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Chunk Sending


Chunk sending is a sending process that allows you to send your campaign in smaller batches to optimize your deliverability and create a domain warmup process.

 

  1. Once you create a campaign, you will have the choice for the process between normal sending, chunk sending or predictive sending:
  2. After choosing Chunk Sending, configure the settings:

    –     Start Time
    – End Time
    – Days of execution
    – Hourly send volume: Number of emails to be sent per hour
    – Increase daily volume by: The daily percentage increase from the moment the campaign is launched.
    – Daily limit: The maximum number of emails to be sent each day.
  3. You can pause and edit a campaign if it’s launched to change the Chunk Sending Settings:Note: You can’t edit the lists once you pause and edit a campaign.
    • After editing the campaign, make sure to update it:
    • Finally, resume the campaign:

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How to create a custom Email Template

The platform has a great selection of ready templates as well as content blocks for you to choose from and build awesome looking, responsive designs. You can also build your own layout using components, such as images, videos, countdown, buy now options or just simple old fashion text and call to action buttons.

To create your custom email template, go to Email -> Email Templates -> Create Template

You will be able to choose between three options: upload your email template, design an email template using either the Classic or New Builder, or create a simple email template.

To upload an Email Template, please check this link.

Design an Email Template using the Classic Builder

When choosing a Template Type, Select Classic Builder.

The first step is giving your email template a name.

Next you can start building your template. To do that, from the left menu, you have three options:

  • You can select Templates, this will present you with a group of email templates that we have built for you. You can simply drag and drop them in the right building area. Once you do that you are free to edit the content as you see fit.
  • You can select Pre-Designed Blocks, this one will open up another sub menu for each page block or section (Header, Top Menu, CTA, Footers…) where you can select whatever block you need and drag and drop it in its designated area.
  • You can select Design Elements, and this one will display the available Layout and Components so you can use them to design your own blocks within your email template.

After dragging a block to the right, you will notice each block or section has options on the left menu and on the top to change the style of the block.

Note: You can at any time click on Update to save your changes.

When you finish editing your template, click on Save and Exit to save your changes and exit the builder.

Design an Email Template using the New Builder

When choosing a Template Type, Select New Builder.

From the top menu of the builder, you will have the below options:

  • Background: change the background color of your entire email template.
  • Link: change the color of a link when adding one.
  • Width: Change the width of your email template.
  • Theme: You can select a theme or create a new one where you can setup background and text style to be used by default in your email template.

On the left menu, you can find Elements and Structure to build your template.

After dragging an element to the right, you will notice an option menu on the left to edit its style.

When you finish editing your template, click on Save & Exit to save your changes.

Create a Simple Email Template

The Template is a simple HTML email with simple text. It will be used when creating an email in the Basic Editor.

Give your template a title and create your email body.

Once done, click on Save.

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Pabbly Integration

To install Pabbly’s Integration, go to Integrations, and click on Pabbly:

When you click on Pabbly, a new tab will be opened where you should login:

Sign in to connect Pabbly with your VBOUT account:

You will be able to create workflows:

Choose the trigger.

Then you will have instructions to follow:

Once you set up the trigger, set up the action:

After choosing the action, click Save & Send Test Request or Save:

 

That’s it! The workflow is ready to go.

Below is a list of VBOUT triggers and actions that can be used in Pabbly:

Triggers:

  • New User Joined a List

Actions:

  • Add Contact to List
  • Create Email List
  • Create Email Marketing Campaign
  • Create Social Media Message
  • Get Contact by Email
  • Unsubscribe Contact
  • Update Contact
  • Add Custom Event to a Contact
  • Update Contact with Custom Fields
  • Add Tag to Contact
  • Get List Details with Custom Fields
  • Register Account
  • List Social Media Channels
  • Remove Tag From Contact

Get Started

 

Creating custom form fields

When you create a list, you can customize its fields by going to the Fields & Form:

And choose which fields you’d like to add from here:

If you want to remove a field, rename it, change its placeholder, default value,  make it required or not or hide it from all public forms, click on the arrow next to it and you will  be able to change it:

Once you finish customizing your form, save changes:

Get Started

Elementor Integration

To activate the Elementor Integration, go to Integrations, and click on Elementor Integration.

Please note that Elementor pro is required for the integration.

This will download a zip file, upload it to WordPress.

After uploading the file on WordPress, go to Settings and add the API key:

You can find the API key in VBOUT here:

After creating your form in Elementor, in the Action After Submit, choose VBOUT:

 

Choose the list from VBOUT:

Map the fields:

and the integration will be ready.

Note that the following fields cannot be mapped: Birthday, GDPR and reCaptcha .

Get Started

Automation glossary

Each automation has Triggers and Actions:

Triggers

Triggers are the first step, without Triggers, you can’t apply Actions.

We have a list of Triggers divided into Messages, E-commerce, Contacts, Time Based, and API.

MESSAGES:

  • Opened Email: This Trigger takes action whenever a user had opened an email that you specify.
  • Clicked Link: This Trigger takes action whenever a user clicks a link you specify from the email sent.
  • Replied SMS: This Trigger takes action whenever a user reply to a SMS that you specify.

E-COMMERCE:

  • Abandoned Cart: This triggers actions to do after a visitor abandons the cart. You will choose if the trigger executes 30 Minutes of Adding Their First Product To Cart or 30 Minutes of Adding The Last Product To Cart.
  • Completed Order: This Trigger is executed when a contact completes an order.

CONTACTS:

  • Joined: This Trigger takes action whenever a lead joins a list you specify.
  • Reached Goal: This Trigger takes action whenever a goal that you specify is reached.
  • Custom Event: This trigger is used to create customized events.
    List of available custom event:

    1. Tag Added
    2. Custom API Event
    3. Join List Confirmed
    4. Lead Scoring (Lead Status, Lead Score)
    5. Landing Page Engagement (Page View, Link Clicked)
    6. Website Engagement (Destination URL, Link Clicked)
    7. Email Engagement (Coupon Redeemed, Email Bounced, Contact Unsubscribed)
    8. Ecommerce Fields (Ecommerce fields including Order Transaction Status)
  • Contact Updated: This Trigger takes action whenever a contact field in the specified list(s) is updated.

TIME BASED:

  • Specific Date: This Trigger takes action whenever the date that you’ve specified and assigned list(s), Audience(s), or Push Domains to is reached.
  • RSS Changed: This trigger executes when RSS content is changed. You can choose specific list(s) or audience(s).

API:

  • Contact Update (API): This Trigger takes action whenever a contact field in the specified list(s) is updated via API
  • Webhook: This trigger takes action whenever data is pushed to the platform via a specific webhook.

ACTIONS

List of available actions:

  • Send Email: This action sends a specific automated email that you create.
  • Twilio SMS: This action sends SMS from your configured Twilio Account.
  • Browser Push: This action opens a browser push that you specify.
  • Add to List: This action adds the lead to a specified list.
  • Update Contact: This action updates a certain field of contacts from a specified list.
  • Remove from List: This action removes contacts from a specified list. Be careful with this action because removing a contact will delete all his related email campaign data (i.e. Clicks and open rate).
  • Push to Automation: This action takes the user to another automation that you specify.
  • Pull from Automation: This action removes the user from an automation you specify.
  • Sync to Third Party: This action syncs options from the platform to a third party via API.
  • Notify Team: This action is used to send an Email to notify the team. You simply add the recipients’ emails and the message to be sent.
  • Add Tag: This action adds tag to the contact.
  • Remove Tag: This action removes tag from the contact.
  • Create New Task: This action creates a new task.
  • Add to Task: This action adds to a previously created task.

TIME DELAY:

  • Add Delay: This action adds a delay between a trigger and an action, or an action and an action. You specify the delay that you want.

NOTES:

  • Note: It’s available in case you want to add notes in your workflow.

Target Segment

With smart filters you can create very specific segments of your subscribers, based on multiple criteria from the list, then target those subscribers once the filters you choose apply to them. Filters are mainly used in creating list segments, email automation and lead nurturing automation.

Below are system filters that are essential for lead nurturing:

CONTACT DATA:

First Engagement Date: The system records the first time a user interacted with any of your marketing initiatives, either a website visit, email campaign open or social media clicks.

Last Engagement Date: The system records the last time a user interacted with any of your marketing initiatives, either a website visit, email campaign open or social media clicks. You can use this date and for re-engagement campaigns to target old users who have been inactive for a while.

First Signup Date: This is the date a subscriber signed up to your email list for the first time.

List Signup Date: This is the date a subscriber signed up to a specific email list.

Lead Status: If you have lead scoring setup, you can target leads who match certain lead status you created within the system. Available options will be a drop-down of statuses that you created on the lead configuration page.

Lead Score: Alternative to lead status, you can target users based on their score. Available options are Score Equals to, Score is Greater Than, Score is Less Than, Score is Between [NUMBER X] and [NUMBER Y] where number x and y are numbers you choose.

Tag Name: The tag you had added to your contacts.

Source Landing Page: This is the Landing Page that the user reached (is or is not).

Field Values:

It can be any Default Field or any Custom List Field.

WEBINARS:

Attendance: The contact attended a specific webinar.

Attendance Time: The contact attended of a specific webinar for a specific time.

ECOMMERCE FIELDS:

Billing Country: The contact’s billing country.

Billing State: The contact’s billing state.

Billing City: The contact’s billing city.

Billing Zipcode: The contact’s billing Zipcode.

First Order Date: The contact’s first order date.

Last Abandoned Cart Date: The contact’s last abandoned cart date.

Last Abandoned Cart Total: The contact’s last abandoned cart total amount.

Last Abandoned Category ID: The last abandoned category ID.

Last Abandoned Category Name: The last abandoned category name, for example Phone.

Last Abandoned Product ID: The last abandoned product ID.

Last Abandoned Product Name: The last abandoned product name, for example iPhone.

Last Order Date: The contact’s last order date

Last Order Quantity: The contact’s last order quantity.

Last Order Status: The contact’s last order status, for example processing.

Last Order Total: The contact’s last order total.

Last Ordered Category ID: The contact’s last ordered category ID.

Last Ordered Category Name: The contact’s last ordered category name.

Last Ordered Product ID: The contact’s last ordered product ID.

Last Ordered Product Name: The contact’s last ordered product name.

Last Visited Product ID: The contact’s last visited product ID.

Last Visited Product Name: The contact’s last visited product Name.

Last Visited Category ID: The contact’s last visited category ID.

Last Visited Category Name: The contact’s last visited category name.

Number of Abandoned Carts: The number of  the contact’s abandoned carts.

Ordered Product Expiry Date: The expiry date of the contact’s order product.

Ordered Product Name: The contact’s ordered product name.

Ordered Category Name: The contact’s ordered category name.

Ordered Product ID: The contact’s ordered product ID.

Ordered Category ID: The contact’s ordered category ID.

Promo Code: The promo code used by the contact.

Promo Value: The promo value that the contact used.

Searched Product: The searched products, for example searched for product named blue t-shirt.

Shipping Method: The contact’s shipping method.

Shipping Address Line: The contact’s shipping address line.

Shipping Country: The contact’s shipping country.

Shipping City: The contact’s shipping city.

Shipping State: The contact’s shipping state.

Shipping Zipcode: The contact’s shipping Zipcode.

Shipping Total: The contact’s shipping total amount.

Store Name: The store’s name from which the contact bought or is buying (This is used when you have multiple stores connected to your account).

Total Lifetime Value: The contact’s total lifetime value.

The available options for conditions differ depending on the field type, you can check some of the available option below:

For email address fields:

  • is: value of the text field matches exactly the value you specify.
  • is not: value of the text field does not match the value you specify.
  • contains: value of the text field contains a value you specify.
  • does not contain: value of the text field does not contain a value you specify.
  • start with: value of the text field starts with the value you specify.
  • end with: value of the text field ends with the value you specify.
  • is on a list: contact is on a list you specify.
  • is not on a list: contact is not on a list you specify.
  • triggered a popup: lead or user triggered a popup you specify.
  • did not trigger a popup: lead or user did not trigger a popup you specify.
  • part of an automation: contact is part of an automation you specify.
  • not part of an automation: contact is not part of an automation you specify.
  • reached a goal: lead or user reached a goal you specify.
  • did not reach a goal: lead or user did not reach a goal you specify.
  • is empty: value of the text field is empty.
  • is not empty: value of the text field is not empty.

Available options for all dates fields:

  • is on: rule must match an exact date with one of those formats (month/day – month/day/year – date matching the exact same date field).
  • is not on: rule excludes a particular date with one of the following formats (month/day – month/day/year – date matching the exact same date field).
  • is after: rule must be after a specific date with one of the following formats (month/day – month/day/year – date matching the exact same date field).
  • is after (x) days: specify the number of days after a specific date with one of the following formats (month/day – month/day/year – date matching the exact same date field).
  • is before: rule must be before a specific date with one of the following formats (month/day – month/day/year – date matching the exact same date field).
  • is before (x) days: specify the number of days before a specific date with one of the following formats (month/day – month/day/year – date matching the exact same date field).
  • is between: rule must be between 2 specific dates that follows one of the following formats  (month/day – month/day/year).
  • is today: rule must match today’s date (no format required).

****date matching the exact same date field: this option gives you the flexibility of making the date a variable versus a fixed date you choose. One example is a birthday rule where you configure the filter to look at the subscriber’s birthday date and match if TODAY is 10 days before his birthday date. Another example below if you want to send a re-activation email for those who have not been active for 60 days, you can tell the filter to look at the last engagement date, and if TODAY is 60 days after that date, then match that rule.

Available options for text fields, all dropdowns and radio button fields will be:

  • is: value of the text field matches exactly the value you specify.
  • is not: value of the text field does not match exactly the value you specify.
  • contains: value of the text field contains a value you specify.
  • does not contain: value of the text field does not contain a value you specify.
  • Greater Than: value of the text field is greater than a value you specify.
  • Less Than: value of the text field is less than a value you specify.
  • Is Between: value of the text field is between two values you specify.
  • is empty: value of the text field is empty.
  • is not empty: value of the text field is not empty.

