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7 min read
The client needed a specialist to implement email and SMS marketing for their newly established online store. The client's main goal at the beginning of the collaboration was to acquire potential customers before the store's opening.
Monika Nastalska
Email Marketing Freelancer at SoftwareSupport
5 min read
The customized reporting system for a cleantech industry. The project's goal was to improve sales management on a global scale, a regional level, and across multiple technologies and products.
About the client: Pacific Green Technologies Group is becoming a world leader at providing sustainable cleantech solutions: renewable energy, clean water, clean air, and efficient use of electricity. These solutions help solve climate warming, green energy, and resource scarcity challenges.
Scope of the Reporting System Project
Duration of the project: 10 days
Stefan specializes in digital strategy/transformation, digital marketing & sales (along the entire customer journey), and product management. He has over 20 years of experience in process management within different organizations, from start-ups to Fortune 500 corporations, serving both B2B and B2C customers. He is an advocate of intensive communication to understand the client's needs. Cooperation for him always begins with understanding customers, market, technology, and competition.
During the project, he drew on his profound knowledge of sales processes, reporting, and implementation of CRM tools like Pipedrive or Salesforce.
Through focused work with Pacific Green Technologies, the respective dashboards and reports were developed.
When implementing standard SaaS software like Pipedrive, the key is to understand the structure of individual reports and an analytical approach to the problem. My experience in the green energy space helped to understand those needs and advise the client approaches to generate additional insights. Due to the short time frame for implementation, the project needed to be completed with efficient operation and cooperation skills.
Stefan Behrendt, SoftwareSupp CRM Freelancer
Within ten days, the reporting system was customized to meet all customer requirements. Within the project, I have conducted the following tasks:
Now, the generated reports and dashboards are used by regional managers and account managers for sales management and onboarding new employees. One single source of data and a unified visualization for the performance evaluation enables the development of measures and sales activity plans. Efficient communication between departments in the company - based on a single source of truth from Pipedrive CRM-data facilitates efficient and effective sales operations. Connecting a CRM with a custom report solution can help you understand a 360 degree view of your leads based on your custom attributes (e.g. sales activity mix).
Due to its rapid growth across its various sales-regions and multiple products/technologies, PacificGreen needed a sophisticated sales dashboard based on its CRM. It was implemented to efficiently manage their sales pipeline based on clear financial and non-financial KPIs using Pipedrive embedded Insights and Reports functionality.
Core project requirements from PacificGreen:
Reporting system need to be used by the head of sales, regional sales managers, and account managers to track sales progress across different projects and technologies.
PacificGreen decided to base its dashboard on Pipedrive’s reporting functionality since these dashboards and reports allow quickly gaining a visually driven overview of all relevant sales figures and KPIs. Additionally, reporting system allow to drill down to the single opportunity to achieve a 360° degree view of all deal-related figures and activities. Insights and reports allow creating reports based on standard and custom fields across the entire Pipedrive database. Results can be grouped, filtered, and monitored to reveal the most granular information within opportunities acquired sales volume by sales executive, deal conversion rates, etc.
According to Pipedrive data, only 2% of the first customer meetings end with the immediate sale. The remaining 98% of potential customers need to be followed up and nurtured through your sales process.
That is why it is important to create reports and analyzes which enable closing more deals.
By using CRM system, the head of sales can predict growth and detect deal-conversion issues. Reporting system make it possible to control activities and thus to monitor the effectiveness of the chosen sales approach. Using this tool augments daily work about which sales approaches are beneficial and which aren’t. Keeping track of PacificGreen’s goals enables to deliver against sales targets consistently. Overall, the use of CRM Insights and reports makes the sales process more effective.
PacificGreen was looking for extensive coverage of its sales activities across multiple regions via various Dashboards. First, a unified, consistent naming structure and uniform definition of KPIs and report-views with respective report configuration parameters across all dashboards were developed:
The project's goal was to provide worldwide sales management at PacificGreen Technologies with an up-to-date overview of global sales performance.
Therefore, the reporting system is based on sales-KPIs like a number of deals, revenue-forecast, etc. Additionally, the indicators had to be adjusted for different sales regions: North America, Eastern Europe, etc.
These dashboards were created for onboarding new account managers, deal tracking, and sales reviews between account managers and the head of sales. Management on such a large scale requires proper planning and monitoring.
