From the course: Marketing Tools: Automation

Sequences and triggers in automation - MailChimp Tutorial

From the course: Marketing Tools: Automation

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Sequences and triggers in automation

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- The building blocks of automation are sequences and triggers. A sequence is the order of all your steps within an automation. Say, sending an email, updating Salesforce, kicking off a survey, and so on. And a trigger is what tells that sequence that it's time to start. Say, an order is received, a customer requests a refund, or maybe a certain amount of time has passed. It's easier to look at it in context. Let's say, we sell socks through our online store. An example automation sequence might look like this. We ship an order via UPS. We send an email, letting them know the order has arrived. And we send another email requesting that they leave a review. The sequence really isn't all that helpful without triggers. We don't want all of those events to happen simultaneously. So let's look at the triggers we'd use within this automation. A customer places an order which triggers the shipment. The tracking data shows that the order arrives, which triggers the email. We wait three days, which triggers sending the email, asking for that review. You can then even layer in some forks in the road. Let's say, we ask for that review, but the customer doesn't open the email. Well, that can be another trigger to send a follow-up or maybe they open the email, but don't fill out the review, that can trigger an alternative email. Or they do fill out the survey, yet another trigger option. Now this is just one tiny example in the massive sea of automation, but regardless of how complex and sophisticated your automation gets, at the core will always be a sequence that follows a trigger.

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