 

OTHER FILTERING OPTIONS:

When you double click on the arrow linking two actions or a trigger and an action, or when you click on the settings gear:

You will be prompted with the following:

Note that you will be able to add different conditions separated by AND/ OR condition.

CONTACT DATA:

  • Field value: User default or list field value.
  • First Engagement Date: The first time a user interacted with any of your marketing initiatives, either a website visit, email campaign open or social media clicks.
  • Last Engagement Date: The last time a user interacted with any of your marketing initiatives, either a website visit, email campaign open or social media clicks.
  • First Signup Date: The first time a subscriber signed up to your platform.
  • List Signup Date: The first time a subscriber signed up to your email list.
  • Lead Status: Target leads who match certain lead status you created within the system.
  • Lead Score: Target users based on their score.
  • Tag Name: The tag you had added to your contacts.
  • Joined List: User joins a particular contact list.
  • Not on List: User is not on a particular contact list.

WEBSITE ENGAGEMENT:

  • Destination URL: User visits a particular page on your website.
  • Duration on Site: User spends a certain amount of time on your website.
  • Number of pages visited: User visits a certain number of pages on your website.
  • Link Clicked: User clicks on a certain link on your website.
  • Video Watched: User watches a certain Youtube or Vimeo video on your website.
  • Form Submitted: User submits a form on your website – Must obtain the form id.
  • Goal Triggered: User reaches a particular Conversion Goal.
  • Popup Triggered: User triggers a site popup.

LANDING PAGE ENGAGEMENT:

  • Page View: User views a certain Landing Page.
  • Link Clicked: User clicks on a certain link on your Landing Page.
  • Link Not Clicked: User does not click on a certain link on your Landing Page.

EMAIL ENGAGEMENT:

  • Email Open: User opens any or a particular email marketing campaign sent.
  • Email Unopened: User does not open any or a particular email marketing campaign sent.
  • Link Clicked: User clicks on any or specific link inside an email campaign.
  • Link Not Clicked: User does not click on any or specific link inside an email campaign.
  • Unsubscribed: User unsubscribes from a list – Could be a negative value.
  • Hard Bounce: A Hard Bounce registered for a particular user – Ex: Email does not exist – Could be a negative value. Here is a list of email bounce codes.
  • Soft Bounce: A Soft Bounce registered for a user – Ex: Email Inbox Temporarily Full – Could be a negative value. Here is a list of email bounce codes.

SMS ENGAGEMENT:

  • Link Clicked: User clicks on a link from an SMS you have sent.
  • Link Not Clicked: User does not click on a link from an SMS you have sent.
  • Reply Intent: User reply with specific intent to an SMS you have sent.

BROWSER PUSH ENGAGEMENT:

  • Webpush Subscribed: When a user becomes a subscriber by accepting to receive Browser Push notifications.
  • Webpush Blocked: When a user ignores receiving Browser Push notifications.
  • Link Clicked: User clicks on a link from a Browser Push.
  • Link Not Clicked: User does not click on a link from a Browser Push.

AUTOMATION:

  • Automation Triggered: User is at a particular stage of an automation.

WEBINARS:

  • Attendance: The contact attended a specific webinar.
  • Attendance Time: The contact attended  a specific webinar for a specific time.

GENERAL FILTERS:

  • By Device: User’s visited your site on a PC, Mobile or a Tablet.
  • By Device OS: User’s visited your site from Android, Windows, iPhone, MacOS.
  • By Location: User’s country and state match your defined criteria.
  • By UTM Source: User’s campaign source matches your defined criteria.
  • By UTM Campaign: User’s campaign matches your defined criteria.
  • By UTM Term: User’s campaign term matches your defined criteria.
  • By UTM Medium: User’s medium matches your defined criteria.
  • By UTM Content: User’s content matches your defined criteria.
  • By Track Social Referral: User’s track social referral matches your defined criteria.

E-COMMERCE:

  • Billing Country: The contact’s billing country.
  • Billing State: The contact’s billing state.
  • Billing City: The contact’s billing city.
  • Billing Zipcode: The contact’s billing Zipcode.
  • First Order Date: The contact’s first order date.
  • Last Abandoned Cart Date: The contact’s last abandoned cart date.
  • Last Abandoned Cart Total: The contact’s last abandoned cart total amount.
  • Last Abandoned Category ID: The last abandoned category ID.
  • Last Abandoned Category Name: The last abandoned category name, for example Phone.
  • Last Abandoned Product ID: The last abandoned product ID.
  • Last Abandoned Product Name: The last abandoned product name, for example iPhone.
  • Last Order Date: The contact’s last order date
  • Last Order Quantity: The contact’s last order quantity.
  • Last Order Status: The contact’s last order status, for example processing.
  • Last Order Total: The contact’s last order total.
  • Last Ordered Category ID: The contact’s last ordered category ID.
  • Last Ordered Category Name: The contact’s last ordered category name.
  • Last Ordered Product ID: The contact’s last ordered product ID.
  • Last Ordered Product Name: The contact’s last ordered product name.
  • Last Visited Product ID: The contact’s last visited product ID.
  • Last Visited Product Name: The contact’s last visited product Name.
  • Last Visited Category ID: The contact’s last visited category ID.
  • Last Visited Category Name: The contact’s last visited category name.
  • Number of Abandoned Carts: The number of  the contact’s abandoned carts.
  • Ordered Product Expiry Date: The expiry date of the contact’s order product.
  • Ordered Product Name: The contact’s ordered product name.
  • Ordered Category Name: The contact’s ordered category name.
  • Ordered Product ID: The contact’s ordered product ID.
  • Ordered Category ID: The contact’s ordered category ID.
  • Promo Code: The promo code used by the contact.
  • Promo Value: The promo value that the contact used.
  • Searched Product: The searched products, for example searched for product named blue t-shirt.
  • Shipping Method: The contact’s shipping method.
  • Shipping Address Line: The contact’s shipping address line.
  • Shipping Country: The contact’s shipping country.
  • Shipping City: The contact’s shipping city.
  • Shipping State: The contact’s shipping state.
  • Shipping Zipcode: The contact’s shipping Zipcode.
  • Shipping Total: The contact’s shipping total amount.
  • Store Name: The store’s name from which the contact bought or is buying (This is used when you have multiple stores connected to your account).
  • Total Lifetime Value: The contact’s total lifetime value.

Get Started

E-commerce integration


Automated E-commerce has many benefits such as increasing sales, loyalty and customer retention, and LTV (life time value). There are several advantages when choosing to integrate your E-commerce website with VBOUT, using the shared data, you will be able to send your customers post-purchase offers, suggested products, cart abandonment reminders, loyalty campaigns, referral requests and much more as well as using the data for internal processing such as notifying a team member of a purchase. To integrate your e-commerce website with VBOUT, go to Settings, Website Tracking Code, click on Show Domain Settings and toggle Activate Ecommerce Tracking on:

After this, you will be able to see the Product Feed:

You can add products manually or mass import them by following the sample given:

Go to Integrations and download your shop’s integration:

If you’re not using any of these shops, you can add the codes from the library by following this documentation:

Get Started

Getting started with Pipeline Manager

Pipeline Manager is an Add-On that must be installed or part of your plan.

You can install the Add-On from here.

Go to Pipeline Manager, and create your Board:

Click New Task to create a Task:

You will see the following where you should fill in:

  • The Task Name
  • Assign to Teammates: where you choose to which teammates you’re going to assign the task
  • Task Type: You get to choose among many options such as Moderation, Deal, Lead Management…
  • Boards: Where you choose from the Task Boards you’ve previously added.
  • Stages: Which stage is the task in? In Review, In Progress, In Queue, Completed.
  • Task Description: Add text and attachments to describe your task.
  • Date and Time of creating the Task, and its Duration.
  • Enable Email update: choose whether to receive email notifications for Task updates.

NOTE: If you choose the Task Type Deal, you can add an amount with the default currency of your account:

This is how your task will appear:

Change Assignee by clicking on the current user “Me” and choose another user.

 

Get Started

Shopify integration

Integrate your Shopify with VBOUT in one click and start your e-commerce marketing automation in minutes.

Before you install the add-on, make sure you have an active Shopify store.

Go to the Integrations and click on Shopify integration.

You will be redirected to Shopify store to add VBOUT Ecommerce Marketing app.

Click on Add app, enter your Shopify account credential and choose the store you like to connect.

Afterwards, you will be asked to connect your VBOUT account. Choose Connect existing account.

Connect your account, make sure to use your VBOUT login email.

Choose your settings and your sync options. Once done, click on Save.

    

After that, you will be able to see the Shopify store in your Integration tab in VBOUT account.

Finally, add the tracking code to your website by following the below steps. Adding this code, allow you to track your clients’ website activities.

Go to Settings -> Website tracking Code, click on Show embed code next to your website store.

Copy the code and paste it into the theme.liquid in your Shopify store.

Once Done, Click on Verify Installation and the website should be verified.

Get Started

WooCommerce integration

To integrate WooCommerce with VBOUT, follow these steps:

  1. Download the WooCommerce VBOUT plugin.
  2. Install the plugin to your WordPress admin panel. For instructions on installing plugin please visit this page:
  3. Once the plugin is active, visit your WooCommerce🡪Settings page.

  4. Go to the Integrations tab and fill out the plugin details. You can get access to your API key from the VBOUT API page:

  5. Any customers added will sync in your E-Commerce List in VBOUT.
  6. If you wish to synchronize old records, prior to installing the plugin, choose the option “Existing Customers and Existing Products”.

  7. Once you click SAVE, the screen will refresh and will prompt you to map your WooCommerce integration settings on VBOUT in the following page.

Get Started

Activate Two-Factor email authentication

You can activate Two-Factor email authentication by going to Settings, Security, and toggle on Turn On Two-Factor Email Authentication, then click Save:

Once the option is on, when you login, you will be redirected to this screen:

You will receive the code by email, copy and paste it and you will be able to access your account:

 

Get Started

Synchronize user data using automation

The Sync to Third Party Automation Action should be used to push Contact Data from the platform to an API listener page on your server. You can in turn insert this data into your database or to your CRM, given it has its own api.

This listener is a web page or web application you create on your server that is always active and has code that allows it to accept and verify “contact” data sent from the platform, This listener then invokes backend services on your server, based on the information received.

You have 3 options to sync your data:

1- Retargeting Audience: Facebook Ads and Google Adwords.

Choose an audience to sync your contact to.

2- Native Integration: Salesforce, Hubspot, etc.

Choose one of the sync that you have already created in one of the connectors. Please note that the sync type should be Automation (Generates URL).

3- Webhook: Your own URL.

Add your Webhook URL, choose what to sync, the sending method and the Data content type.

How it works

  1. Create a private file on your server that is not publicly accessible to front-end users. The custom listener code will be added to this file (more explanation below).
  2. On the automation action, choose Synch Contact to Third Party, choose which marketing data to synchronize and insert the path to the file created in step 1.
  3. The platform will automatically send the marketing data to you each time a contact matches the automation rules specified.
  4. The platform sends a FORM POST containing contact information appended to the URL.
  5. The API listener (code sample included below) detects and processes the data.
  6. The API listener page must contain a custom script that waits for the messages, and then passes them to various backend applications for processing.

List of available marketing data

There are two ways to sync the data from the platform to the third party app.

  1. Using GET as in this example: https://www.example.com/?param1=[#SHORTCODE-1#]&param2=[#SHORTCODE_2#]&… where [#…#] are the custom fields shortcodes from the list you are targeting within the journey. These shortcodes will hold the values of the contact that reached that action, within the journey. The URL would be your receiving end of the API. Note you can use our shortcode library to manipulate the shortcodes, ex: [#PROPER EMAIL/2#] and there are no limits on the number of fields you can pass.
  2. Using POST request in the following order: 
    Array
(
    [transactionid] => 123456789
    [contact] => Array()
    [fields] => Array()
    [campaigns-opened] => Array()
    [links-clicked] => Array()
    [pages-visited] => Array()
    [automation-triggered] => Array()
    [goals-reached] => Array()
    [webhooks-triggered] => Array()
    [lead-score] => Array()
    [lead-status] => Array()
)

Basic Information: ‘contact’

This field contains basic contact information such id, email address and phone number as Array:

Array
(
    [id] => Contact's ID
    [email] => Contact's E-mail Address
    [phone] => Contact's Phone
    [profile_url] => Contact's Profile Page
)

Custom Fields: ‘fields’

This field contains an array list of arrays of the custom fields for the contact:

Array
(
    [id] => Field ID
    [name] => Field name
    [value] => Contact's field value
)

Email Campaigns Open: ‘campaigns-opened’

This field contains an array list of arrays of the campaigns opened by the contact:

Array
(
    [id] => Campaign ID
    [name] => Campaign name
    [open_date] => Contact's open campaign date/time
)

Links Clicked: ‘links-clicked’

This field contains an array list of arrays of the links clicked by the contact:

Array
(
    [url] => Link url
    [clicks] => Contact's total clicks
)

Pages Visited: ‘pages-visited’

This field contains an array list of arrays of the pages visited by the contact:

Array
(
    [page] => Page url
    [visit_date] => Contact's page visit date/time
)

Automation Triggered: ‘automation-triggered’

This field contains an array list of arrays of the automation workflows triggered by the contact:

Array
(
    [id] => Automation ID
    [name] => Automation name
    [trigger_date] => Contact's automation triggered date/time
)

Goals Reached: ‘goals-reached’

This field contains an array list of arrays of the goals reached by the contact:

Array
(
    [id] => Goal ID
    [name] => Goal name
    [reach_date] => Contact's goal reached date/time
)

Webhooks Triggered: ‘webhooks-triggered’

This field contains an array list of arrays of the webhooks triggered by the contact:

Array
(
    [id] => Webhook ID
    [name] => Webhook name
    [trigger_date] => Contact's webhook triggered date/time
)

Lead Score: ‘lead-score’

This field contains an array list of arrays of the lead scoring reached by the contact:

Array
(
    [id] => Score ID
    [name] => Score name
    [score] => Score value
    [score_date] => Contact's score triggered date/time
)

Lead Status: ‘lead-status’

This field contains an array list of arrays of the lead status reached by the contact:

Array
(
    [score] => Contact's total score
    [label] => Contact's score label
)

Update contact from response

You have the option to update your contact info based on the API response.