PacificGreen is a company that serves different regions with a wide diversity of various technologies. Thus, the implemented system enables effective sales management on every type of market and across multiple technologies and products.
PacificGreen’s essential requirement was the immediate availability of a Pipedrive Expert and a quick implementation by a skilled consultant. The client needed a specialist who has a background in sales management and data analytics. PacificGreen hired Stefan with SoftwareSupp as a specialist who perfectly matched the project requirements. Multi-year experience in Green Energy, customer journeys, and sales management allowed him to understand assumptions quickly.
It also helped him to make recommendations for improving the existing KPI-reporting system. The entire planning, communication, and documentation during the implementation of the Pipedrive-reports and dashboards took place via the SoftwareSupp project product.
8 min read
A detailed guide on data migration. Our expert explains the unusual elements of this process and what is worth paying special attention to. If you think about technological development, data migration is the first step to the goal.
We’re all well familiar with the concept of data migration. Yes, most of us recorded CDs with songs or movies to exchange them with friends back in the times where there was no Wi-fi in all public places, as it is nowadays. Yes, recording a CD is an easily understandable example of data migration but, probably, on a very small scale.
During the past 2 decades, the world has seen unprecedented technological advancement in all spheres. And so did the data migration process. Based on the observations of Gordon Moore, scientists concluded that there is a significant technological boost every two years. Systematic increase of computing power and internet connection bandwidth is related to Moore's Law. In this article, we will try to prove that data migration does not have to be a necessity but also technological development.
Data migration is the process of moving data from one location to another, one format to another, or one application to another. Generally, it is the result of introducing a new system or changing the location of data storage. A business factor is typically an application migration or consolidation where older systems are replaced or extended by new applications that will share the same dataset.
Nowadays, data migrations often start when companies move from infrastructure and on-premises applications to cloud storage and applications to optimize processes or transform their business.
The data migration process is very risky. If, after the process, we think that the data has been fully transferred and we stop using the original environment completely, then it turns out that something has gone missing somewhere, we will register its loss.
Kamil Hudaszek, SoftwareSupp Data Analytics Freelancer
1. Pre-migration planning.
2. Project start. Identification of key stakeholders.
3. Definition of the quality policy and presentation of the project objectives. Establish a robust data quality policy management process and inform the company of project goals, including shutting down legacy systems.
4. Solution design. Defining what data to transfer and the quality of that data before and after the transfer.
5. Construction and testing. Code your migration logic and test the migration as a mirror image of your production environment.
6. Execution and approval. Demonstration that the migration is compliant and that the transferred data is fit for business use.
7. Decommissioning and monitoring. Shut down old systems.
In the 21st century, companies and businesses do not only move workloads to new or upgraded physical storage systems or servers. Cloud computing allows storing any information online, which has plenty of benefits. For instance, you can access data from any device anywhere in the world. No wonder that more and more companies shift to SaaS (Software as a Service) and PaaS (Platform as a Service) models.
In addition, more and more businesses shift to an online model with employees working from different countries around the world. Thus, it’s much more convenient to store all data on the cloud rather than keep all the servers in one place. The same goes for companies and businesses physically located in one country but sell their services and products in other countries and markets. Modern cloud implementation tools make the data migration process fast and efficient, with almost no risks of losing any information.
Data migration happens for a variety of reasons. It can be modernization or expansion of the existing applications and storage systems or introducing new software. If the company decides to implement a centralized database, it will also need to transfer all the current information to new storage. The same goes for moving IT infrastructure to a cloud. No matter, it is happening on the internal system level or the external one - all these changes cause data migration. One more common reason for migrating data is merging and acquisition. It appears when one business merges into another one- their data should be transferred to the mutual storage system. Moreover, increasing data security has also been recognized as a good cause for data migration.
CRM systems allow storing and tracking customer data, such as lead information, customer interactions, purchases, etc. With the help of the CRM system, an organization can manage all this data more effectively to build better relationships with clients and generate sales. If your company has never used a CRM system or wants to shift to a more advanced one, you will need to start a data migration process. Within this, all the information on your clients will be moved and structured in the CRM system.
