Let’s try something new
Marketers spend a lot of time thinking about the best ways to reach the right people, at the right time, with the right message. And while their ideas can be revolutionary, the channels marketers are often shoehorned into don’t feel as exciting (looking at you, email). With Pendo, it doesn’t have to be this way.
When Top Hat’s marketing team was tasked with running a renewal automation campaign to support their customer success organization, Matthew Walcher, Top Hat’s marketing web developer, knew there had to be a more effective method that didn’t involve the inbox. “We were going to do an email campaign,” said Walcher. “But [I just thought], ‘I feel like we can make this better with Pendo.’”
Instead of forcing users to leave the Top Hat app to respond to emails regarding their upcoming renewal, Walcher wanted to leverage Pendo to communicate with users while they were actually using the app. Walcher also mentioned that the renewal process for their account reps was previously very tedious and completely manual. “They literally had to email every single one of their customers,” he said, “and that’s what we were trying to solve. How do we make this more efficient, less tedious for the account reps, and automate it so that they don’t have to do so much admin work?”
Out with the admin, in with the automation
Walcher and his team deployed an in-app guide with two different pathways, corresponding to the two ways a user could respond to the guide’s renewal intent prompt.
The guide first populated in a very unobtrusive way with a simple yes / no question. Depending on how the user responded to the first prompt, the guide would then expand to include other fields where the user could enter in more detail about their renewal intent. Each pathway resulted in a custom success message to suit the user’s submission. Walcher also needed a solution for users who ignored or dismissed the guide. Using Pendo, he was able to program the guide to continue to resurface until the user submitted a response. “That was helpful, and got us a bunch more [responses] as well,” said Walcher.
Walcher noted that there were a few nuances to navigate as he was setting up these Pendo in-app guides, but that the payoff has been worth it. “We had to program a bit of a delay to make sure our Marketo script and form were loaded before displaying the Pendo guide,” said Walcher. “We also had to make sure that the form positioning was right. At the end of it, it was relatively simple.”
Leveraging a Pendo in-app guide not only made for a more seamless user experience, but it also took a huge load off other teams’ plates. With Walcher and his team managing the renewal campaign, the customer success and sales teams could focus on higher-value tasks instead of the administrative work that was previously required of them. “They were really excited. Anything that makes things easier and more efficient for them, they were like, ‘this is awesome!’”
The success of this campaign has also opened the door for Walcher’s team to partner with other departments within the organization, as more groups have become interested in exploring how they can use Pendo to automate similar processes.