Turn on the Update contact from response option and choose the key response you need to map to a contact field.

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How to manage client billing information?

You can manage your client’s billing information by going to Partner Portal > Accounts > choose the Account and choose Billing Details from the drop-down menu:

In the Payment Method section, choose whether to Add a Payment Method or Use the Agency’s card:

In the Invoices section, you will see all of your client’s invoices:

In the Manage Addons section, you can buy Add-ons for your client:

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KonnectzIT integration

KonnectzIT is an app that allows you to Integrate third-party apps with your VBOUT account.

To connect KonnectzIT, go to Integrations and click on KonnectzIT:

It will open KonnectzIT where you should login, go to Apps, search for VBOUT and click on it:

It will open a pop-up to add the API key:

You can get the key from your account’s Settings, API:

Once you add the API key and click on Yes, continue, VBOUT will become an authorized app and you will be able to use KonnectzIT with your VBOUT account:

Below is a list of VBOUT triggers and actions that can be used in KonnectzIT:

Triggers:

  • New User

Actions:

  • Create Email Marketing Campaign
  • Create Social Media Message
  • Add Custom Event to a Contact
  • Create Contact to List
  • Create Email List
  • Update Contact

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FTP Integration

To integrate FTP with VBOUT, go to Integrations and click on FTP Sync:

Note that FTP Sync is an add-on that you should purchase or have as a part of your plan.

Go to Connectors and click Create Sync:

Choose whether you want to create the Sync from VBOUT to FTP:

Choose the sync type: One Time, Hourly, Daily, Weekly, or Monthly.

Source Contact List: From which list on VBOUT.

Export Fields: Choose which fields you want to export from the list that you selected on VBOUT.

Destination FTP Account: Connect your account or choose a connected account.

File Name: Give the exported list a name.

Toggle on the ones that you want:

  • Override files with same name?
  • Add date stamp to file name?
  • Use field IDs instead of labels for excel header row?

or from FTP to VBOUT:

Sync Type: One Time, Hourly, Daily, Weekly, or Monthly.

If Record Exists? Update or Skip

Source FTP Account: Choose or connect the FTP account.

File Name and File Format.

Import Fields: Choose which fields to import.

Destination Contact List: Create or choose a list from VBOUT.

New Contact Status: Choose the status of the contact that is synced (active, bounced, unsubscribed, unconfirmed).

 

Check below some of the most repeated questions:

Q: FTP download supports JSON format. Does SFTP download supports JSON as well?
A: JSON format is supported in addition to CSV, XLS, XLSX

Q: I see CSV as the only Upload format, does this mean that the format should exactly be the same as the Downloaded CSV for a list?
A: The uploaded file may not be the same as the downloaded file, it could be in a different format or different columns. But it is important to have the mapping fields for the uploaded format to be correct.

Q: Does the order of the columns matter in the Upload CSV file? Is adding all the columns mandatory in the CSV while uploading?
A: Yes, once the sync is created based on the existing excel/CSV file in the FTP host, all future files should have the same columns in the same order.
When creating a sync, you can choose which columns you want to import from. The remaining columns (not selected in the sync mapping) will be ignored.

Q: I believe the CSV column heading should be id, email, fields IDs. Is it correct?
A: You can name the column heading as you want. Once the sync is created you will have to stick to those headings and can’t change them as our platform will use those as reference.

Q: Can you please provide some estimate about how long will it take to sync lists like account with 250,000+ records?
A: The estimation about how long will it take varies a lot because it does not only depends on the number of records but also on the number of columns each record has.

 

 

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Creating Gated Forms

Creating Gated Forms inside the File Manager:

To create gated forms inside the File Manager, right click on the item and choose Create Gated Form:
Note that it is the better option if the form needs to be linked to multiple downloadable files or if we are on the go.

A screen will pop-up to configure the form, Select the list, give it a name for your reference (Form Name), a name for the contacts (Form Title), tags, which fields to show, and if you want to store the file’s URL in a Custom Field:

Note that if you map the URL field to a custom hidden field, you will be able to then add it to an automation as a shortcode:

Once you click Submit, the form will be ready, you will have its link:

Afterwards, you can right click and choose Show Gated Forms, to Edit or Delete the Form:

Note: The generated file URLs are cookied therefore, if someone downloads the form once and try to revisit the page again, it will skip the form and take them to the download directly, unless the cookie is cleared.

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Insightly Integration

To install Insightly integration, go to Integrations, and click on Insightly.

Note that Insightly is an add-on, if it’s not part of your plan, you should purchase it:

Go to Social, and add your Insightly account:

Fill in the required information:

Once you have connected your Insightly account, you can go to Contacts, Connectors and choose Insightly or from the Integrations tab choose Insightly, and click on Create Sync:

Once you created syncs, you will see them here:

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Social Media Streams Management


Engagement inbox allows you to track engagement for a group of social media accounts

You can access engagement inbox by going to: Social > Streams > Groups and select a group:

Click on filter to decide:

  • Order items: Newest first or Oldest first.
  • Select channels: which social channels you want to see engagement stream from.
    Note: Pinterest is not supported here.
  • Select streams:
    Facebook: Timeline Activities, Messages, Reviews, Tagged Posts .
    Instagram: Comments, Tagged Posts, Messages.
    LinkedIn: Comments.
    YouTube: Comments.
  • Items from the past: 24 hours, 7 Days, 30 Days, 90 Days.
  • Show archived.

After clicking apply, you will see the engagement inbox stream:

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How to create a plain text email campaign

To create your campaign using the plain text editor, once you reach the design section, choose Basic Editor:

You will be redirected to the editor where you can create your campaign via coding:

 

Or you can design your campaign using these tools:

Or you can choose one of the template you have previously created:

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Using Custom SMTP

Custom SMTP allows you to use your own SMTP while sending from the platform, using your own IP pools.

In the following documentation, the following is covered:

  • Configuring Custom SMTP
  • Custom SMTP and Agency accounts
  • How Custom SMTP is applied within your account

Configuring Custom SMTP

Custom SMTP is an Add-on that you must install or have it as part of your plan:

Once installed, you can access the Custom SMTP under Settings to configure it:

Click on Add Custom SMTP, you will have 3 choices:

  • Sparkpost
  • Sendgrid
  • Custom

For Sparkpost or Sendgrid, you are able to either use the SMTP credentials or the API key/credentials:

The difference between Sparkpost and Sendgrid is that on Sparkpost you can choose the default IP pool.

Usually, the provider tries to send from the API key, if they weren’t able to, they will revert to the SMTP, that’s why some users may want to add both API credentials and SMTP credentials, however, you can choose to add only one of the two.

Note that when you want to use API credentials, these 2 are essential to be chosen, otherwise, the custom SMTP won’t connect:

For Custom SMTP, you are only able to add the SMTP credentials:

After filling the SMTP credentials or API key, you will have to add the email address:

NOTE: Make sure that the email address is valid (verified) to use with your SMTP provider, otherwise you won’t be able to add the Custom SMTP and will face an error:

This email address will be used for testing only

Once you have successfully connected your Custom SMTP, you will be prompt with a pop-up to test it:

Here, you will view all of your connected Custom SMTP:

You can choose a default SMTP:

If you set up a Custom SMTP as default, you won’t have any domains under Domain Sender Verification:

If you want to test the SMTP, click on the drop-down and choose Test SMTP Server:

Finally, if you want to add more than one sending domain with Custom SMTP, you need to add the Custom SMTP for each domain.

Custom SMTP and Agency accounts

If you have an agency account and are using the Custom SMTP, you will have 2 choices for the default SMTP:

You can use the SMTP as a default for your account and/or use it as default for your sub-accounts.

Of course you can use a different SMTP as default for your own account while using another one for your sub-accounts. Moreover, if you have an SMTP set up as default for your sub-accounts, you can set up another one for other sub-accounts.

To assign accounts for a custom SMTP, click on Assigned Accounts, or you can click on the number in blue under Accounts:

You will see all your accounts and choose which ones to assign to the Custom SMTP:

How Custom SMTP is applied within your account?

Custom SMTP will be applied in every area that requires emails.

It will be used in email campaigns:

If you don’t use a verified sending email and send the campaign, it will be paused with an error:

If you send from within the lead profile, or send a draft email from an unverified sending domain, it will show you that it was sent but nothing will be received.

Automated messages as well won’t be sent if you don’t use a verified sending domain.

The social reminders will also be sent from the Test email address.

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Why are auto-replies sent to the from email

Auto-replies such as out of office replies are being sent to the From address instead of the reply-to address. This usually happens because the reply-to email address is used when the contact clicks on the Reply button, which is not the case in auto-replies.

Here is a suggestion to properly handle Automatic Responses:

1. Create a subject line filter on your email client that catches popular out of office subject lines: ex: Out of office, autoreply, auto-reply, on vacation, automatic reply, automatic response, etc…
2. Create a rule to add these into a designated folder called in your inbox, ex: Email Footprint.

This solution will not catch all auto-replies but will substantially reduce them on your end. You can also update the filter lists as you see other terms used in subject lines.

Scheduling posts directly from WordPress

To schedule posts from your connected WordPress to VBOUT, click on Schedule on Vbout:

You can choose to send as an email campaign, post to social media, or both:

When you choose to send as an email campaign, you will be able to choose the list, give the campaign a name, subject, from email, from name and edit the content:

When you choose post to social media, you can choose a Facebook page from the pages connected on your VBOUT account and choose whether to use tracking URLs or not:

The content for both email or social post can be edited in a visual mode or text mode:

To make sure you have properly connected your WordPress account to your VBOUT account, scroll down in the menu to Vbout Settings and click on Connection:

Add the user key and click on Connect to Vbout:

Note that you can get the key on your VBOUT account by going to Settings, API Integrations, and view and copy the key:

After connecting, you will be able to choose the default settings for turning your content into email marketing posts on VBOUT:

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Twilio Phone Calls


To make phone calls using Twilio, you need to connect your Twilio number:

Under Voice Application(In order to setup Twilio and find the required keys check this article)

After successfully connecting the Twilio number, you will be able to make phone calls either by clicking on the number of the contact in the All Contacts view:

Note that you can edit the number here on the fly:

Or you can call the contact from the lead’s profile:

 

When you make the call, you will see all the data, add notes during the call:

And access the dial pad:

You can also choose to record the call or not. And once the call is done, you can re-call the contact from the same window:

You can see all the call logs inside the lead profile, as well as edit and/or delete notes, or even add new ones:

Moreover, you can listen to the recording (you can adjust the playback speed) and you can download the recording if you would like to.

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Exporting lists

When exporting a list from your account, go to the list in question:

Click on Columns and choose the fields you want from the list’s custom fields or any other fields:

The fields you choose will appear here:

Afterwards, go to lists and export the contacts:

The exported file will have the fields you chose included:

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Zoom integration

The platform offers a native Zoom integration where account owners can sync with VBOUT, webinar registrants along with their attendance activities and help turn event data into marketing data.

This native integration will do the following:

  • Automatically create a new VBOUT list each time a Zoom event is created.
  • Send each webinar registration back to the corresponding VBOUT list.
  • The contact activity timeline will display the Zoom activity with attendance time.
  • The contact will be tagged with the Zoom event name.
  • Create automation campaigns based on Zoom webinar activities (ex: when a contact joins a a Zoom webinar, put them in a content drip, create a pipeline activity and send them to a custom audience on Facebook Ads).
  • Create custom segments and lead scoring based on webinar activities.

To access this integration, go to the Integrations page from the drop-down menu of the Settings:

Connect your Zoom account and make sure to approve the authentication screen through Zoom.

You can change the Settings once you connect the account to create a new list for the contacts or add the contacts to an existing list, and add tags to these contacts:

Once you successfully connect your Zoom account, you will see it under the Integrations page:

After launching a meeting, once someone registers to this meeting, they will be added to the list:

and you can check their activity, for example if they attended the meeting or not, on their profile:

 

 

To uninstall the VBOUT Application from your Zoom account, please follow the following instructions:

  1. Login to your Zoom account and navigate to the Zoom App Marketplace
  2. Click Manage–>Installed Apps or search for the VBOUT app
  3. Choose the VBOUT app
  4. Click Uninstall

You can use shortcodes for custom webinar URLs or Password:

If you have further questions, please contact our support directly via Live Chat or by emailing support@vbout.com.

 

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Adding forms to a landing page

When creating a landing page, to add a form, go to Pre-designed blocks:

Choose Forms and drag and drop the design that you’d like to choose:

When you drag and drop the form, you will see the settings on the left to create a new list or use a previously created list (the previously created list has the fields you’d like to include while the new list created only has the fields shown in the form chosen).

In case you need to add or edit the fields in the form you need to change them from the Form builder. Please check Creating custom form fields for more details.

Once you finish configuring the form settings, click on apply changes:

In case you missed the settings or want to access them again, click on the gear icon:

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How to create an automation based on your webinars data

Once you integrate your Zoom or GoToWebinar webinar with your account, you will be able to create workflows related to the webinar.

Use the Custom Event trigger and choose one of these options:

Webinar Attended: Once a contact attends a webinar of your choice, they will enter the workflow.

Time Spent (Minutes): If a contact spends a specific time, more or less, it all depends on your choice, they will enter the workflow.

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GotoWebinar integration

The platform has a native GotoWebinar integration to capture the leads who register to attend your GotoWebinar meeting.