Data migration is a kind of step forward. It is about awareness and willingness to develop. Systematizing duties, automating processes, and organizing data are the basis of effective management. As we wrote earlier, the implementation of CRM in the company internal system increases work efficiency. Here we want to emphasize that apart from the fact that it is an indispensable element of CRM integration, it is also a part of the development puzzle. After all, the database is a knowledge base. Customer data, documents, internal company information - these are crucial components of the company operations. That is why it is worth taking care of security and proper data storage.
Data migration is often connected with business management. The process of data portability is not only about moving information from one storage to another. Indeed, it has to do with systematization and the organization of data. So, what’s the connection between data migration and business management? To put it simply, data migration allows companies to manage and understand all the processes better. No matter whether you’re introducing an improved storage system for your customers’ information or want to boost sales, data migration can be a solution for both these problems. How? Further, we’ll talk about CRM (Customer Relationship Management) implementation. SoftwareSupp has extensive experience in CRM implementation for different companies and businesses.
Now, we will explain the difference between data migration, data integration, and data replications. All these processes may seem pretty similar at first glance when, in fact, they all serve different purposes and require unique approaches.
Data integration is the process of merging two or more data repositories into one. It means that various information- types or information formats will be stored together. Contrary to data migration, where all information is transferred from one storage to another in the same format.
Let’s imagine data migration as a one-time and one-way journey. During this process, the information travels from its original storage or location to the new one. After this process, the primary storage is usually abandoned.
Data replication is a continuous process during which the information is periodically transported to the target location. The original source of information is never deleted or abandoned. Both the original and target locations serve as backup. If the data source is no longer needed, data replication turns into a data migration process. At the same time, data replication can be a part of the data integration process that was described above.
Let’s briefly go through the benefits of a CRM implementation:
All in all, a CRM system gives structured and organized information on current sales funnels and daily tasks. A CRM implementation can boost any business revenue because it provides statistical data on clients and improves the mistakes and gaps in the sales process and marketing strategy.
Data migration can be divided into the 6 most common types. However, some of them can be combined to enhance the process as a whole. Below, we’re providing more details on all 6 types of data migration.
This one happens due to the storage equipment upgrade. The information is moved from one physical storage medium to another one. Examples of such data migration can be digitizing paper documents or going from mainframe computers to a cloud storage system. In both cases, the storage technologies become more advanced.
Databases are where the data is organized and structured with the help of the database management systems (DBMS). Database migration involves transferring data to a new DBMS.
This one is needed when an organization changes the application software or vendor. The key issue here is the difference in data formats and types. It’s crucial to preserve all the information when moving it to a new application. Such application migrations often require data information to fit in with the current software.
It is a data movement from an on-premises location to a cloud environment. Information can also be transferred between different cloud environments. SolarWinds Report on IT trends stated:
No wonder that in 2021, a cloud solution is a must for a successful business.
This type of data migration has to do with business applications and information on all business processes. Business process migration to a new environment is usually driven by business optimization or merging and acquisition.
To put it simply, a data center consists of servers, computers, storage devices, network routers, and other similar equipment. The role of the data center is to maintain the most important applications with the help of data storage infrastructure. When an organization conducts data center migration, it means that- it can be transferred from one physical location to another or from one piece of equipment to another.
Regardless of what type of data migration works best for the company, there are two approaches for moving information. Let’s have a closer look:
The name of this strategy says: all data is transferred at once during a limited time. One significant disadvantage of this approach is that all live systems go down during the data migration process. For instance, if any service is updating their mobile application by implementing the “Big Bang” approach, their users can have issues if they use mobile apps at the same time. However, one of the main benefits of this strategy is that data migration does not take long (usually up to a few hours). Thus, a company can plan and prepare a downtime and warn both the clients and the employees to prepare everybody for a smooth transition.
This strategy cannot be implemented at once but is divided into phases. Both old and new systems run in parallel to ensure access to all the applications during the data migration process. The information is transferred continuously with almost no downtime for all the systems.
All in all, the first strategy is less expensive and easier to implement. Because all changes happen at once, the risks of a failure skyrocket too. “Trickle” migration, in its turn, is costly and more complicated to perform because the two systems are running simultaneously.
There are three distinguishing phases in the data migration process:
In some cases, one more stage is added. It’s called the preparation stage. The ETL process is the same. No matter if an organization chooses a “Big Bang” or “Trickle” migration strategy.
Let’s see what an ETL process looks like based on a real-life example. Here SoftwareSupp experts had to set up a Pipedrive and conduct data migration for a luxury travel agency.
