about terms in online marketing in 2019. The techniques described here can help you to increase sales, improve customer retention, and provide superior service.

The uptake on these new technologies is increasing exponentially everyday, as more and more businesses take advantage and jump into Messenger Marketing and eWallet loyalty programs.

Done the right way, they can provide a massive boost to an online business. 

And those that don’t may well fall by the wayside, as their competitors lock in the market with their custom loyalty programs.

 Will your competitors beat you to the market?

If you’re not using Messenger bots to create performance growth and increase customer engagement, Beyond Points can help you.

Let’s have a chat to find out how you could supercharge your Messenger marketing strategy today.

 

The growth of chat marketing has led to a number of providers getting into the game. But even after three years, we still recommend ManyChat to our clients. Here are the reasons why.

Everyone has a favourite.

If we’re talking ice cream, you probably already have a flavour in mind. Most people have a favourite clothing brand, movie genre, and type of music.

When it comes to chat marketing, we have a definite favourite:

ManyChat.

We started using ManyChat three years ago. And since then, we’ve seen a bunch of competitors rise to prominence in the chat marketing sector.

Yet through it all, we’ve never felt tempted to make the switch. To this day, we still recommend ManyChat as the chatbot builder of choice to all our clients.

We’re not alone either.

Over 300,000 businesses use a ManyChat strategy. The platform sends more than 30 million messages per day. The simple fact is that it makes chat marketing easier. And to show you how, we’re going to look at some of its key features.

Feature #1 – Simple Bot Building

When they hear the word “chatbot,” many business owners instantly think they need in-depth coding experience to create one. After all, a chatbot can conduct a full conversation with a human. Plus it can gather data for use in marketing campaigns.

Surely, that makes them complicated to create.

Well, not if you’re using ManyChat. The platform allows you to create a chatbot in just five minutes. There’s no coding required and you have full control over the direction the bot takes. 

It’s easy to create a conversational flow and it’s simple to integrate the bot into Facebook.

ManyChat uses a drag and drop interface to help you develop your chat flow. If you’re not comfortable with that, it features a range of templates for specific business niches.

Feature #2 – Broadcasts and Campaigns

ManyChat gives you full control over the types of messages you send to your customers. If you want to broadcast to a targeted audience, you can easily do that. For example, you may wish to retarget a group of people who’ve purchased a specific product. You can use ManyChat to create a chat-marketing broadcast specifically for that audience.

It also allows you to create specific campaigns based on customer opt-ins. Let’s say your ecommerce store has a newsletter. You can send the details of the people who’ve opted into that newsletter to ManyChat. Then you can use the platform to plug the leads into a full campaign that sends a sequence of messages.

Feature #3 – Regular Updates

ManyChat has evolved over the three years we’ve used it. That’s because the team behind it encourages feedback from its users. And more importantly…they act on that feedback.

In their comparison of different chat marketing platforms, Bot Academy highlighted this as a key feature:

“We use ManyChat for Bot Academy and love their software. It’s so easy to use and the team actively listens to our feedback and actually builds the features we want!”

Chat marketing is a constantly evolving field. Without ManyChat’s commitment to keeping pace with the industry, we’d probably have started using a different platform.

However, they keep introducing new features. For example, the platform integrated both SMS and email messaging in September 2019. These new features offer you the opportunity to engage with prospects on the platform of their choosing.

Bear in mind that some prefer not to use Messenger as a means of contacting a business. This upgrade to the ManyChat platform makes it even more flexible. And it gives you more avenues to market consumers.

And that’s not the only reason we keep using ManyChat. Here’s another recent upgrade… 

Feature #4 – Accepting Payments Via Messenger

In 2019, ManyChat introduced the ability to receive payments from customers using Messenger.

There are all sorts of benefits to this feature, including:

• The customer experiences less friction, as they don’t need to bounce between platforms to buy an item.
• There’s less chance of the customer building a shopping cart only to abandon it halfway through.
• You’re able to sell conversationally. This means you can use chat to answer key queries at the point of sale and pull customers over the line.
• People trust Facebook, as it’s one of the largest social media platforms in the world. This means they’re more likely to buy within Messenger than they are to buy from a regular website.

With this feature, you’re building convenience into the buying process. That’s vital nowadays, since the world is moving towards instant gratification instead of long customer journeys.

ManyChat Free vs Pro

One of our favourite things about ManyChat is that it doesn’t force you into a paid commitment from the start. The platform offers Free and Pro variations. This means you can test it out before committing to the monthly fee.

The Pro package will vary in price from $10 up to $145. The exact price depends on how many subscribers you have. If your subscriber count goes up to about 25,000, the platform introduces custom pricing.

So, what are the key differences?

With the Free plan, you’re able to send out an unlimited number of messages to subscribers, just as you can in Pro. However, you’re limited to two message sequences. You’re only able to create 10 tags and three custom fields. And you’ll see the ManyChat branding on most of the growth tools the platform offers.

This means your customers will see the branding too.

Pro lifts these restrictions and gets rid of the branding. You also gain access to greater functionality, including an in-depth A/B testing feature. 

Finally, the Pro version receives superior support compared to the Free version.

We believe the Free version is a great way to test the platform out and send a few broadcasts. But the Pro version truly unlocks ManyChat’s potential as a chat marketing tool.

Why We Stick With ManyChat

We stick with ManyChat because of the key features we’ve mentioned above.

The user-friendliness of the platform allows us to introduce the concept of chat marketing to clients. If speed is of the essence for a campaign, there’s no better platform for getting a chatbot up and running as fast as possible.

We’d love to have the opportunity to discuss how ManyChat can give your marketing campaigns a huge boost.

Schedule a strategy session with our team today to learn more.