To access this integration, go to the Integrations page from the drop-down menu of the Settings:

Connect your GotoWebinar account:

You can change the Settings once you connect the account to create a new list for the contacts or add the contacts to an existing list, and add tags to these contacts:

Once you successfully connect your GotoWebinar account, you will see it under the Integrations page:

After launching a meeting, once someone registers to this meeting, they will be added to the list:

and you can check their activity, for example if they attended the meeting or not, on their profile:

You can use shortcodes for custom webinar URLs or Password:

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Supported Form fields

The platform has different form elements that you can add to your custom forms. These fields will determine the final fields used on the list:

1. Text: In this field, you can ask the user to fill in a small text such as a short answer, an email…

2. Textarea: This field is similar to the previous one, it can be used to add feedbacks, leave comments, suggestions…

3. Number: In this field, you can ask the user to fill in a number or a currency.

4. Radio: This field can be used for choosing only one option:

If you click on the radio, it becomes the default radio, you can add a new option once you click on Add Option

5. Checkbox: This one is similar to radio, but the user can choose many options:

6. Select: This field is used to select an option from a drop-down menu; an example can be choose your major:

7. Country: This field is a list of all countries so the user can choose their country:

8. State: This field is a list of all States so the user can choose their State:

9. City: This field is a list of all Cities so the user can choose their City:

10. Email: This field can be used so users add their email address:

11. Phone: This field can be used so users add their Phone Number:

12. Date: This field can be used so users add a Date, for example, Birthday, Graduation…

13. Birthday: This field can be used in order for the subscribers to add their birth date:

14. URL: This field can be used so users add a link:

15. File Upload: This field is used to allow contacts to upload files while filling the forms (ex: upload an image, a pdf cv…)

16. Payment: This field category is used to create a payment form. It includes Products, Shipping, Billing, and Checkout fields. For more details please check this link.

17. GDPR: This field is used to ask users to accept the Terms and Privacy Policy, you can add other conditions to it and set them as required or not:

18. reCAPTCHA: This is a field added to prove that users are not robots before they finish the form:

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Sync landing page optins to Zoom or GoToWebinar

You can connect your landing pages with Zoom or GoToWebinar and use native forms to capture registrations. This gives you the ability to design a fully branded landing page to drive opt-ins, versus using the limited registration pages provided by Zoom and GoToWebinar. It also helps you retain the history of the lead prior to the signup, which is often lost when using external forms.

Any new opt-in to the form can be sent to the chosen event on your webinar system by activating the settings below. This should not impact the default email communications generated by Zoom or GoToWebinar.

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Setting up payments with Stripe or PayPal

If you want to use your landing page or email campaign to sell a product or service, with the payment component, you will need a PayPal or Stripe account.

To set up your Stripe account, click on settings:

Add your stripe ID/email and your stripe key:

You can find your Stripe key on your stripe account here:

After adding the Key, choose Stripe as Payment Gateway, add the Amount and Product Description and click on Apply Changes:

When the contact clicks on the button, they will see this screen:

Note that if you’re using the test key, Test Mode will appear on the top of the screen:

If you’re using Paypal, add your Paypal ID or Email:

and choose Paypal for the Payment Gateway, once the contact clicks on the button, the following will show up:

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How to access uploaded files in a form

There are three methods to access the files uploaded in a form subscription:

From the list:

Go to the list and click on it:

Next to each contact, you will see the file, click on it:

Once you click on this, the file will open.

From Export Contacts:

Another method is to Export Contacts:

Once your export is completed, open the excel sheet and click on the links to view the file (or open the links in your browser):

From Lead Profile:

The third method is to go to the contact’s profile, and copy the file and paste it in another tab:

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Email Marketing Benchmarks and Statistics

Open Rates:

After analyzing the performance of different email campaigns among various industries, we found that the average open rate for emails was 19.67%

Therefore, any open rate equal to 20% or above is considered as an indicator of a successful email campaign.

How to improve open rates?

A marketer’s main concern is to achieve a high open rate and reach the goals set up for the email campaign prepared. Therefore, having a high open rate is important.

However, open rates do not mean your campaign was successful, clicks are another important factor of a successful campaign.

If you’re suffering from a low open rate for your campaigns, you should follow these tips:

  • Use a relevant subject line, interesting enough to capture the recipient’s attention.
  • Choose the right audience.
  • Do not send too many or too few campaigns.
  • Use chunk sending.
  • Do not send emails to purchased lists.
  • Allow recipients to update their preferences.
  • Create a sunset policy.

Using a relevant subject line: Do not judge a book by its cover, however, the title of the book plays an important role in grabbing the reader’s attention. Same thing applies to emails, in order for the recipient to open the email, the subject should be interesting. Using A/B testing at this stage on a small sample of recipients is important to decide which subject line is more successful for the campaign.

Choose the right audience: Choosing the right audience is a very important factor in increasing the open rate. If you’re targeting the wrong audience, do not expect to reach the desired open rate. Examples of wrong audience may be inactive recipients (contacts who did not open the last campaign(s), contacts who belong to another industry..).

Do not send too many or too few campaigns: When sending too many emails, your contacts eventually will get bored and stop opening the emails. If you’re sending too few emails, your contacts will forget about you and stop opening them as well. The key is to send the right amount of emails based on the industry. Targeting your audience from another channel is very important. For example, use social media, landing pages…

Use chunk sending: Chunk sending is a sending process that allows you to send your campaign in smaller batches to optimize your deliverability and create a domain warmup process.

Do not send emails to purchased lists: Purchased lists often include old or bad data that lead to honeypot traps and are easily detected by ESPs. They trigger high bounce rates and low engagement which can impact your reputation negatively. Make sure to build your own lists of contacts through proper nurture or client relationships.

Allow recipients to update their preferences: This is very important for companies that send different types of content. You can let people signup to your product update versus your event announcements for example.

Create a sunset policy: What are you doing with unengaged contacts? Do you always entire your entire database or do you create segments of highly engaged contacts? Think of suppressing contacts that have not engagement with you in the past 6 to 12 months, through opens or clicks, by creating reactivation and goodbye automation campaigns.

Best and worst days for sending emails:

An analysis of the open rates and clicks throughout the week shows the following:

  • Best day with highest email open rates: Friday. (19.3%)
  • Best days with highest click-through rates: Friday. (2.9%)
  • Best days with highest click-to-open rates: Wednesday and Friday. (14.4%)
  • Email unsubscribe rates are almost the same throughout the week. (0.1%)
  • Worst day with lowest email open rates: Saturday. (17.5%)
  • Worst days with lowest click-through rates: Saturday. (2.6%)
  • Worst day with lowest click-to-open rates: Tuesday. (13.8%)

Click rate:

The average click rate for different types of email campaigns is 2.61%.

Any percentage equal or greater than this number is a sign of a successful campaign.

If you believe that your campaign is not generating the click rate that you expected, we compiled a few tips that will improve your click rates.

How to improve click rates

To improve click rates, work on the content in order to make it more appealing and interesting for your target audience. You should choose the proper audience as well who will be interested in this content. The design plays an important role as well, which is why we prepared ready made templates at your convenience.

Adding more links to your campaign makes it more effective. Making the text click-through will definitely increase your click rate.

Add the proper links: Do not add irrelevant links, or general links that will have the recipient go through different pages before reaching the right page.

Use the same link more than once within the campaign: For example, you can add two CTAs for the same action within the campaign, one at the beginning and one at the end to remind the recipient of the button and increase the click rate.

Testing the content of your campaign using A/B testing: Other than the subject line, you can use A/B testing with your content on a sample audience to check which content is more engaging, hence improving your click rate.

Make sure that your subject line accurately reflects the content of your emails: If the subject line is irrelevant to the content, the recipient won’t be interested in the content and won’t click within the campaign, which refers to a low click-through rate.

Tips for Improving Your Email Marketing Statistics:

Open and click-through rates will eventually improve your email marketing stats overall. 

Here are some tips to improve your email marketing statistics:

  • Write an effective, straightforward subject line.
  • Make sure to follow all the tips on avoiding spam. (a link for our article)
  • If you’re facing too many hard bounces, it’s a sign that your list needs cleaning. Check our article on maintaining a good list’s hygiene. (a link for our article)
  • Most of the soft bounces occur when a contact is temporarily unavailable. Try to avoid soft bouncers for a few campaigns and try again later.

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E-commerce list

Once E-commerce is activated in your account, an e-commerce list will be automatically created with all the contacts from the website:

Once you click on a record, you will be able to see their e-commerce activities:

Click on the activity and you will see its details:

You can access E-commerce Activity from the left side, showing Order History, Abandoned Carts, and Search History:

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Adding bookings to a Landing Page

To add a previously created meeting calendar to your landing page, you can use the Booking component:

Within the settings of this component, you will be able to choose the Booking Calendar:

 

After choosing the Booking Calendar click on Apply Settings and that’s it.

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How to setup proper attribution for Facebook ad campaign

When using Facebook paid ads, you get the option to choose regular parameters or dynamic parameters:

Facebook offers the following URL dynamic parameters to place on your ads:

ad_id={{ad.id}}
adset_id={{adset.id}}
campaign_id={{campaign.id}}
ad_name={{ad.name}}
adset_name={{adset.name}}
campaign_name={{campaign.name}}
placement={{placement}}
site_source_name={{site_source_name}}

Name-based parameters

Name-based parameters, such as ad.name, will be set to the campaign, ad set or ad name used when the ad was first published. Campaign, ad set or ad names can still be changed, but the parameters will refer to the original names. This means that URL parameter values that contain campaign, ad set or ad names can’t be changed during the lifetime of that campaign, ad set or ad once it has been published. If you did want to change the parameter value, you’d have to create and publish a new campaign, ad set or ad.

For example, if you’d like to track campaign name and source, you would input the following parameters:

utm_campaign={{campaign.name}}&utm_content={{ad.name}}.

If your campaign name is Prospecting 2018 and the ad name is Holiday, the dynamic parameters would automatically pull in the appropriate values for these parameters. In this example, the URL would appear as: utm_campaign=Prospecting%202018&utm_content=Holiday. You won’t be able to change this parameter value once you’ve published the campaign.

The name-based dynamic parameter, in this case {{campaign.name}}, will be set to the campaign name that was used when the ad was first published. The campaign name itself can be changed, but the parameter value will still refer to the original name.

Dynamic parameter values

If you’re using Google Analytics, you should input a UTM parameter for tracking. For example, if you’d like to see your ad’s campaign name and ad name in Google Analytics, you would place the following parameters:

utm_campaign={{campaign.name}}&utm_content={{ad.name}}

When you check your metrics in your website analytics tools, these values will have been dynamically filled in so that you can see which campaign and ad name generated traffic or conversions on your website.

Example:



www.yoursite.com?utm_source={{site_source_name}}&utm_medium={{placement}}&utm_campaign={{campaign.name}}&utm_content={{ad.name}}&utm_term={{adset.name}}

DMARC: Everything you should know and how to set it up

In this article, we will explain the following:

  1. What is DMARC?
  2. Why is DMARC important?
  3. How does DMARC work, briefly, and in non-technical terms?
  4. How does DMARC work (detailed)?
  5. Why some ESPs reject/quarantine emails if DMARC is not set up?
  6. How to create and verify a DMARC record on the platform?


What is DMARC:

DMARC, which stands for “Domain-based Message Authentication, Reporting & Conformance”, is an email authentication, policy, and reporting protocol. It builds on the widely deployed SPF and DKIM protocols, adding linkage to the author (“From:”) domain name, published policies for recipient handling of authentication failures, and reporting from receivers to senders, to improve and monitor protection of the domain from fraudulent email.


Why is DMARC important?

With the rise of the social internet and the ubiquity of e-commerce, spammers and phishers have a tremendous financial incentive to compromise user accounts, enabling theft of passwords, bank accounts, credit cards, and more. Email is easy to spoof and criminals have found spoofing to be a proven way to exploit user trust of well-known brands. Simply inserting the logo of a well known brand into an email gives it instant legitimacy with many users.

Users can’t tell a real message from a fake one, and large mailbox providers have to make very difficult (and frequently incorrect) choices about which messages to deliver and which ones might harm users. Senders remain largely unaware of problems with their authentication practices because there’s no scalable way for them to indicate they want feedback and where it should be sent. Those attempting new SPF and DKIM deployment proceed very slowly and cautiously because the lack of feedback also means they have no good way to monitor progress and debug problems.

DMARC addresses these issues, helping email senders and receivers work together to better secure emails, protecting users and brands from painfully costly abuse.


How does DMARC work, briefly, and in non-technical terms?

A DMARC policy allows a sender to indicate that their messages are protected by SPF and/or DKIM, and tells a receiver what to do if neither of those authentication methods passes – such as junk or reject the message. DMARC removes guesswork from the receiver’s handling of these failed messages, limiting or eliminating the user’s exposure to potentially fraudulent & harmful messages. DMARC also provides a way for the email receiver to report back to the sender about messages that pass and/or fail DMARC evaluation.


How does DMARC work (detailed)?

More detailed explanation can be found here.


Why some ESPs reject/quarantine emails if DMARC is not set up?

Large scale email receivers, such as Yahoo, Comcast, AOL and many more are increasingly requiring that email messages be properly authenticated, and when they say properly authenticated it means in a DMARC-compliant way.
When DMARC is not verified, some ESPs automatically reject or quarantine the email.
Most of the time, the quarantine emails, meaning they send them to SPAM.

Source: DMARC.org


How to create and verify a DMARC record on the platform?

For your convenience, the platform has a built-in DMARC policy check and generator.

To check and create a DMARC policy, go to Settings > Domain Sender Verification, add your Sending Domain and click on Generate:

Once you click on the Generate button, the system will create a default record for your convenience. You can edit this record by clicking the Edit icon.

The changes that you make to “DMARC policy type”, “Email analysis percentage”, “Email aggregate DMARC reports to”, and “Email forensic DMARC failure reports to” will be reflected in the Value:

DMARC policy types:
There are three types of policies: None, Quarantine, and Reject.

  • None: The mailbox provider won’t take action for emails that fail DMARC.
  • Quarantine: This will make the mailbox providers treat all emails that fail DMARC as suspicious. Quarantining an email delivers it into an area outside of the inbox, such as the spam or junk folder.
  • Reject: The mailbox providers will reject all emails that fail DMARC.