On the screenshot below, you can see the following stages of the ETL process:
The data migration process isn’t an effortless thing that companies perform daily. It’s a pretty challenging procedure that can have serious consequences if something goes wrong.
We’re briefly talking about some risks and challenges to keep in mind during the data migration process:
The database migration should be carried out by an experienced specialist. It is a large project requiring expert knowledge, and if properly conducted, it does not bring any risk. It is a business technology update process. Finally, modern business focuses on the following technology.
With SoftwareSupp, your data migration process is at minimum risk. We know how to move and optimize information to benefit your business. With a large pool of dedicated experts in different industries, data migration becomes a natural process that will result in better access to information, flawless performance, and a profound understanding of how your business works.
7 min read
How to run lead scoring: methods, benefits, and implementation. The goal is to convert the lead to a customer.
Not all leads are the same, and that’s ok. But how do you know which ones will turn in customers? The answer to this question is vitally important for the successful and fruitful marketing of any business. No matter if it’s a small local shop that goes online or a large company selling its services worldwide. That’s why today we’re talking all about lead scoring - a system of classification leads.
Lead scoring is important to qualify how near the lead is to our ideal buyer and wherein the buying process is the lead situated. Lead nurturing is all the actions and efforts to move the potential client through our buying process stages. The goal is to convert a lead to a customer.
Carla Rodriguez, SoftwareSupp CRM Freelancer
Lead scoring is a crucial practice in inbound marketing. It’s the process of assigning attributes to each lead you’re generating for your business. Usually, these values are converted to numerical points, so it’s easier to compare the results of each lead. To put it simply, lead scoring looks like a race: those prospects that score the highest number are the closest to make a purchase.
Lead scoring usually comes in when the company starts making more money and generating more and more leads. At this point, you should be able to differentiate between prospects who will unlikely turn into customers not to waste your resources.
Let’s now look in detail at the pros of lead scoring to understand better how it works.
After lead scoring, you have a clear picture of your leads at the moment and know how many of them will likely convert into clients. Consequently, you understand where and how you should improve your marketing strategy.
Lead scoring shows specific issues that need to be fixed. In such a way, you don’t spend money on marketing and sales randomly. Indeed, you invest in those strategies and approaches that will bring visible results.
With lead scoring, you can see at what exact stage of the sales process each prospect is. It’s much easier to sell to leads that are ready to make a purchase and, as a result, generate more money for the company.
There are two ways you can do lead scoring. Let’s have a closer look at them:
This method is based on pure data analysis. You count all the scores your lead gets based on the given attributes and receive a specific amount. Depending on this number, the prospect can either pass to the next sales stage (if it turns out to be a prospective customer) or still has to gain the necessary score. The threshold (number of scores needed) for the lead to convert to the client is agreed upon by the marketing and sales teams of the company.
This approach appeared later than the traditional lead scoring method. Predictive lead scoring became possible, to a great extent, due to machine learning and AI. It works based on an algorithm: the approximate score of a perfect prospect is calculated based on the company information and big data. Then, all the incoming leads are scored against this calculated score of an ideal lead profile. It helps to determine which prospects are most likely to convert into customers.
Let’s now move to the criteria based on which you can assign attributes to your leads. These are called lead scoring models and will vary depending on the type of your business and target clients. Each company has to decide which models work best for them to convert leads into customers. One more essential factor here is how to gather the necessary information from your potential clients. Usually, it can be done by analyzing the questionnaires they fill in on landing pages. Here are the most common metrics that can be used for most businesses:
This factor means a lot in understanding who is a buyer persona for the service you provide and what he wants. If you’re selling to a specific category of customers (students, for example) or deliver only in one area, give points to all leads that fit in. It’s quite unlikely that people older than 40 will purchase goods for students or those living in France will become your clients if you only deliver products within Germany.
How prospects interact with the company’s website tells a lot about where and how they can convert into clients. When leads are getting familiar with your business, they can take the further actions:
You can assign as many points as you want with each value depending on the type of your company and marketing funnels. In total, the picture can look like this:
What pages and how many times do leads visit before becoming customers?
What offers and how many of them do your leads download?
The type of web pages and the number of visits are the indicators of what content and marketing techniques work best to turn leads into customers.
