Overall internet traffic is up 18% since the start of the new year.
That’s due in large part to our new work from home reality. With stores and businesses closed around the country, buyers – B2C and B2B alike – have turned online. This includes brick & mortar, real-estate, and door-to-door sales operations who know that the key to surviving and (yes, even thriving) is directly tied to their digital presence.
So it’s no surprise that we’ve heard from dozens of customers asking us how they can best optimize their Drift playbooks for this new world. And also why we’ve seen so many customers change up their messaging to better engage with this increase in traffic.
Here, we’ve rounded up some of the best messaging and playbook changes from Drift’s customer base so you can learn from and apply them to your own business.
What’d we miss? You can join in the discussion in the Drift Community here.
Adobe
Adobe recently took Adobe Summit, the Digital Experience Conference, from an in-person event to virtual one. And to keep attendees engaged, they landed on a solution they were already using to drive sales – Drift chatbots. Using Drift allowed Adobe to interact with customers and visitors who tuned into Summit, in real-time. The bot answered questions and offered an easy way for anyone watching to learn more about Adobe applications. Chat also allowed Adobe to recreate the human, conversational experience attendees expect from an in-person event.
Here’s how they did it:
Step 1
A bot was built to target the URL where the summit was hosted. In this case, adobe.com/summit. You can target bots based on a specific URL, visitor behavior or demographics by setting criteria in the “Audiences” tab of the flow builder.
Drift Tip: Our audience estimator lets you see how many conversations you can expect based on your targeting criteria.
Step 2
Get the messaging right to keep attendees engaged. In this case, the Adobe Summit bot opened with the question “What can we help you with?”
Drift Tip: A good hook can make the difference between someone converting via chat and someone walking away. An effective opening question needs to be relevant and engaging. It invites a site visitor to start a conversation without asking for too much in return.
Make sure you also keep context in mind. For example, an opener like the one Adobe used might be too broad for a bot on your homepage, but makes sense when you’re trying to be as helpful as possible during a virtual event or other specialized, one-off interaction.
Step 3
In addition to facilitating conversations during Adobe Summit, the bot was also able to capture site visitor information with Drift’s email capture skill, which was then fed into Adobe’s CRM. This seamless flow makes following up post-event simple and easy to execute.
Evolve IP
Evolve IP offers tools that enable employees to work remotely while maintaining secure access to important workplace applications. Now that more companies are supporting distributed and remote workforces due to measures surrounding the coronavirus outbreak, Evolve IP sought to leverage Drift to deal with an uptick in site traffic.
Here’s how they did it:
Step 1
Evolve IP added a bot on a form page to act as a “second net.” This allowed them to engage with visitors who may have otherwise abandoned form fills. They built a page dedicated to answering questions about working from home and how Evolve IP could help businesses and individuals adapt to this change.
Drift Tip: Setting up a “skip the form” bot is easy when you start with a template in Drift’s Playbook Marketplace. You can access the Marketplace here.
Step 2
In addition to providing useful information about working from home and how Evolve IP could help, the company also sought to connect interested visitors to sales as quickly as possible. To do this, Evolve IP gave site visitors the option to “speak to a human” or learn more about working from home within the bot. They also shared an offer for small businesses to access their solution at no cost or on a month-to-month basis.
When the sales team is online, Evolve IP uses the routing skill to alert a member of the team to hop in and continue the conversation.
When the sales team is offline, they use the book-a-meeting skill to serve up the right team member’s calendar to allow site visitors to pick a time that is convenient for them. This eliminates the back-and-forth of scheduling that might otherwise extend the sales cycle.
Step 3
In the case of site visitors that weren’t ready or able to purchase, Evolve IP offered information on how to access their product for free.
Ping Identity
Ping Identity offers cloud identity, private cloud identity and on-premises software solutions that allow customers, employees and partners to securely connect to cloud, mobile, SaaS and on-premises applications and APIs.
To offer their solutions to a newly remote workforce, they created a landing page where potential customers could provide contact information to take advantage of their offerings.
Here’s how they did it:
Step 1
Ping Identity leveraged a “skip the form” bot to make sure they could capture site visitors who might not engage with a form or who are unwilling to fill out all required fields.
Step 2
The Drift bot opens with a straightforward hook: “Looking to secure your remote workforce? We’re here to help with any challenges.”
Drift Tip: Including a value proposition in your hook leads to better engagement and more conversations.
Step 3
As soon as someone engages with the bot, Ping Identity offers a direct line to their sales team for those ready to buy. Visitors who aren’t ready have the option to learn more about working from home.
Drift Tip: You can decrease conversation drop off and increase conversion by reducing friction and allowing qualified and interested visitors to connect with your sales team ASAP.
Keet Health
Keet Health is a healthcare platform designed around the patient and provider relationship. In light of COVID-19, Keet sought to help healthcare practitioners currently unable to provide the same hands-on, in-person outpatient care they typically offer. To enable a similar virtual experience, Keet created a modified version of their software offering that healthcare providers can access for free.
Here’s how they did it:
Step 1
Keet’s homepage bot gets straight to the point with pre-programmed answer choices which can do a variety of things including connecting you to a Keet team member or directing you to Keet’s dedicated Keet for COVID landing page.
Drift Tip: If you don’t have the resources to build out a dedicated landing page, consider using Conversational Landing Pages. They allow you to share content with your site visitors while simultaneously engaging with them as they review the content. You can check out some examples of conversational landing pages here.
Step 2
If a site visitor selects the bot’s “I’d like to learn about the Keet for COVID offer,” they’re prompted to take a short survey to provide Keet’s team with more info before they follow up.
How is your business adapting amid the coronavirus outbreak? Join in the discussion in the Drift Community here.
