Interview with the “Dr. Frankenstein” of marketing part 2
Published: Fri, 11/06/20
Below is part 2 of my interview with former Navy Nuclear Engineer & software & marketing automation specialist Troy Broussard, who is — when it comes to using Zapier especially — like a cross between Steve Jobs & Dr. Frankenstein.
Hit it, Maestro:
BEN SETTLE: How could info publishers & marketers use Zapier to pick up a lot of easy sales using a cheap Zapier account?
TROY BROUSSARD: Yeah. Here’s an example, info publishers are always dealing with bonuses and tracking. Who got what bonus and who bought, what version of what software, so you can give them the bonuses you promised and all of that. That stuff can all be absolutely like logged and monitored and automated through integrating their fulfillment system, whatever shopping cart they use with Zapier and logging all of that into a Google spreadsheet. So that you could really easily pull up a Google Sheet and see all of that data.
And having that data in a Google Sheet means that later, you could automate sending out marketing based on the data in that Google Sheet as well. So that's an example where you can use it to not only stay organized and improve your tracking and your support, but also go deeper in the relationship because now you have the data that you could mine into, and create additional income potential and sales, mining through that data that you have very readily and easily at your disposal.
I just ran a promotion, for example, were one of the products that I had sold I did some updates and added a whole bunch of new bonuses and stuff to it. And so because I have that tracking and that data, I can go back and easily create a campaign to say "Hey, there's an upgrade available to these limited people." And not hit the wrong people with it and cause more drama or more support on the help desk. So there's a good example for info publishing, I think.
BEN SETTLE: I remember watching you track your list and your prospects and your leads all the way before the sale with a promo we did together, through the sale, even after the sale. Was that through Zapier?
TROY BROUSSARD: Yeah. Absolutely you can do that through Zapier. So you can also use it as a data protection service for yourself. So that every time somebody opts in that you can save that data and archive it into a Google Sheet so that you've got a backup of your list real time. And then as people progress through different offers, and buy different things, you can again, track all of that inside of a Google Sheet. Even if you don't have like a really robust CRM, like Infusionsoft, you could do a lot of that same stuff, combining Zapier and Google Sheets and track the progression and history of a contact and be able to then see what they've done, what they bought, what offers they've gone to, where they've opt in for different products or different freebies. And be able to see that complete.
I would call it like a journal. Like a financial journal and an accountant or bookkeeper will track every single transaction, its date and timestamp. And then you have a journal of what's happened on that account. Well, you can do the exact same thing to create journal level tracking for your clients behaviors inside of your system by combining Zapier and Google Sheets. And you'll probably notice, like I've said it a bunch of times already, and I'll probably say it a bunch more in the rest of this interview. But Google Sheets and Google Docs, but really Google Sheets more than anything else, is one of the most important free tools that you can use in conjunction with Zapier and whatever other tools you use.
So for like you, Ben, where you've got 1ShoppingCart, and you've got AWeber. Google Sheets is kind of the missing link with Zapier, you'll find that there's so many ways that you can expand the capabilities of what you can do by adding Google Sheets into the mix of those few apps that you go deep with when you learn to use Zapier.
BEN SETTLE: I like how it can give us all Infusionsoft-like powers, without needing that complex monster of a tool. Would that mean I could have it trigger off a direct mail campaign that alerts my fulfillment company, and they will just automate that. Could I use it for something like that?
TROY BROUSSARD: Yeah, absolutely. There's lots of ways you can do that, depending on different shopping cart stuff. But yeah, there's lots of ways you can do that. And what's really cool with Google Sheets is that you can set up automations and triggers in Google Sheets as well. So as an example, let's say that somebody buys something and it adds a row into that Google Sheet. Well, the Add Row action in the Google Sheet can trigger and create another automation that goes off and sends that data out to a fulfillment center, for example.
And maybe you've got a fulfillment center, that you got a personal connection with and they're really good. But maybe you just need to give them an added alert. And so maybe it triggers a text message through Twilio. I mean, there's all kinds of ways that you could go off of that. But Google Sheets, this is why I say it's so powerful, as the hub is because not only can use it for logging and putting stuff into it, but you can also use it to trigger other actions kicking off automatically as well. So does that make sense?
You could save that order data and all of the fulfillment information, and maybe this is a fulfillment center that you really like but they really don't have their own kind of API or their API maybe doesn't integrate with the shopping cart that you use or something like that. This is where the digital duct tape comes in. This is where you can use Zapier to automate that process, capture the data from your shopping cart, capture the data from your email system, combine them, put them onto a Google Sheet, format it and trigger off an email to go out to have all of the proper information. Or wait and do a batch off of that information all through Zapier.
BEN SETTLE: What do you do if Zapier does not integrate with something? Are there's still ways to use it if you have a platform that doesn't directly integrate with it.
TROY BROUSSARD: Yeah, absolutely. There's some really cool stuff that Zapier includes in its core functionality. It has The ability to send email, it has the ability to parse text.
This is an example that we did with you, for example, with 1ShoppingCart. We couldn't get 1ShoppingCart to integrate with Zapier. It doesn't, it doesn't have any integrations. But what it does have is when somebody purchases, it sends an email to you, and it can send an email to a fulfillment center as well. So it can at least send an email when a purchase happens. Well, what we did with Zapier is we use that email as the trigger. And instead of just sending the email to you, we created a little mail forwarder so that it went to you but it also went to this hidden email that we use for Zapier, and now Zapier receives that email.
And we can use the capabilities of Zapier to look inside the email and say, "Oh, this is the product." And pull out that product information and automate off of that. And so we use that to pull out the product information, to pull out the customer information, connect it in with the Membrandt powered app that you had at the time, and use that to add access into that product and give bonus content inside the app based on that data. And so we made a bridge to multiple systems, none of which actually supported Zapier.
This is why Zapier really is the digital duct tape of online marketer.
We literally joined you know three different systems only one of the three actually supported Zapier. The other two didn't. And we duct taped it together with Zapier, and made an efficient automation out of it.
So ends part 2 of this interview.
In part 3 tomorrow, we go deep into how freelance copywriters, coaches, consultants, and other services can clean up when getting clients, so you become more of an order taker than a salesman for your services.
And do it all using a cheap Zapier account.
In the meantime:
Troy and his long-suffering business partner Moshe are selling a live Zapier training along with the recordings, if this sort of thing interests you.
Plus, if you buy from my link below by the deadline, you also get:
“elBenbo’s Copy-Soaked Brain”
This was an unadvertised bonus I did for our $399/month coaching program in Learnistic.
The tl;dr of it is this:
Part of my copywriting process is, I read my sales letters out loud 10x's before running it. This audio is the 4th of 10 readings of the elBenbo Press sales letter — with all the edits, bumps, and ideas being worked out and arranged at that stage, and with all the psychology & insights going through my brain as I think about, work on, and write/edit my own sales copy.
The deadline to get all this is tight.
You got til Sunday, 11/8 at midnight EST.
Details at this link:
https://www.EmailPlayers.com/zapier
Ben Settle