Email subscription looks like a solid decision to get to know more about the services the company provides. Thus, you can give more points to the website visitors who sign up for the newsletter.
The actions we discussed in the previous part are not the same as engagement. Engagement defines how long the leads are consuming your content (for instance, how much time they spend reading blogs or emails).
The general rule is that the more time a lead stays on the website - the more likely they’ll become a client.
Check if your leads react to your posts on social media channels (Facebook, LinkedIn, Twitter, Instagram, etc). If they are engaged with your brand on social networks, it shows how interested they are in your services. Did they like or repost anything? Give them a few points for this activity.
These are the funnels through which prospects get to know about your company and services. The most popular lead sources are:
Start with your buyers’ journey and look at their first point of contact. It will help to analyze what content and lead sources are the most effective for sales. Some web pages, for example, will raise leads' interest in your product, while others can leave them unresponsive.
Of course, for each business, the importance of each particular lead source will vary. To be more precise, it all depends on your target audience. Let’s say, you’re selling to zoomers mostly. No wonder that investing in radio and developing this lead source will be ineffective as teenagers rarely listen to it.
So, how lead scoring looks in practice? We’ll explain based on the BANT framework that is used by most sales teams in all industries all over the world.
BANT stands for budget, authority, needs, and timing, and all of them are used to qualify leads. A common practice is to consider a prospect viable if they satisfy at least three out of four BANT criteria. We’re cracking all of them below:
Find out whether the lead can afford the product or service you’re offering. Learn all about their budget and flexibility when it comes to money. You can also think about special pricing if you really want to keep the lead and let them continue with the buyer’s journey. However, if your prospect is not ready to spend enough funds on your product, it’s better not to invest time, effort, and resources to move them to the next sales stage.
Is a lead in charge of making decisions and purchases? Or are they simply looking around and gathering information about what’s available on the market? Or do they need to consult a group of stakeholders or other team members before finalizing the deal? If the lead does not have enough authority, you might be wasting your time. Try to discover who’s a real decision-maker and make them part of the sales process. In such a way, the chances of successful purchases will increase significantly.
Does your prospective customer really need your product or service? Ask them about the challenges they’re facing and issues they’re seeking to resolve. If your product cannot solve this problem, don’t push the sales process further. .
Are your leads ready to make a purchase within the next few months or they will only do this in a year? It’s not worth hunting your prospects down and pushing them into buying something if they have no such intentions. On the contrary, you can pause the sales process a bit and communicate with them later. One more tip here would be suggesting a time-limited offer to create the feeling of urgency. Thus, leads will be more motivated to make a purchase in the nearest time.
In other words, it’s the process of building and developing relationships with your leads throughout each sales stage. We’re now talking about lead nurturing because it’s a complex approach that includes lead scoring. It’s important to understand that you cannot push a lead to purchase your services all of a sudden. Conversely, you need to guide them carefully during the whole sales process and nurture trusting friendly relationships. Even if a purchase doesn’t happen, such a lead will still have positive experience with your company and can come back in the future or recommend you to friends/family/etc.
All in all, lead scoring is not the only tactic to keep in mind to generate sales and boost your revenue. Lead nurturing also includes:
All of these are interconnected and when combined all together bring tremendous results both for your business and clients.
5 min read
How to reduce the IT specialist recruitment costs and speed up the process. Find out that 30% of tasks in your business can be automated.
The world is changing. But the IT industry is changing even more. From year to year, it affects other businesses that want or must develop technologically. It has been confirmed that work automation has a significant impact on the efficiency of an employee.
Sounds interesting, right? Now think about what can be improved in your company? What tasks consume these 48 hours of work?
The data shows that it is worth investing in work automation. Now the question is how to do it.
Can I hire an IT specialist for a company that will improve the internal system?
Following this point, you would also need to hire a marketing specialist to improve the efficiency of your campaigns. In addition, it is worth thinking about an extra person who would improve the performance of the website. But okay, don't go too far. Suppose you only want to improve the internal system. We will analyze how long such a process takes and, above all, how much it costs.
