What are workflows?
Workflows is a feature that allows you to set up your own custom automations. How it works:
- Select what record type you want to create a workflow for (Survey, Project or Referrer)
- Choose a Trigger – what should cause a workflow to run
- Set Conditions – for which records should the workflow be allowed to run
- Set action – set an action to run (Send Email, Send SMS, Create Task, Create Note)
What type of scenarios might I automate?
Here are some ideas for processes you might want to automate:
- Survey – set an SMS to be sent 55 days after a Help to Buy valuation job is completed to ask the customer if they’d like to book a desktop extension soon. Or create a task to remind yourself to follow up with a call.
- Project – automate a task to be created when a project reaches a certain job stage to set the assigned users to complete them.
- Referrer – send an email to a referral partner when they move to “Lapsed” to encourage them to start referring again.
There is a long list of ideas towards the end of this guide to help share ideas for processes you can automate.
What type of processes can I automate with Workflows?
There are a lot of processes that you can automate with workflows, and we completely understand you might not know where to start. We’ve shared a list of ideas below that could provide some inspiration for the type of workflows you could set up.
Sales conversion
Lead nurture – when a new record is created at the ‘Quote’ stage, you can set up your own custom email or SMS content to be sent out based on the job type, lead source and more. View guide.
High converting sources – you could set up a task for team members on leads that come in from higher converting sources to ensure they focus on these records first
Contacted status – you can create your own contacted statuses in your Quoting Preferences settings. When setting different ‘contacted’ statuses you can set a task for the next follow-up attempt and/or a message to your customer. For example, a ‘contacted’ status of “Unsuccessful – Attempt 1” creates a task for 3 hours time to remind you to try again. When setting a contacted status of “Unsuccessful – Attempt 2” this could trigger an SMS to the customer saying you’ve tried to contact them to discuss their survey needs and how to get in touch. View guide.
Update a job status late at night without alerting customers until working hours – with our standard automated emails, they are triggered and sent as the job is updated in real-time. Using the workflows feature, you can set a delay on the workflow email so it only runs on certain days of the week between certain times (e.g. working hours). This allows you to upload a report late at night or very early in the morning, with the email only processing once the job reaches your set sending hours on the workflow so it is sent at a more professional-looking time and looks less automated. This could also be set for new quote emails, lead nurture and more.
Compliance
As the job moves to booked, you could create a task for the assigned surveyor/user to complete the desktop research or to complete their own conflict checks.
Admin
When a booking moves to “Tentatively Booked” you can set a task to automatically created with a delay (e.g. for 2 days time), if the job is still at the tentatively booked stage to remind you to contact the access contact again. If the job is no longer at the tentative stage, the task won’t be created helping you to only follow-up on the records that need it.
You could also create an email to be sent to the Access Contact to remind them to get in touch about confirming the access.
Customer support
Report follow-up – instead of using our 7-day follow up template, you can create an email to send to the customer X days after their report is uploaded to see if they need anything or request a review.
Valuation extension – create a task in X-days time or an SMS to send in Y-days time to follow up and see if the customer needs a desktop extension on their valuation (E.g. a Help to Buy valuation). View guide.
Moving tips – you could set up various emails to be sent to the customer at various date ranges after the report due date to share useful tips and tricks for maintaining their property once moved in (if a condition survey) or other useful information for other job types. This helps you stay in touch to remind your customer to recommend you to others or use you again if needed.
Engagement
Lapsed partners – set up a task for your team member to contact a partner X days after their last referral, or if they moved to the Lapsed status create a task to see if you can help encourage more referrals. Alternatively, you could set an email to be sent to touch base with your partner automatically.
Last activity – set up a task to create for your team member if it becomes too long since an activity was last carried out on a referrer record. View guide.
New live partners – once a new partner is set to Live, set an email to automatically be sent to your new referrer with details on their referral links, login and how to refer. Every touch point can be used to engage partners further and support their journey with you.