This episode features Interact Customer Success Manager, Damaris Pacheco, Growth Manager, Jackie Aguglia, and Social Content Manager Jesy Nelson.
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Hi guys, and welcome back to Interact’s Grow Podcast, where we help you with all of your marketing and actually grow your business. I’m your host, Jessmyn Solana, and we have all four of us today. Ladies, welcome. Hello. Hello. Hello. Super funny slash side story because I was about to talk about how the weather is getting cold and I just sent Jesy a meme this morning about how as, as you get older, you basically check the weather app all day.
So I just want to know if anyone else is like me out there. Let me know. Cause I was about to bring up the weather again, this could totally be another topic for another day, but just how weather You know, it affects your mood, but how does that affect your day to day when you get into, like, a specific routine?
It worked really well for you, and then the world decides to shift. And it kind of screwed up for everybody. Yeah. But we are not talking about that today. So I had this question kind of roaming around in my head. I thought it would be really interesting for us to answer. We have customers at different stages of their business.
You know, maybe they just started. We have people who Are super seasoned, and so this is not specific to any of those stages. It’s, I wanted to generalize this question in, for a purpose, a specific purpose, just to hear what everybody has to say and the reasons behind it. So today we’re going to talk about if you could only implement one tool or suggest one tool to our customers, which would it be and why?
Who wants to start? Oh, everybody’s so quiet. I volunteer Jackie as tribute. Well, I was going to say quizzes. You should implement quizzes in your business. And I think the reason I say that is because it’s so, it can be used in so many different ways. So I know for sure we have some episodes out there of when not to use a quiz, right?
Like, are you too new to your business and when you can use one, but if you’re using an interact quiz, for example, as. As your website so that you’re not paying for a domain name. You’re not paying for a website hosting service. You’re not paying for a landing page builder, right? You can use interact in the code and the analytics that come with it.
The lead generation that comes with it to collect emails and download everything to a CSV. So really, you can collect a lot of customer research. Voice of customer information from them when you’re just getting started out. But then also use quiz analytics to see like, where are people going, right?
Like you can use different buttons, your questions to see if they’re interested in this topic versus this, to see which platforms they’re going to. If you’re on different social media platforms or hosting blogs and things like that. So my obvious answer is interact quizzes. So you briefly mentioned that you could use it at different stages of your business, I guess.
Which stage would you recommend it for the most? I think we’ve talked to Josh has a, we have, we’ll find this podcast episode and link it here because Josh talked about this and I think it’s when you’re ready to scale your business or maybe not even at that point yet, but you know that your things are selling, right?
Like you have a purpose online, you have a following online. People are actually interested in what it is that you have going on and they’re starting to purchase from you. And especially if you’re selling different things, you would absolutely want to use a quiz. So you can figure. out who is there for what reason.
So you can point them towards the funnels, the offerings, the resources that would make most sense for them and the reason that they’re there in your audience. I love that. I love that. So I know we talked a little bit about this before the episode in how this kind of segues into actually communicating with your customers, because quizzes are a form of communication, right?
However, you’re not directly speaking to them. So. How does the communication part play into implementing a quiz in your business? Well, I think it. It’s, it’s creates a more of a connection, right? Creates a better relationship or like getting off on the right foot because you’re not just like trying to sell to the people that are getting onto your website for the first time.
You’re actually trying to get to know them. You’re trying to figure out why it is that they’re there. You’re trying to teach them something about themselves that they, that they’re looking for online. Right. That’s like how they found you. And I think that’s the biggest difference. You’re not just like submit, like, right.
How many websites do you get on where it’s just like, subscribe to my email list. I have no idea what you’re going to be sending to me, so I don’t subscribe to you anymore. Because I’ve been bombarded with spam emails, you know, for no reason, the things I’m not even interested in. But with a quiz, like I absolutely know what emails I’m getting and why, like I’ve subscribed to several quizzes when we had our community open and even just in giving quiz feedback, and I’m still on several email lists I’ve purchased from different quizzes because they just resonated with me so much.
I was like, wow, I never knew that that really impacts my life. And I want to know more about that. So I’m staying on your email list. I love that. That is actually, that’s funny. I want to add a little bit to what Jackie is saying. It made me think of where we’re in the middle of training somebody to create quizzes for, you know, we’re sort of going in, we’re in the stage of trying to teach strategy and things to look for when we get an AI request, right.
From one of you guys that are listening. And so one of the things that we talk about a lot is like, just when I look at Somebody’s website if they don’t send me. Any information to go off of if I, that’s all I get, I always talk about this and this ties back into communication. I promise everybody. I always talk about what do you see that stands out a lot?
Like, what words are being used a lot? What what message is the message that like, resonates like high level in the website that really sort of touches. Or makes that audience be felt and seen. And so back to what Jackie was saying with communication, like sometimes just the messaging that you see in the website should sort of help you like build that bridge of like, okay, this is like what I’m trying to create, like high level overview.