The first thing that we need to calculate is the expense of publishing the job advertisement for an IT specialist. A job ad that will be visible to a specific audience of employees on Linkedin costs $ 5-12 per day. It depends on the type of offer. It means that we have to count from $ 150- $ 360 a month. On the popular polish website- pracuj.pl, the price of listing an advertisement ranges from 15-150$ per month. On this website, the most frequently chosen option is 90$. At Jooble, the minimum cost is min 30$, which increases with the level of interest in the offer. The website Indeed suggests spending $3 a day on publishing an active ad. It means that the weekly expense of searching for an employee on a reputable website is $ 22.50 because the price may increase depending on the activity. On Glassdoor, the cost is between $ 65 and $ 199 per job posting. Most employers depend on time, so they decide to publish on many portals.
Do not forget to count also the time spent on looking for an employee. The average time needed to find an employee is 33-49 days. But it is not uncommon for the process to extend up to 3 months. It is related to a series of meetings that you need to prepare for. According to Eurostat, the average salary in Europe in 2020 was $ 33 per hour, which is about $ 5280 a month. Of course, this amount varies by region and industry. However, it does not change that the month of working time devoted to looking for an employee costs money.
The onboarding process is another expense included in the company's development. The process of introducing a new employee may take up to 90 days - as long as the trial period. Let also take into account that it is a time of numerous internal training. In summary, the recruitment process is very time-consuming and expensive.
You would like to hire a person to automate processes in the internal system in the company.
By theorizing, you decide on SoftwareSupp services. You connect with SoftwareSupp, describe your needs briefly. SoftwareSupp finds you a suitable IT specialist in about 24 hours. Moreover, the expert is immediately ready to work for you. You are arranging a meeting with each other. He is experienced in the implementation of such projects, so he knows exactly what to ask and what you will need. The dedicated specialist tells you what CRM system fits your company and what integrations will be necessary. The expert creates a list of tasks to be implemented for CRM integration, which he writes down on your project board. You get information on how long this implementation will take and the expert gets to work. Moreover, you can be 100% sure of the qualifications of the employed person.
Each SoftwareSupp expert is certified. The certification process consists of checking technical skills as well as identity and communication abilities. The verification is a five steps process. Only after completing them, the freelancer can join the project. Thanks to this, we can be sure that the specialist employed on the platform will perform top-quality work.
By cooperating with SoftwareSupp, you can ask for sample projects that your expert has carried out. You can be sure that the project will be completed on time. In the event of a mishap, we guarantee project continuity. You will not have to worry that the employee will find a more favorable job offer. SoftwareSupp ensures security in all respects.
Moreover, you only pay for the completed job based on the regular invoice. What is more, during the implementation, you can add tasks or hire an additional expert to help with other cases. On the project board, you can monitor the status of completing tasks. You know exactly at what stage the work is at.
As part of our Terms & Conditions, a confidentiality agreement is signed electronically. The agreement covers business-related matters - our and expert's responsibilities, NDA, copyright, possible complaints. So your company's interests are secured.
After cooperation with us on company technological development, the clients enjoy 2x growth in leads' volume and an increase in deals' conversion by 100%. Best of all, customers save several hours a day thanks to work automation.
SoftwareSupp and their expert helped us integrate two core systems for our day-to-day marketing, our CRM system and email marketing. This has helped with the efficiency of sales and marketing working together and giving both teams the complete oversight of prospect activity. The integration team were professional and very easy to deal with, no questions were too difficult or silly. I’m very happy to have ongoing support from SoftwareSupp
Emma Dolby Marketing Manager, Direct Air
Now let's compare SoftwareSupp with an employment agency. Among all the elements provided by SoftwareSupp, the agency's offer covers only the field: legal assurance and quality + project continuity.
At SoftwareSupp, we don't limit ourselves.
In our database, we have experts in various software, programming languages, and technological skills. Depending on your needs and industry, we select people based on experience, language, and demographics. It may happen that we do not have an software expert in our database because you need a specialist for something completely new or niche. Nevertheless, within 72h you will get an IT specialist ready to work on your project.
At the moment, our database of experts includes 276 people. We can help you develop your business, improve your work, increase the quality and performance of your website, and strengthen your market position.
Get inspired by the technological development of other companies and find a field to show off in your industry. There is still much to be achieved. Remember that your competition may already use new technological solutions. Don't let yourself be left behind.
7 min read
Magento developer created dedicated events to make the plugin work better and be more powerful. Check out how Rana developed the Smartech plugin and prepared it for Magento marketplace requirements.