Email analysis percentage: The percentage of emails that will be checked.

Email aggregate DMARC reports to: The aggregate DMARC reports contain information about the authentication status of messages sent on behalf of a domain.

Email forensic DMARC failure reports to: A forensic report is essentially a copy of the email that failed DMARC validation and is typically sent immediately after the failure.

Once you finish, click on the value to copy it to your clipboard:

Once you finish, add the entry to your DNS record and click Verify.

Here’s an example:

Depending on the DNS server, changes might take anywhere from a few minutes to 24 hours to reflect.
If the verify does not work after that time, please contact support for further assistance.

 

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Custom social media profile access

If you want your users to have access to specific social media accounts, you can give Custom Social Media access.

Go to Users and edit a user:

Customize user permissions and choose Custom Social Groups:

Choose the group of social accounts that you want the user to have access to:

Once you finish, save and the user will only have access to the accounts in this group.

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Why I’m not receiving my own campaign

If you’re using the platform to send emails and you’re not receiving any of them, here are few reasons that may cause this:

Mail Server Block:

Sometimes, mail servers’ configuration is set up to reject emails coming from an external server even if it’s using the same domain. This usually causes the email’s delivery to be delayed or in some cases bounced.

To fix this, you should check the configuration of your ESP. (also known as Email Service Provider).

Your Sending Domain is blacklisted:

You should scan your sending domain to check if it’s blocked or blacklisted as this would affect the delivery of your emails and delay or block them.

Your Sending Domain is not verified:

When you haven’t verified your sending domain on the platform, you will be sending from email.domain.com@send10.vbt.io
Sending many times from this domain will cause our SMTP to block the domain and stop sending from it.

IPs are blacklisted:

This is very rare to happen as we run an hourly check on our IPs and rotate them from one pool to another when needed, however, during this hour, an IP may get blacklisted while you’re sending your email campaign which causes a delay in delivery.

In the following, you will see a list of our sending IPs that you can run a check on yourself to whitelist any IP that you may find blacklisted and doubt it delaying your sending process:

192.174.80.197
192.174.90.236
156.70.5.9
156.70.2.4
192.174.90.234
192.174.93.180
192.174.90.233
192.174.86.56
147.253.210.51
147.253.216.16
156.70.23.184
156.70.23.185
192.174.80.250
192.174.80.241
192.174.85.35
192.174.90.235

You can always reach out to support to better help you on this.

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Manage your email inbox

The platform provides deep inbox integration, which allows you to get the latest conversations with your contacts in the lead’s activity timeline. Connect up to 10 additional email inboxes with your account and start tracking conversations directly from the contact profile. You can reply and add recipients to your lists directly from the conversation. Gmail accounts are currently not supported.

Adding Email Inboxes

• Navigate to the Connection Center.
• Under Communication tab, choose Email Inbox and click on Connect your Inbox.

 

• Upon clicking, you’ll be directed to an authentication page.
• Here, you can add the email inbox you wish to connect.

Note: When you sync your inbox, the emails received prior to connecting won’t appear, but only the ones from the moment you start the sync.

Accessing Email Inbox:

• After connecting, you can access your inbox from the contact profile.

• Click on the message to view it in detail.

• You can reply, add recipients, and attach files directly from the conversation.

Adding Contacts to Lists:

• Hover over the email (from or cc) to view the information tooltip.
• Select Add Contact to include them in your lists.

 

Notification for New Emails:

• The system will notify you of new emails through the top-right notification panel.

Note: The system only brings over the conversations from contacts on an existing list. If you wish to view all the emails that came through, simply add your connected email account to a list and all received emails will be pulled in.

 

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Can I prevent auto-replies to my campaign

To prevent automatic replies such as out-of-office emails to your campaigns, go to Settings > Default Sending Values and toggle on the option below:

NOTE: Different servers use different headers while routing auto-replies. While this option captures most popular email clients, it cannot guarantee complete removal of auto-reply emails.

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List of available shortcodes

In the table below is a list of our available shortcodes with an example of each type:

Shortcode Example
Profile Information: Your default information [BUSINESS_NAME] [ADDRESS] [PHONE] [WEBSITE]
Social Channels: Your default social channels [FB] [TW] [PN] [IN] [LI]
Social Channels Share Buttons: Shortcodes to share the email or landing page on social channels [FB_SHARE_BUTTON] [TW_SHARE_BUTTON] [LI_SHARE_BUTTON] [FB_LIKE_BUTTON]
Email Campaign-Specific: Shortcodes to allow your contacts to redeem a coupon from the email campaign, unsubscribe or update their preferences, or view the online version of the email campaign.
Note that you can change the text in Settings > Shortcodes > Email Campaign Shortcodes
[COUPON_CODE]
[COUPON_CODE_NOLINK]
[COUPON_CODE_QR]
[ONLINE_URL]
[UNSUBSCRIBE_URL]
[UNSUBSCRIBE_LINK]
[DIRECT_UNSUBSCRIBE_URL]
[DIRECT_UNSUBSCRIBE_LINK]
[UNSUBSCRIBE_REDIRECTION_URL]
[UNSUBSCRIBE_REDIRECTION_LINK]
[DIRECT_UNSUBSCRIBE_REDIRECTION_URL]
[DIRECT_UNSUBSCRIBE_REDIRECTION_LINK]
[PREFERENCES_URL]
[PREFERENCES_LINK]
Date Stamp: Shortcodes to post the current date.
[#DATE.NOW format=m/d/Y#]
[#DATE.NOW format=m/d/Y H:i:s#]
[#DATE.NOW format=l m/d/Y H:i:s#]
[#DATE.NOW format=d-m-Y#]
[#DATE.NOW format=d-m-Y H:i:s#]
[#DATE.NOW format=l d-m-Y H:i:s#]
List shortcodes: Each list has its own shortcodes that you can choose from [#FIRSTNAME#]
[#LASTNAME#]
[#EMAIL#]
[#PHONE#]
[#FULLNAME#]
[#ADDRESS-1#]
[#ADDRESS-2#]
[#COUNTRY#]
[#STATE#]
[#CITY#]
[#ZIPCODE#]
[#TITLE#]
[#WEBSITE#]
[#DATE-OF-BIRTH#]
[#GENDER#]
[#COMMENTS#]
[#INSTAGRAM-URL#]
[#FACEBOOK-URL#]
[#TWITTER-URL#]
[#LINKEDIN-URL#]
[#PINTEREST-URL#]
[#YOUTUBE-URL#]
[#GOOGLE-MY-BUSINESS-URL#]
[#COMPANY-NAME#]
[#COMPANY-ADDRESS#]
[#COMPANY-PHONE#]
[#COMPANY-WEBSITE#]
[#YEAR-FOUNDED#]
[#NUMBER-OF-EMPLOYEES#]
[#ANNUAL-REVENUE#]
[#INDUSTRY#]
Shortcode split using /2: If you have a Full Name field for example and want to use only the first name, you can add /2 inside the shortcode [#FULLNAME/2#]
Shortcode Fall Back using the | Character: If your contact has an empty field and you want to replace it with another field or with a text [#FULLNAME|COMPANYNAME#] [#FULLNAME|*there*#]
Shortcode Combo: If you want to combine both cases in the row above [#FULLNAME/2|COMPANYNAME|*there*#]
Shortcode Capitalization: This is used to capitalize the first letter (PROPER), the whole word (UPPER), or nothing capitalized (LOWER)
Note that you can mix capitalization with other formats		 [#PROPER FULLNAME#] [#UPPER FULLNAME#] [#LOWER FULLNAME#] [#PROPER FULLNAME/2| LOWER COMPANYNAME|*there*#]

 

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Editing automation

When editing a trigger or action in a workflow, some contacts may be impacted by the change and others won’t.

In the following table, you will find some of the most common case scenarios and their impacts:

Note that the new contacts added to a workflow after the changes always follow the new edits:

Workflow Edit Pending contacts before the edited step Pending contacts on/after the edited step  Analytics
Edit an action Follow the new edit No impact Reflect change
Delete an action Exit the automation Exit the automation Reset
Edit a trigger No Pending contacts before a trigger No impact No impact
Delete a trigger No Pending contacts before a trigger Exit the automation Reset
Delete an arrow and reconnect to the same action before trigger execution No impact No impact No impact
Delete an arrow and reconnect to the same action after trigger execution No impact Exit the automation No impact
Delete an arrow and connect to another action No impact Exit the automation No impact
Change conditions on arrows Apply new conditions Match old condition No impact
Change a delay Apply the new delay Keep old delay No impact

 

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Task automation

Once you install the Pipeline Manager from the Addons, you can use the Task actions in the automation:

Create New Task: Once the automation triggers, a task will be created, you can configure it when you double click on the action:

Add to Task: Once the automation triggers, the contact will be added to a Task of your choice:

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E-commerce dynamic blocks

When creating an email template or campaign, you will find new components for E-commerce:


E-commerce blocks are:

  • Store Feed
  • Related Products
  • Last Viewed Products
  • Last Viewed Categories
  • Last Abandoned Cart
  • Last Order Details
  • Product Renewal Reminder

When you choose one of the Ecommerce components, you can edit its style and settings from the left panel.

You can customize the below settings:

  • Store Name: Choose your store to display products
  • Product count: How many products you want to show.
  • Product view: Stacked or Tiles.
  • Options: To Show or Hide Image, Description or Price.
  • Mix products from: 1 category or more.
  • Prioritize choice based on: Recent Visit, Most Viewed, Last Abandoned Cart, Last Completed Order, Custom Preferences

Once you finish your editing, click on Apply Settings in order to apply your changes.

You can also use the Ecommerce Shortcodes:

You can access your products’ images directly from the File Manager Ecommerce tab:

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Ecommerce in automation

When creating a workflow, you will come across ecommerce special triggers:

Abandoned Cart: This triggers actions to do after a visitor abandons the cart. You will choose if the trigger executes 30 Minutes of Adding Their First Product To Cart or 30 Minutes of Adding The Last Product To Cart:

Note that if a contact is added to the workflow and they made a purchase before the delay is over, they will be removed from the workflow automatically and won’t receive the action. That’s why we always recommend adding a delay after this trigger.

Completed Order: This Trigger is executed when a contact completes an order.

Custom Events: This trigger is used to create customized events, for example, A contact who searched for iphone:

CONTACT FIELDS:

  • Tag Added: When a contact has a new tag added, they enter the automation (based on the criteria chosen in the trigger).
  • Custom API event: When a contact fields have change through API.

LEAD SCORING:

  • Lead Status: If you have lead scoring setup, you can target leads who match certain lead status you created within the system. Available options will be a drop-down of statuses that you created on the lead configuration page.
  • Lead Score: Alternative to lead status, you can target users based on their VBOUT score. Available options are Score Equals to, Score is Greater Than, Score is Less Than, Score is Between [NUMBER X] and [NUMBER Y] where number x and y are numbers you choose.

LANDING PAGE ENGAGEMENT:

  • Page View: User views a certain Landing Page.
  • Link Clicked: User clicks on a certain link on your Landing Page.

WEBSITE ENGAGEMENT:

  • Destination URL: User visits a particular page on your website.
  • Link Clicked: User clicks on a certain link on your website.

EMAIL ENGAGEMENT:

  • Coupon Redeemed: When a contact redeems a specified coupon, they enter the automation.

WEBINARS:

  • Webinar Attended: When a contact attend a specific webinar.
  • Time Spent (Minutes): When a contact attend a specific webinar for specific amount of time.

ECOMMERCE FIELDS:

  • Billing Country: The contact’s billing country.
  • Billing State: The contact’s billing state.
  • Billing City: The contact’s billing city.
  • Billing Zipcode: The contact’s billing Zipcode.
  • First Order Date: The contact’s first order date.
  • Last Abandoned Cart Date: The contact’s last abandoned cart date.
  • Last Abandoned Cart Total: The contact’s last abandoned cart total amount.
  • Last Abandoned Category ID: The last abandoned category ID.
  • Last Abandoned Category Name: The last abandoned category name, for example Phone.
  • Last Abandoned Product ID: The last abandoned product ID.
  • Last Abandoned Product Name: The last abandoned product name, for example iPhone.
  • Last Order Date: The contact’s last order date
  • Last Order Quantity: The contact’s last order quantity.
  • Last Order Status: The contact’s last order status, for example processing.
  • Last Order Total: The contact’s last order total.
  • Last Ordered Category ID: The contact’s last ordered category ID.
  • Last Ordered Category Name: The contact’s last ordered category name.
  • Last Ordered Product ID: The contact’s last ordered product ID.
  • Last Ordered Product Name: The contact’s last ordered product name.
  • Last Visited Product ID: The contact’s last visited product ID.
  • Last Visited Product Name: The contact’s last visited product Name.
  • Last Visited Category ID: The contact’s last visited category ID.
  • Last Visited Category Name: The contact’s last visited category name.
  • Number of Abandoned Carts: The number of  the contact’s abandoned carts.
  • Ordered Product Name: The contact’s ordered product name.
  • Ordered Category Name: The contact’s ordered category name.
  • Ordered Product ID: The contact’s ordered product ID.
  • Ordered Category ID: The contact’s ordered category ID.
  • Promo Code: The promo code used by the contact.
  • Promo Value: The promo value that the contact used.
  • Searched Product: The searched products, for example searched for product named blue t-shirt.
  • Shipping Method: The contact’s shipping method.
  • Shipping Address Line: The contact’s shipping address line.
  • Shipping Country: The contact’s shipping country.
  • Shipping City: The contact’s shipping city.
  • Shipping State: The contact’s shipping state.
  • Shipping Zipcode: The contact’s shipping Zipcode.
  • Shipping Total: The contact’s shipping total amount.
  • Store Name: The store’s name from which the contact bought or is buying (This is used when you have multiple stores connected to your account).
  • Total Lifetime Value: The contact’s total lifetime value.