Time of the project: 3 weeks
Scope:
Effect: Custom development of the Smartech plugin provided by Netcore. Creating dedicated events to make the plugin work better and be more powerful.
Every successful and prudent company tracks user behavior and then responsibly stores and uses the collected data for marketing and business development purposes. Here's why Netcore needed our assistance to create a dedicated and powerful plugin for ecommerce owners who have websites and want to mark interesting events on those sites.
So, the project includes expert support in planning, development, and configuration of a custom Smartech Netcore plugin that can be installed on Magento websites. It captures all events performed by users and then enables marketing, tracking, and automation.
First, we started with additional planning and work breakdown to the already defined scope with the client. We made sure to incorporate Magento plugin development best practices from both a technical and business perspective so that the plugin would be easily scalable.
We've done all the necessary research and used the best approaches compared to other existing plugins and marketing automation solutions in the market.
Magento developer performed a complete plugin development, consisting of upgrading an existing plugin and creating some brand-new features and "events" from scratch.
The project was dynamic and had to run smoothly, so our client required a full-time commitment. We ensured that the team was highly engaged and provided overall support to the client. In addition, our expert gave the necessary guidance and iterated tasks to complete the project successfully.
Magento is the software chosen for this custom plugin development project. It's an ecommerce platform built on open source technology that provides online merchants with a flexible shopping cart system. The Smartech plugin had to be compatible with this platform and meet its requirements.
Before we get into the details of what we developed for this particular project, let's discuss the plugin itself in a little more detail. Smartech is Netcore's flagship product. It's an AI-powered marketing platform that helps you listen to your customers, analyze their behavior, and boost conversions.
Now, picture this: An end-user wants to buy something on your ecommerce site, and you've already added some events. So, you can actively track all the page data, such as product name, product ID, product specs, etc. All this information about clicks or scrolls made on your Magento website is sent to Smartech to help you target the end-user with relevant communication and upsell or cross-sell your products.
Smartech is an all cloud-based omnichannel marketing automation solution that offers marketers an engagement platform across different channels, such as email, SMS, voice, social, web, or app. To wrap up, Smartech Netcore is a well-known plugin among marketers and product managers worldwide, which is available on the Magento marketplace.
Now, for easier understanding of the project goals, below you can find a summary of the technical background of Netcore's Smartech plugin prepared by magento developer:
1. The plugin had to have admin configurations to Inject the Smartech API key and details. Any updates or migrations within the plugin were possible through the Magento website. As a result, we needed a clear confirmation every time we wanted to integrate the Smartech plugin with Magento. The SoftwareSupp expert needed to synchronize data between Magento and Smartech, and this synchronization was done through authentication API keys and some other information from the Magento website.
2. Magento JavaScript had to import external Smartech JavaScript. Magento is built based on modules. A module is a logical group or a directory containing blocks, controllers, helpers, models related to a specific business feature. So, the SoftwareSupp expert took advantage of this capability and added Smartech JavaScript in one of the modules. The JavaScript that we've added was responsible for collecting and exchanging all the data. We've placed a JavaScript file in the module that captures the events in the client's server when the user browses the web page. Then, all the data collected through the JavaScript file was sent to Smartech.
3. Smartech JavaScript had to be included in the Magento frontend pages and fetch data in every page header. So, this JavaScript file must have been available on every page of the Magento ecommerce website.
4. Data was fetched and sent to Smartech based on Magento frontend events.
5. Synchronization of historical data from Magento to Netcore Smartech. This included orders, customers, catalogs, and abandoned carts.
6. Real-time data synchronization. This includes checkout, purchase orders and abandoned cart.
Overall, the plugin is available for Magento websites. All the data from your Magento site is sent directly to the Smartech plugin to serve marketing purposes in a big way. Download the plugin and use it to track and engage your end-users.
Our client already had a partially-realised plugin and asked us to update it. They prepared a list of features, events, and additional attributes that should be included in the Smartech. Before implementation, the plugin offered only a few attributes, and we wanted to make it more useful and attractive.
The events we're about to go into were meant to run in the background and then capture and summarize all the end-user requests. So, when they browse and search for a product, the browser passes the information to the Smartech plugin through Magento. Now let's dive into the custom events for this project and explore some of them.