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Using URL parameters to send forms data

URL Parameters can be used to send forms data to external websites through one of these following methods:

1. Prefill form fields with custom merge tags
2. Submit form fills to an external page

Prefill form fields with custom merge tags

To mass personalize the URL, you can send an email, use a link inside the email that takes the contact to a landing page, for example: https://lp.vbt.site/26216/landing-page-1?firstname=[#FIRSTNAME#]&company-name=[#COMPANY-NAME#]

This way the link will be personalized based on each contact, for example, if the contact’s first name is John and the company name is Marketing, the link will become like this: https://lp.vbt.site/26216/landing-page-1?firstname=John&company-name=Marketing

 

Submit form fills to an external page

You can send the form fields to an external redirect page:

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Suppression list

The platform has a built-in hygiene list as well as an Unsubscribe/Preferences functionality that’s called a Suppression List. It can be used in two cases: one, if you have an Unsubscribe list you’re importing from another platform or, two, if you have contacts in your personal database that you wish to keep as unsubscribed. The Suppression List prevents these unsubscribed contacts from being added as active contact in the future; once they are added to that list they will be marked as unsubscribed from all lists, current and future.

When you import or create contacts, their status is marked as Active by default (as seen below).

On the other hand, if the Suppression List is activated and you import contacts on it or create new ones, their status will be Unsubscribed by default.

To activate your Suppression List, go to Contacts -> Lists, from the Gear icon, choose Activate Suppression List.

In some cases, you might see the Contact’s status as Active when creating a contact in Suppression List. However, once you click Add Contact or you import contacts, they will automatically as Unsubscribed (see pictures below).

Once this contact is added to the Suppression List, it will be listed as Unsubscribed on all the previous lists he was a part of:

However, the Unsubscribed status of the contact can be changed manually in other lists.

Another element that can be added in the Suppression List is a domain.

To do that, first, go to the Lists tab and click on the drop-down next to “Fields & Form”. Next select Suppression settings as shown in the picture below.

A pop-up will show where you can enter one (or more) domain(s) that you want to suppress (see picture below).

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Tasks files and assets

In this article, we will discuss Attached Files, Notes, Mentions, Assets, and Contacts for tasks created in Pipeline Manager:

Click on the Date to Schedule Date, on the Time to Schedule Time, or on Duration to Set Duration.

  • Add Note: Click on Add Note and write the Note, you can mention a teammate or Insert/edit image to your Note as shown above.
    To mention a person in the Note, type “@” followed by the person’s user name. Note that the person in the mention will receive an email notification with the task link:

When you choose to Insert/edit image, you will be taken to the File Manager where you can choose from the pre-uploaded images and files or upload a new one.

  • Attach File: You can attach files to your Task.

Change Task Type by clicking on the icon in the image below.

Change Task Name by clicking on the name under the icon.

  • Associated Contacts: Here you will see all the Associated Contacts with the Task, including Social Media Accounts if there is any post added from the stream. When you click on Add, you can Attach Contacts to the Task or Create new contacts:

When you attach a contact to a task, you will be able to see their details and edit them (except for the email address) and add or remove tags:

If there is more than one contact attached to the task, click on the preview (eye symbol) to be able to see the contact’s details, if you click on the contact’s email next to it, it will open its profile:

You can send your associated contacts an email or SMS from the platform by clicking on Contact Actions.

  • Associated Assets: Here you will see the assets from the platform associated with your task. Click on Add to Attach Assets to the Task:
  • Attached Media: Here you will find the Files you have added with Attach File. You can also Attach Files by clicking on Add:
  • Task Tags: You can add Tags to your Task by typing them in Task Tags.

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Social Media Content Bank


Content Bank is a feature in Social Media that allows you to create templates and use them in Social posting.

Note that Content Bank is an add-on that must be installed or part of your plan:

Once you have Content Bank installed, you can access it in Social:

Click on Add new content, you will be able to add categories:

Click on Edit Tags to add tags:

Toggle Only for specific groups to assign post to a specific group of subaccounts.

Once you add new content, your Content Bank will look like this and you will be able to filter the templates based on categories and use them in your posts:

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Managing tasks

Tasks are pieces of work often to be finished within a certain time, assigned to or expected of a person. Tasks help you organize your work especially if you’re a company, this way, each employee can know what’s his Tasks. Each Task has a Board working on it.

There are several ways to create a Task on the platform, we will learn how to do so in the article below.

Go to Pipeline Manager, from your Left Side Menu, and choose New Task:

Or you can choose Create New Task from the drop-down menu in each of the following:

1- Email

2- Automation

3- Social > Streams

4- Contacts > Lists

5- Contacts > Goals

6- Landing Pages >  Landing Pages

7- Landing Pages >  Site Popups

If you choose Create New Task:

Note: you can choose to enable emails notification for task updates.

If you choose Add to Task, you will get the following, where you choose the Task you want to attach to:

You’ll see the list of previously created Tasks:

When a New Task is created, you get a notification on both the Left Side Menu and the notification icon on the top right:

If you Add to Task, or Update a Task, you also get a notification:

Check the status of your Tasks by colors as follows:

  • When you see the red color, it’s 17 hours and above overdue
  • When you see the green color, it’s less than 17 hours overdue or is not overdue yet.

 

To Manage or Add Task Board, click on the Gear > Manage Task Boards:

Click Add Task Board, or Edit if you want to update an existing Task Board; or the drop-down menu to Delete a Task Board:

Give your Task Board a Name and choose the Stages.

Note: If you delete a board, you can move its tasks to another board:

You can Add Stage and change the previously defined Stages color and name.

Once you finish, click Submit.

Note: After creating a Task Board and choosing its stages, you can’t delete a stage that has tasks:

After creating a Task, you can monitor its progress, notes and media on the stream, where you can also view other Tasks, change Task Name, Type, Stage, and Open and Close Tasks:

Note: If you delete a user with tasks assigned to him, you can move his tasks to another user:

 

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Tasks widgets

On your dashboard, click on the New Widget option and choose the Tasks Summary widget

This is how it will appear:

You can filter Stages, Teammates, and Date Range:

StagesTeammatesDate

 

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What is BIMI

BIMI stands for Brand Indicators for Message Identification. It’s a standard that attaches your brand’s logo to your authenticated email messages. With this simple, visual verification, recipients can recognize and trust the messages you send. BIMI adds your logo to your emails in the inbox so subscribers can quickly identify your messages and trust they’re from you.

BIMI is a recent addition to email DNS authentication, to help ESPs (email service providers like Gmail, Yahoo, etc…) authenticate your brand and add your logo beside your subject lines.
Here are the requirements you need to setup BIMI on your domain DNS:

  • SVG logo (preferably square icon) hosted on a secure repository.
  • Access to your DNS configuration (Cloudflare or Godaddy).
  • DMARC Policy setup already with Quarantine or Reject (here is a link to learn more about DMARC).
  • The record format: 
    default._bimi --> TXT --> v=BIMI1; l=https://path_to_your_svg_logo.com;
  • DNS check from our friends at MXToolbox.

Here’s an example of an inbox before BIMI:

After BIMI:

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Tasks and social media

The built-in Task Manager helps you and your team collaborate on important social media conversations and events that matter the most to your brand.

Once you are on your Social Streams, choose the comment, messages and conversations then open a task to one of your team mates. They will in turn be able to manage and reply directly from the Tasks page.

First, go to Social > Streams:

Choose Create New Task or Add To Task if it already exists. You can assign it to the relevant team mate and even tag others in the descriptions using @NAME:

The created task will show under the Tasks page where you can expand the activity log to preview the details of the social post. Clicking on the social media under the Associated Assets on the right panel will also expand the activity:

Once clicked, you will see the full details of that engagement to reply, to comment or direct messages.

Note that by default, the Associated Contacts will display the social contact relevant to the post, comment or direct message:

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Task views and filters

VIEWS

You can use the Task View option to Choose between List View, Table View, or Pipeline View.

LISTTABLEPIPELINE

In the List View your tasks will be in a stacked list where you can click on the task from the left panel to choose which one to manage. Note that there is a color label so the left of the card indicating which task is overdue (RED), due today (GREEN), future date (NO COLOR).

To change the Stage of the task click on the color button:

You can Close, Copy, or Delete the Task by clicking on the … option from the top right of the task view:

Once a Task is closed or marked as completed, it will be hidden from the view. You can however access the top Filter, choose Closed and click Apply to view them:

You can also reopen the task by either changing the color code or by clicking on the … and choose Reopen:

To filter the tasks by different team members, change the user from yourself, labeled Me, to another team member that was added from your Users page. To view all tasks click the All Users filter. To get a better visual display of your team members, we recommend they upload their profile photo to their account, which is available under their Settings.

Change the order of the Tasks from Newest First or Oldest First by clicking on Sort.

You can also perform batch Task Close, Reopen, or Delete by selecting multiple at the same time then choosing the action.

Your tasks will be sorted in a table format that summarizes each task name, stage, associated contacts, due date and the person assigned to the task.

Additional options are available from the drop-down menu to Close (or Reopen if it’s a closed task), Copy or Delete a Task:

To change the stage of the task or any other details, click Edit from the Actions column of the task:

You can also customize the table view and how/hide columns to fit your preference (ex: in the picture below, we hid Assigned To from the table):

Use the Pipeline view to view tasks sorted into color coded stages, where you can drag and drop them from one stage to another. You can also drag them to the bottom default options: Open (defaults to In Queue) or Close (defaults to Completed).

The labels around each task card indicates if that task was overdue, due today or due in the future.

FILTERS:

To access the available Filters, click on the Funnel next to Views. Choose to filter by Stages, Due Date, Tags then click Apply. If you choose Task Type, you might be prompted with additional filters (ex: If you filter by task type Deal, you will get an additional amount range option to include in your choice). Note that your filter options will be saved as your switch between the List, Table and Pipeline view.

 

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Adding links to emails and landing pages

When creating an Email Campaign or a Landing Page, one of the most important elements should be your Call To Action (CTA). CTAs usually link to an external URL, a downloadable file, an anchor within the same page, a link to a landing page created on the platform, a phone number (click to call), or an email (Click to email).

Email and landing page builders have a built-in feature to make these edits easily.

Anchor Link

Using Landing page builder or Email classic builder

To add an Anchor Link, highlight the beginning word or icon of the section you wish to ‘jump to’, then click the Anchor icon on the top editor. From the left panel, give it an Anchor Name:

Once the anchor has been created, choose the navigation or button you wish to hyperlink to that Anchor:

Choose the Anchor and save:

Using Email New builder

To add an Anchor Link, click on the block settings where you wish to ‘jump to’, add a unique ID for the anchor.

Once the anchor has been created, choose the navigation or button you wish to hyperlink to that Anchor:

Choose the Anchor and save:

Aside from Anchor Links, you have the ability to add different types of links:

Website Url

Add an external URL such as a blog post or signup page on your website:

Landing Page Link

The landing page option shows you all the pages created on your account to choose from. This lets you create a page-to-page or email-to-page, guided flow or funnel easily:

Booking Calendar

The Booking calendar option shows you all the booking calendars created on your account to choose from.

File Manager

When you choose File Manager, it automatically opens all your uploaded media and files on your account. You can choose to link to a downloadable PDF, an image, video or even create a graphic on Canva.

Email Address

The click-to-email hyperlink lets you pre-populate, in the recipient’s default email application, a predefined email, subject line, and message body. When a contact clicks on the link, their email application will open with the to Email Address, Message Subject, and Message Body already filled for convenience:

 

Phone Number

The Phone Number hyperlink creates a click-to-call action that opens up the contact’s default phone application when clicked (ex: phone dialpad or skype)

 

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Shortcodes cheat sheet

SHORTCODE SPLIT USING /2:
If you have a Full Name field for example and want to use only the first name, you can add /2 inside the shortcode [#FULLNAME/2#]

SHORTCODE FALL BACK USING THE | CHARACTER:
If your contact has an empty field and you want to replace it with another field [#FULLNAME|COMPANYNAME#] or with a text  [#FULLNAME|*there*#]

SHORTCODE COMBO:
If you want to combine both cases in the row above[#FULLNAME/2|COMPANYNAME|*there*#]

SHORTCODE CAPITALIZATION:
This is used to capitalize the first letter (PROPER) [#PROPER FULLNAME#], the whole word (UPPER) [#UPPER FULLNAME#], or nothing capitalized (LOWER) [#LOWER FULLNAME#].
Note that you can mix capitalization with other formats [#PROPER FULLNAME/2| LOWER COMPANYNAME|*there*#]

 

In the table below is a list of our available shortcodes with an example of each type:

Shortcode Example
Profile Information: Your default information [BUSINESS_NAME] [ADDRESS] [PHONE] [WEBSITE]
Social Channels: Your default social channels [FB] [TW] [PN] [IN] [LI]
Social Channels Share Buttons: Shortcodes to share the email or landing page on social channels [FB_SHARE_BUTTON] [TW_SHARE_BUTTON] [LI_SHARE_BUTTON] [FB_LIKE_BUTTON]
Email Campaign-Specific: Shortcodes to allow your contacts to redeem a coupon from the email campaign, unsubscribe or update their preferences, or view the online version of the email campaign.
Note that you can change the text in Settings > Shortcodes > Email Campaign Shortcodes
[COUPON_CODE]
[COUPON_CODE_NOLINK]
[COUPON_CODE_QR]
[ONLINE_URL]
[UNSUBSCRIBE_URL]
[UNSUBSCRIBE_LINK]
[DIRECT_UNSUBSCRIBE_URL]
[DIRECT_UNSUBSCRIBE_LINK]
[UNSUBSCRIBE_REDIRECTION_URL]
[UNSUBSCRIBE_REDIRECTION_LINK]
[DIRECT_UNSUBSCRIBE_REDIRECTION_URL]
[DIRECT_UNSUBSCRIBE_REDIRECTION_LINK]
[PREFERENCES_URL]
[PREFERENCES_LINK]
Date Stamp: Shortcodes to post the current date.
[#DATE.NOW format=m/d/Y#]
[#DATE.NOW format=m/d/Y H:i:s#]
[#DATE.NOW format=l m/d/Y H:i:s#]
[#DATE.NOW format=d-m-Y#]
[#DATE.NOW format=d-m-Y H:i:s#]
[#DATE.NOW format=l d-m-Y H:i:s#]
List shortcodes: Each list has its own shortcodes that you can choose from [#FIRSTNAME#]
[#LASTNAME#]
[#EMAIL#]
[#PHONE#]
Shortcode split using /2: If you have a Full Name field for example and want to use only the first name, you can add /2 inside the shortcode [#FULLNAME/2#]
Shortcode Fall Back using the | Character: If your contact has an empty field and you want to replace it with another field or with a text [#FULLNAME|COMPANYNAME#] [#FULLNAME|*there*#]
Shortcode Combo: If you want to combine both cases in the row above [#FULLNAME/2|COMPANYNAME|*there*#]
Shortcode Capitalization: This is used to capitalize the first letter (PROPER), the whole word (UPPER), or nothing capitalized (LOWER)
Note that you can mix capitalization with other formats		 [#PROPER FULLNAME#] [#UPPER FULLNAME#] [#LOWER FULLNAME#] [#PROPER FULLNAME/2| LOWER COMPANYNAME|*there*#]

 

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Native Salesforce connector


You can synchronize VBOUT with Salesforce or Salesforce with VBOUT through the integration:

To access the integration tab for Salesforce, go to: Contacts > Salesforce Connector

Note: Salesforce is an Add-on that must be installed or part of your plan.