There were different sets of event categories and attributes. Our client wanted to make sure that tracking was, well, everywhere: From the home page to subsequent listing pages and shopping cart pages. It was necessary to capture data on every page to make sure nothing was missed and that Smartech was, in fact, an effective solution.
Here are the examples of event categories that have been implemented by Certified Magento developer:
These are just a few of the events that we've been able to implement. The point is, we've taken a complete update of the plugin and turned it into a unique tool that enables modern marketers to map the customer journey to deliver a delightful Customer Experience.
If you have an idea for your custom plugin or want to update an existing one: We've got you covered. Hire us to develop or reinforce your digital solution. We will introduce you to the right freelancer matched to your project. Our offer contains estimated time of delivery, costs, and the link to check the expert's profile. After the launch, you can book a call with us and start working on your project immediately.
4 min read
Mautic marketing automation can be helpful in various industries. In this project, SoftwareSupp freelancer improved audience segmentation, e-mail sending, and lead tracking processes for a chemical company.
The client’s company is the first digital marketplace built for chemicals, polymers, and ingredients. Marketplaces have modernized and disrupted major industries.Their value is simple:
for sellers- provides instant customer-facing digital transformation without any capital expense;
for buyers and R&D -provides an unmatched user experience and the tools to search, filter, sample, quote, and purchase from every major producer on earth - all in one place.
NUMBER OF EMPLOYEES: 50-100
Marketing automation is a complex ensemble of activities facilitating the work of marketing activities and team management. Effective automation requires special software to improve sales processes. It is a solution that allows you to collect data about customers and information about transactions. Thanks to this, you can run personalized campaigns. The system enables you to manage data. Moreover, Mautic marketing automation increases the efficiency of sending e-mails, planned campaigns, and analyzing implemented activities.
The company faced incredible growth, huge demands on marketing automation, email marketing, and leads tracking. The issue is combined with the company’s services offering marketing services for their clients who want to reach more customers. Based on previous first-hand experience with the challenges and limitations of other tools, a client needed a flexible, scalable, easy-to-use, and powerful tool to manage their marketing automation challenges on behalf of their clients.
Appropriate software has been selected for the specialized needs of the client: MAUTIC
Mohammad Abu Musa worked with the client to implement Mautic marketing automation tool.
Marketing automation is a broad term, but in this case, we can distinguish between several items:
Mautic marketing automation helped in setting up and executing email campaigns easily, leads tracking, and dynamic content. Further, this software was integrated with their existing products. With a business model reliant on the engagement of both buyers and sellers, the company must nurture two very different audiences. In addition, the client provides marketing services to premium sellers who expect branded and customized campaigns to be served to chemical buyers in specific target industries. It means conceiving, creating, and launching dozens of differently branded campaigns to diverse audience segments, analyzing their results, and optimizing content as needed. Moreover, the company's status as a start-up meant achieving those goals quickly and on a tight budget.
After project realization, the client can set up and execute email campaigns quickly and effectively. The goal was to increase business results. Mautic marketing automation was implemented to improve work, and streamline communication. It resulted in a significant increase in the efficiency of daily tasks. Mautic is a flexible, easy-to-learn, inexpensive, and customizable solution.
Key selling points at this project were:
Presently, the client can quickly and easily launch additional instances for premium sellers that need help nurturing the customers that visit their storefronts. A company can create and serve content on behalf of over a dozen sellers in just 5 months by:
Currently, many sellers' sales forces are grounded in the face of COVID-19. Thus, their sellers can take solace because their products and value props continue to reach existing and potential customers.
Mohammad Abu Musa helped install, maintain, scale, and run different instances for Mautic marketing automation and provide performance enhancements and integrations that did not exist in Mautic. Thanks to the Mautic implementation, the client has gained an intuitive tool that enables the automation of repetitive processes in the marketing department.
In this project, data collection, reporting, and analytics have been improved. Now, a team can manage sales more effectively. Tracking leads makes it possible to observe the path of a potential customer. These and other solutions support the company's development. The implementation of the Mautic software made the time of performing individual tasks shortened to a minimum. Currently, work is done more efficiently. Automation of marketing tasks has a positive effect on the quality of work.
At SoftwareSupp's resources, freelancers can publish their own stories. The contents prove their specific knowledge, experience, and unique skills. Software experts describe their work on projects and present implementations in which they are specialists. Once we heard that the possibility of publishing educational content allows them to get more involved.
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