After going to Salesforce Connector, click Create Sync

The sync is bi-directional and can be customized as a one-time, recurrent or part of an Automation at the contact level:

If you want to update an existing record, and not override an empty field, toggle this option:

Afterward, Select Contact Email List to Sync and Salesforce Destination; you can choose to Sync contact’s activities as Salesforce Notes by clicking the checkbox:

or, you can sync VBOUT activities to tasks on Salesforce:

Also, you can choose to update the status of unsubscribe contacts in VBOUT to Opt-out in Salesforce.

Once these are chosen, you will specify the data destination as follows:

NOTE: If the contact is unsubscribed on VBOUT, and you update that contact again from SF to VBOUT with the settings “Set status to active”, the system will ignore them completely and keep them unsubscribed.

Click on Add Data when you finish. You can choose to Copy Data from previously saved Syncs.

Once you finish, you will see the following:

You can Edit the Data based on what you want to change simply by clicking on the Edit button, it will take you to the previous step.

Once all is set, click Save Changes.

You can re-sync an existing one time sync, with an option to Pause, Resume.

If you choose the other way around (From Salesforce to VBOUT):

Note:

  • Synching a lead from SF to VBOUT will be unique one time unless the email on VBOUT was set to NOT REQUIRED
  • In case the lead’s email address is updated in Salesforce, it will be updated in VBOUT also.

First, you select which Data to Sync:

Then, you Select Contact Email List Destination:

Afterward, you Set Contact Status:

Once you finish these steps, you get to choose the VBOUT Data Destination for each Salesforce Data Fields:

Finally, you click Create Sync:

Here are some examples of how data will look like on Salesforce

  • Pages Visited:

  • Links Clicked:

  • Campaign Open:

  • Lead Score:

  • Lead Status:

  • Goals Reached:

  • Automation Triggered:

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Contacts communication preferences

26% of people cite that the reason behind unsubscribing is receiving too many emails. Contacts Communication Preferences or Email Preferences is a way to let your contacts unsubscribe manually from a specific list and choose which lists they want to stay in. This way, they won’t choose to unsubscribe from all your emails at once and won’t be bothered by receiving many emails.

In the instructions below, we will see how to use Preferences:

1- Choose the Preference option from the Shortcode, when sending an Email Campaign or composing an Email Automation Template.

There are two types of Preferences Shortcodes:

Preferences URL, which is a hyperlinked text of your choice that takes the users to the Preferences page. (Check Step 4)

Preferences Link, which shows a raw link that users can click to take them to the Preferences page, this one is usually used in the text versions of emails.

 

2- To include a list or hide it from the preferences tab, go to Rename option of your list and turn on Include in contact Preference Page.

NOTE: The sending list will be automatically included in the preferences even if you had turned it off in the settings.

3- To modify the description and name of the list click on the Rename option of your list and modify the name and description:

4- To modify the default text for the preferences shortcode, go to Settings > Shortcodes and expand the Email Campaign Shortcodes Tab.

5- Contacts can update their information from the TARGET LIST by clicking on Update your profile information from the preferences page:

6- Contacts can unsubscribe from all lists by clicking on “Unsubscribe me from all communications”:

7- You can continue using the original UNSUBSCRIBE shortcode, which removes people from all Lists in one click

8- You have to include either the UNSUBSCRIBE shortcode, or the PREFERENCES shortcode inside your email, or the system will automatically append an UNSUBSCRIBE option at the bottom of your campaigns

9- Once the recipient chooses which list to unsubscribe from and click Update your Preferences, they will be taken to the next screen:

The recipient is immediately unsubscribed after they click Update your profile information (if they chose to unsubscribe from a list or all lists). They are not required to choose an option. If they close the form without choosing the reason, the activity log will show the default “Manual Unsubscribe” without additional information.

10- You will see the unsubscribed user in their activity feed:

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Outlook junk folder policy

Outlook has a default setting with Safe Sender option that filters emails that aren’t added to the list and delivers those emails to Junk folder. Outlook might also look at other signals such as your domain DNS (spf, dkim, dmarc), IP reputation, domain sender reputation, content of the message and many other signals, to determine if the email is spam or not.

That process is far from perfect and often times legitimate emails can be delivered to Junk folder even though the sender is fully compliant and was already added to the safer Safe Sender list. The key to email deliverability with Outlook and any ESP for that matter, is to be consistent with your sending patterns, be fully compliant with spam rules and regulations, have a sunset policy and only target contacts that have already opted-in to your mailing. 

Here is a comprehensive resource on why emails can go to spam and how to improve deliverability.

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Sync contacts to custom audiences on Google for retargeting

Google retargeting audience

Syncing your contacts to Google Adwords custom audience allows you to create more personalized experiences for your leads by retargeting them with relevant ads based on their customer journey ‘s stage.

There are two main steps to achieve this:

  1. Create a custom audience on Google Adwords.
  2. Create an automation for Google Adwords retargeting ads.

How to create a custom audience on Google Adwords?

Visit your Audience Manager:

Download the sample CSV provided by Google Adwords and format it with one sample contact such as your own email:

Complete the additional options then click Upload :

You will get this confirmation message if your sample file was correct:

Automation for Google Adwords retargeting Ads:

Make sure to connect the Adwords account:

Create an automation and add the Sync to Third Party action:

Choose the Google Adwords account and the Target Audience:

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Add-Ons

Add-Ons are extensions that can be installed to your account. There are free and paid add-ons, based on the plan you choose.

To access Add-Ons, go to Settings > Add-Ons or click here. In this page, you will find Add-Ons with their description and prices.

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Sync contacts to custom audiences on Facebook for retargeting

Syncing your contacts to Facebook custom audience allows you to create more personalized experiences for your leads by retargeting them with relevant ads based on their customer journey ‘s stage.

Below are the major steps to achieve this:

  1. Create a custom audience on Facebook.
  2. Create an automation for Facebook retargeting ads.

How to create custom audience on Facebook:

To create a custom audience on Facebook, follow these steps:

  1. Visit your Business Ad Manager on Facebook and create a new audience:

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2. Choose this option from the popup list:

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3. Choose the option: Use a file that doesn’t include LTV

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4. Add your own email to start the Audience and Save it:

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5. Now that audience will appear on the Automation –> Sync to third party option:

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Automation for Facebook retargeting Ads:

It’s an easy process with 2 simple steps:

1- Create an automation
2- Choose the action “Sync to third party” and configure it.

Step 1: Create an automation:

Go to Automation page, click on “Create Automation”:

Step 2: Choose the action “Sync to Third Party” and configure it:

  • Go to Facebook Custom Audience
  • Choose an account that has activated Ads, choose an action

NOTE: The connected ad account must have access to Facebook business manager.

  • Add record which allows you to retarget a specific ad to an audience:
  • Remove record from the audience receiving your ad or add them to another audience:

 

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Using URL parameters with your landing page

URL parameters are very helpful in making your personalization experience much easier. They are used in the following:

1. Personalize the landing page with the contact details
2. Personalize the landing page using custom shortcodes

Personalize the landing page with the contact details

You can personalize your landing page in an easy and simple way:

  1. Add the shortcodes in the landing page from the list’ shortcodes:

  2. Add the parameters to the landing page link, for example: https://lp.vbt.site/26216/landing-page-1?firstname=John&company-name=Marketing

Personalize the landing page using custom shortcodes

You can use custom shortcodes which are shortcodes you create by adding a word inside [##] like [#EXAMPLE#]. These shortcodes do not have to be already created through a list, they can be random shortcodes of your choice. The link would look like: https://lp.vbt.site/26216/landing-page-1?firstname=John&example=Platform

This would be the result:

You can find other ways to use the URL parameters here.

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UTM tracking

UTM Tracking allows you to measure the performance of your campaigns on your analytics platform, such as Google Analytics.
UTM stands for “Urchin Traffic Monitor“, a name derived from Urchin Tracker, a web analytics software integrated in the Google Analytic code base.

UTM tracking relies on five variables that can be appended to your links:

  1. UTM Medium: The medium used for tracking, example: SMS, Landing Page…
  2. UTM Campaign: The campaign used for tracking, example: ad
  3. UTM Content: The content used for tracking, example: shirts
  4. UTM Source: The source could be a social channel like Facebook, a website, example: mydomain.com
  5. UTM Term: A specific term used for tracking, example: Lipstick

Here is one example: https://www.example.com/page?utm_content=drip-holiday&utm_medium=automation&utm_source=email&utm_campaign=special-offer

UTM can be activated in 4 different places in the platform:

  • Email campaign:
  • Automated Emails:
  • Automated SMS:
  • Landing Pages:

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Spam scoring

Every ESP (email service provider) have integrated spam scoring services that scan your emails before they deliver them to their end users. They look for spam keywords such as “Lottery”, “Medication”, “Rolex Replicas”, as well as other variable such as public spam databases and blacklists to judge if you are fit for

I- Delivery vs Rejection

II- Inbox vs Spam/Junk vs Promotions tab.

The platform uses SpamAssassin service to score your email content and give you a ‘general’ benchmark on how your keywords are being scored.

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Upload your HTML email template

To upload your HTML email template, follow these steps:

  1. Go to Email -> Email Templates -> Create Template.
  2. Choose Upload a Template File.

  3. Follow the instructions:

  4. Create campaign and choose your template from My Templates:
  5. Or, go to the builder and choose Pre-Designed Blocks:
  6. Drag and Drop from My Designs:
  7. The final result:

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How to avoid your emails ending up in spam

Subject line and keyword choice:

It is recommended that you use a short Subject Line, keeping it under 50 characters. Emails with personalized subject lines are 26% more likely to be opened.

Certain words, too much punctuation, and special characters all trigger spam filter:

Winner, Amazing, Free, Urgent, 100% guaranteed, limited time, you’re a winner, now only, risk free, one time offer

Avoid using these words.

Volume of sending:

Remember, the higher the volume, the riskier it is to go to spam.

Size of the email:

The size of the email can also affect hitting spam. If an email file size exceeds 100 KB, it has a higher risk of ending up in spam.

Send only quality content:

Codes must render well on mobiles since that’s where 55% of the emails are read.

21% of users unsubscribe because of useless content.

Getting marked as Spam once per 5000 recipients can get you suspended from many ESPs

Images and media:

Keep your images hosted on your servers and avoid attaching media to your emails. Also, make sure your images are optimized for web so loading time of your email does not take long, which will cause your users to exit your message.

Email clipping:

Many email clients, web and mobile, automatically clip your email content and only show above the fold copy opting the user with a button to read the full email. Try to fit your most important content and Call to Actions at the top of your email (above the clipping fold). This will ultimately enhance your click-through rate and email engagement.

Sender domain:

The quality of the sender domain and its reputation can highly affect the emails to go to spam. Make sure you choose a clean sender domain, and properly setup the SMTP, DKIM, DMARC, and Bounce path.

Company information:

Inserting the company information at the footer gives your emails credibility and helps in avoiding spam. According to CAN-SPAM ACT, when sending B2B email promotions, you have to include details about your company, such as address and phone, in order to be compliant.

The platform provides shortcodes to your company information for easy insertion inside your campaigns.

Personalization of the content:

74% of marketers say targeted personalization increases engagement. Using company name and/or persons’ names can help in avoiding spam. The platform makes this task easier with the shortcodes options.

Unsubscribe link:

Giving your users the option to opt-out of receiving emails from you is a good practice that helps deliverability. Most email marketing services let you insert unsubscribe links inside your campaigns so users can click them if they want to opt-out from future mailing from your company. The platform checks if you have included this link in your templates, if not, we automatically force it at the footer of the email. This rule is to be applied to Email Automation (drip emails) similarly to traditional email campaigns.

Avoid sending from generic emails:

Most spammers use generic company emails, ex: info@, webmaster@, sales@, support@, admin@, etc… Avoid sending emails from these inbox users and instead use a personal email, like your-name@ to differentiate yourself and try to show legitimacy. If you are concerned about reply backs, you can always setup the right email reply to, differently from your sender’s email.

Never Mass Email, Cold Purchased Email Lists:

Cold lists are pricey, contain a lot of wrong email data and will risk getting your business blacklisted and even sued. Unless you get the user’s permission to receive emails from you, do not include them in your mass mailing. There are other ways to safely get into someone’s inbox, by using white-label techniques like LinkedIn approach, submitting a request through website contact form or social media tagging.

Single Vs Double Opt-in:

Permission is the key to success for any marketing campaign. When a user requests updates or information from you, he is automatically a qualified top of the funnel lead. Double opt-in increases your chances of users whitelisting you because they have to click and confirm a link to become active. Single opt-in however requires less work from the user’s side which can increase the number of subscribed users. There is a simple trick to merge both methods, by doing a single opt-in form with automation, that sends an opt-in confirmation link email to be clicked. Once the user clicks on the link, you can move them to another list called “Duplicate Confirmed”, using the Automation engine. When you send an email to users, you can target both lists and you will probably notice that the second method, however, will get a higher open rate than the first.

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Social media notification panel

This feature allows you to save time checking each social channel’s updates as you can check them all from your account.

Facebook When a new post is published, someone comments on your post, ads comments, reviews, tags or direct messages.
      X When someone mentions your business, when a new post is published, retweets your post, sends a direct message, when someone from your followers publish new post, or your latest followers.
LinkedIn When a new post is created or if someone comments on a post.
Instagram When someone comments on your post, tags your account in a post, or direct messages.

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Maintaining a good list hygiene

How you deal with emails that bounce, complain or unsubscribe, is super important in establishing good reputation with ESP’s. Good email marketing providers should take care of list hygiene on your behalf. Cleaning up a subscriber list can increase open rates by 25%. Here is how we manage this process:

  1. Unsubscribed Emails: When someone opt-out from receiving further mailing from you, we unsubscribe them from that email list so they won’t receive further emails from you.
  2. Bounced Emails: We compiled a list of different types of bounce codes returned by the recipient’s servers. In a nutshell, there are 2 different email bounce types, Soft Bounces (inbox is temporarily unavailable, try back later) and Hard Bounce (inbox does not or cannot receive your messages). For hard bounces, we automatically unsubscribe emails from your list to not receive further campaigns from you. For soft bounces, we keep the contact active for up to 5 campaigns, if the issue persists, we graduate these emails to hard bounce.
  3. Complaints: Some users might for some reason wish to complain that your email is spam. When a complaint is made, we track this action and automatically unsubscribe users from your sending list.
  4. Suppression List: Active marketers update their contact lists often, this might cause overlap or override for those who unsubscribed in the past. Suppression list is a way to prevent this error by creating a list of users who will never receive emails from you. The suppression list unsubscribes contacts as follows: I- If you mass import them from an excel file or Salesforce or other supported CRM. II- If they are on multiple lists already. If a Suppression List user opt-in in the future via a Landing Page, or you manually changed their status, they will become active again on that particular list.

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Most common reasons for an email to end up in spam

Improper Authentication:

Authentication is extremely important as it helps ISPs identify you as a sender. You should make sure your email server supports these protocols (DKIM, Domain Keys, SPF, and Sender ID) and that they are properly implemented.

High complaint rate:

If too many people are flagging your mail as spam, ISPs will take action and will first start sending your mail to the Spam Folder, then they may start throttling your messages or even block them. Keeping an eye on the complaint rate is critical if you want to reach the Inbox.

Lack of an Unsubscribe Link:

It is important to give the customers the choice to opt-out of a service. Not adding an Unsubscribe link to the emails will only force a subscriber to hit the Spam button in order to stop receiving emails from a Sender. Avoid this by adding an opt-out link to your emails. Some studies have shown that you can lower the complaint rates by simply placing the Unsubscribe link at the top of your emails and making it visible, easy to find. The system automatically adds an Unsubscribe link at the bottom of your email in case you didn’t add it, this will lower the chances of your email going to spam.

Here’s how you can add an Unsubscribe link using shortcodes:

High Frequency:

This is the number one reason subscribers either hit the Spam Button or Unsubscribe from an email stream. ISPs want to make sure that their users’ mailboxes don’t get crowded and in order to protect their users from email fatigue, they can start junking the messages. To avoid this, the best way to go about it is to simply include a link to your Email Preference Center in your emails. This way you let your subscribers tell you how often they want to hear from you. 26% of people cite that the reason behind unsubscribing is receiving too many emails. Allow users to choose exactly how many emails they get each day, week, or month.

Sending to inactive users:

Subscribers can lose their interest and stop opening your emails. The most common tendency is to send emails to even more users. However, this will only hurt your deliverability even more because ISPs have ways of monitoring the activity of the users. They can check whether users open the emails, click on links, delete or mark emails as spam or not spam, basically they monitor the users’ level of responsiveness or engagement. Based on these metrics ISPs decide folder placement – whether the email goes to the Inbox or if it gets Junked. The only way to avoid hitting the Spam Folder is by tracking user engagement as well. Before removing the inactive users from your distribution lists it is worth trying re-engaging them. One great way to do that is by sending them reconfirmation campaigns (In order to maximize your email deliverability it is important to keep your address list current and clean. A reconfirmation email, otherwise known as a re-opt-in email, reminds clients you correspond with about your business (which can increase your inbound marketing), effectively cleans your lists with minimal impact to your deliverability, and prevents inadvertently spamming your clients).

Inadequate content:

It is well known that the ISPs are protecting their users with the help of spam filters. Using the wrong words or even characters in your email can trigger the spam filters and therefore throw your email in the Spam Folder. The key thing to remember is that a spam filter is trying to remove commercial advertisements and promotions. So generally, words that are common in such emails should be avoided or used sparingly. That said, take a look at these 100 Spam Trigger Words & Phrases to Avoid

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Activating Twilio 2-way reply

In order to activate Twilio 2-way reply, you need to add a webhook on Twilio, follow these steps:

From the options menu, click on phone numbers:

Click any number you need to attach the webhook to:

Under messaging, ADD the below URL.

https://crons.vbout.com/Twilio/Webhook

Click on save and you will be able to see this number in the social streams on your account.

Note that if you have more than one number, you need to repeat these steps for each number.

You can reply to texts here:

and add numbers as contacts as well:

 

 

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How to embed a form on your website

Lite JS is one of the list’s embed code. It’s flexible and any change you do in the style reflects directly to the page where you’re using this code.

To access the Lite JS code, click on List Embed Code:

You can choose to Edit Style:

After clicking it, the style editor will open:

Once done, Save Changes and copy the code and paste it on your website:

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Contact Tags

Tags are important for segmenting, filtering, targeting contacts, in an easier, less complicated way.

In the following, we will discuss how tags work:

Managing Tags: To add/remove tags from your account visit your Settings page, Contact Tags.

Note that you can still add tags dynamically from the automation or from the contact profile page, and then they will appear automatically on the settings page below:

Adding Tags to Contacts: Visit your Contact’s page, click on a record, and add tags to this contact from the right panel.

As you start typing, you will see auto-suggestions to choose from. You can also add new tags directly separated by a comma:

Tags in Automation: You can use the actions Add Tag or Remove Tag in the automation by using the visual workflow builder. Similarly to the contact page, you can add tags on the fly even if they don’t exist on your Settings page.

As you start typing, you will see auto-suggestions to choose from.

In addition, you can use tags for better targeting inside your workflows, under the triggers as well as the conditions before the actions:

Tags and Lead Scoring: you can use tags inside the lead scoring rules, by choosing the Action Trigger “By Tag Name”:

Tags and Audiences: You can create smart segments of your lists based on tags by choosing General Filter, “By Tag Name” then selecting the relevant tag from the drop-down:

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Create images using Canva design editor

Canva is a visual drag-and-drop graphics editor, that lets you design artworks, banners, infographics and more, without the need for editing skills. Canva is fully integrated into the platform, so you can use it for graphics on your social media posts, email campaign builder, landing page banners and more.

To use Canva with the social media suite, click on the Compose option and choose the Design on Canva next to the media upload controls:

You can also access the Canva editor directly from your File Manager, which is available on all the platform’s products.

To create a new graphics, open your file manager and click on the Design on Canva option:

Canva login window will open up to ask you for your credentials. You can create a free account on Canva to use this features.

After logging in, you will be able to edit a graphics template as below:

You can also choose from Templates, Photos, Elements, Text, Background, Uploads, Folders and More. Note that there are free and paid premium templates to choose from. Hover over the artwork to view the FREE label.

Templates: Here you can choose from the pre-designed templates.

Photos: Choose from a variety of millions of images.

Elements: Design using different elements.

Text: Add text to your designed image.

Background: Choose from a collection of backgrounds to use in your images.

Uploads: Upload your own images and use them in your design.

Folders: Your Designs, Likes and Purchased Template are divided in the Folders.

More: You can choose from these apps: Pexels, Pixabay, Embeds, Emoji, Facebook, Instagram, QR Code, Google Maps, YouTube, GIPHY, and Dropbox.

Drag the desired artwork to the grid and start your edits:

Once you finish, click Save. If you chose a FREE template, you will proceed to the platform, if you picked a paid one, you will be prompted to Pay and Publish:

The image will appear in your file manager with an option to re-edit that graphics. Double click the image to insert it into your posts, landing pages or email campaigns:

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How to personalize your subject line

Using Shortcodes makes it easier to personalize your Emails. Below is a step by step guide on how you can use Shortcodes in the Subject Line of Email Campaigns.

First, go to the Email -> Campaigns page and Edit/Create Campaign.

Inside the configuration, in the Subject Line field, you will be able to see the “</>” icon. Click the icon to get the list of Shortcodes you are able to use.

Choose from the target List below to view the available list of field Shortcodes.

Click the desired Shortcode and it will appear in the Subject Line of the campaign.

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Campaign groups

Marketing campaigns such as Facebook sponsored Ad or event registration often require few assets working together to be able to capture and nurture the lead. Assets such as landing pages, email templates, automation drips, and forms are essential for the success of these campaigns. With Campaign Groups, you can organize these assets into groups, then easily copy them when you are running similar campaigns for yourself or your clients…

Campaign Groups can be used on the platform by following these simple steps:

Step 1: Install the Add-on

Step 2: Create Group

Step 3: Attach Assets

Step 4: Attach More Assets if needed or duplicate or copy to a subaccount

Step 5: Attach assets in an opposite way

Step 6: Copy to Account

Step 1: Install the Add-on:

Go to Add-ons and Install the Campaign Group Add-ons:

Step 2: Create Group

After installing the add-on, refresh your page and you will see the Campaign Groups here, click on Create Group:

Give your Campaign Group a Name and a description (for your own reference):

Step 3: Attach Assets

After creating the campaign group, you will choose the Assets that you’d like to attach from the following:

Landing Pages, Email Campaigns, Automations, Popups, Lists, Goals, Email Templates, Automated Messages, Dashboards.

You will see the assets that you chose here:

Step 4: Attach More Assets if needed:

Once you finish, go back to Campaign Groups. You can choose from the dropdown menu to attach more assets, duplicate the campaign group or copy to account if you’re an agency:

Step 5: Attach assets in an opposite way

You can attach from an automation, list, landing page… an asset to the campaign assets

Choose the campaign group:

You will notice that the asset has been added:

Step 6: Copy to Account

Once you had created the campaign group, choose Copy to Account:

And choose the sub-account that you want to copy the assets to:

 

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Lead scoring glossary

Below is a comprehensive list of engagements under your Lead Scoring feature that you can use to score your leads:

Contact Data:

  • Field value: User default or list field value.
  • First Engagement Date: The first time a user interacted with any of your marketing initiatives, either a website visit, email campaign open or social media clicks.
  • Last Engagement Date: The last time a user interacted with any of your marketing initiatives, either a website visit, email campaign open or social media clicks.
  • First Signup Date: The first time a subscriber signed up to your platform.
  • List Signup Date: The first time a subscriber signed up to your email list.
  • Lead Status: Target leads who match certain lead status you created within the system.
  • Lead Score: Target users based on their score.
  • Tag Name: The tag you had added to your contacts.
  • Joined List: User joins a particular contact list.

Website Engagement:

  • Destination URL: User visits a particular page on your website.
  • Duration on Site: User spends a certain amount of time on your website.
  • Number of pages visited: User visits a certain number of pages on your website.
  • Link Clicked: User clicks on a certain link on your website.
  • Video Watched: User watches a certain Youtube or Vimeo video on your website.
  • Form Submitted: User submits a form on your website – Must obtain the form id.
  • Goal Triggered: User reaches a particular Conversion Goal.
  • Popup Triggered: User triggers a popup.

Landing Page Engagement:

  • Page Visit: User visits a certain Landing Page.
  • Link Clicked: User clicks on a certain link on your Landing Page.

Email Engagement:

  • Email Opened: User opens any or a particular email marketing campaign sent from the platform.
  • Field Values: The value of a particular field within an email list matches certain criteria.
  • Link Clicked: User clicks on any or specific link inside an email campaign.
  • Joined List: User joins a particular contact list.
  • Unsubscribed: User unsubscribes from a list – Could be a negative value.
  • Hard Bounce: A Hard Bounce registered for a particular user – Ex: Email does not exist – Could be a negative value. Here is a list of email bounce codes.
  • Soft Bounce: A Soft Bounce registered for a user – Ex: Email Inbox Temporarily Full – Could be a negative value. Here is a list of email bounce codes.
  • Spam Complained: If a contact marks your Emails as Spam.

SMS Engagement:

  • Link Clicked: User clicks on a link from an SMS you have sent.

Browser Push Engagement:

  • Browser Push Subscribed: When a user becomes a subscriber by accepting to receive Browser Push notifications.
  • Browser Push Blocked: When a user ignores receiving Browser Push notifications.
  • Link Clicked: User clicks on a link from a Browser Push.

Automation:

  • Automation Triggered: User is at a particular stage of an automation.

Webinars:

  • Attendance: The contact attended a specific webinar.
  • Attendance Time: The contact attended of a specific webinar for a specific time.

General Filters:

  • By Device: User’s visited your site on a PC, Mobile or a Tablet.
  • By Device OS: User’s visited your site from Android, Windows, iPhone, MacOS.
  • By Location: User’s country and state match your defined criteria.
  • By UTM Source:  User’s campaign source matches your defined criteria.
  • By UTM Campaign: User’s campaign matches your defined criteria.
  • By UTM Term: User’s campaign term matches your defined criteria.
  • By UTM Medium: User’s medium matches your defined criteria.
  • By UTM Content: User’s content matches your defined criteria.
  • By Track Social Referral: User’s track social referral matches your defined criteria.

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