And then how can I like tailor that to go towards a branch? I don’t know how else to explain like a tree of life. Right. So it’s interesting that we’re talking about that because we’re in the middle of doing that. So. I also was going to add that, you know, we always talk about Henry’s house of coffee, how they use their quiz as if like you’re coming into the store, you can totally use your quiz as kind of like a, hi, like welcome to this little corner of the internet.
I’m here. This is who I am. This is what I do here. Like you can. Like convey your personality and your style and like your brand voice through your quiz. And it’s kind of like a get to know you, like if the person was meeting you in person, but they can’t. So you do that through your quiz. It’s so funny.
You said that Jesy, because I was going to say the exact same thing. I just listened to earlier this morning, the first episode ever we did on our podcast with Henry’s house of coffee. And he literally said, it’s like, it was either him or Josh, but they said, it’s literally a quiz is a digital version of you living.
on your website so that you can have these conversations when people get in, get to know them and then triage them to the right thing that they need.
I love it. So what’s next? What else we got one? I think I could go next because it kind of connects back to quizzes and info you get from quizzes. But I think a really important thing to implement in your business, like from the get go is a CRM platform. And we personally use HubSpot. And I know that HubSpot might not be the right choice for everyone that’s starting a business.
So you can even use like You know, Google sheets or whatever that you need to, but having a place where you can track all of your customers information from, you know, when did they 1st visit your website? You know, when did they become a customer? When was your 1st contact with them? Like, all of those things is so important and it helps you refine your messaging down the line to them, which will make a huge difference in.
Difference in like your sales and everything else. So I would say that a CRM would definitely be a game changer. If you’re like just starting out, get all that information on your customers right away and keep tracking that for years and years to come. Yeah, I really liked that you called out specifically.
It does not have to be something super expensive, like HubSpot. You can use Google Sheets. The idea is to have a searchable function where you could easily see. Okay, I’m looking for this person, maybe make some notes on them maybe log down what their website URL is the top three things that they need from me, or like, even like what kind of service I offer that they need it’s just a way to actually log all of that.
Yeah, and I mean, it, it’ll show you so many different things in the sense that like, you could have someone that got to your website, opted in through your quiz and have been on your email list for two years, and then they end up purchasing from you. That’s a customer you want to talk to, like, what changed?
Why? You know, what took two years? What changed in your business? Was it something about my offer? And then you’ll have the person that, you know, maybe just found your website and instantly purchases. Like, these are two different people. Knowing these things makes a huge difference on how you’re going to market yourself, the messages you’re sending, maybe refining your offers.
So I think that’s a huge part to have. So I, back in the day, oh, I was just going to say that I wanted to call out specifically. Making lists with your CRM, whether that is Google Sheets or like a tool like HubSpot. Being able to make lists of people. So if we go to back, go back to what Jackie was saying, how you should implement a quiz.
Let’s say, you know, you can’t you can’t put it in your budget to get a CRM tool like. HubSpot. My gosh, I’m sorry. All the other ones are escaping me right now. Sometimes like your email platform can count as a CRM, but also not really. But anyway, the idea is you take people from other tools, whether that’s ads, whether that’s quizzes whether that you know, is a contact form on your site or your social media, people reaching out to you, just a way to like.
Track. Okay. Who are my people? Like who are specifically interested in me and what I do? Yeah. I love that. And I think back to our HubSpot and we have so many people who, you know, are trying out quizzes, but they haven’t become customers yet. And we’re always so intrigued. Like what, what’s that thing that’s holding them back from.
All right, I need this quiz. You know, maybe we find out that their website’s not up and running yet. Maybe we find out that they don’t have like. A tested offer yet, and they’re waiting for something, but when that moment happens that we’re like, wow, they finally moved into this next bucket of our personas, like to who they are.
I think it’s really interesting to see, like, how each customer progresses and how they do that differently. Yeah, and I don’t have a. Oops. So sorry, Jackie. No, you were wanting to talk forever. No, this relates because what I was going to say is back in the day, I used to study travel and tourism when I was in college.
And there was a huge case study on Ritz Carlton specifically and how they would empower their employees when people would come in, especially like member, like. Loyalty members, right? Would come in, they would actually have like these notebooks. I mean, I’m sure it wasn’t a paper notebook, but like a database CRM where it housed specific notes, like, Hey, this person has a child who really loves this specific snack or this juice, or it has this stuffed animal.
Right. Or, you know, this flavor of wine, this type of transportation, and that’s why they’re, they’re ranking and their ratings are so high is because they go above and beyond and wowing their customers. And so I think people who are using quizzes and who are using email overlook segmentation so much when it’s as simple as that.
It’s you taking a little note about a conversation that you had with this person or a quiz. And then you use that and remind them that you know that, that you remember that about them in their emails. Because like with this case study with Ritz Carlton, it was exactly that. After the stay was over, maybe months later.
down the line or at Christmas or on their birthday, they would reach out to them and like say that thing that they remembered or it was literally in a note of their CRM, but oh my God, I would never say in any other hotel because these people get me and that’s what everybody’s looking for. It’s so true, especially like now.
I feel like we’re in the age where like standard marketing doesn’t do it anymore. Like, I want you to email me and be like, how’s your dog ace doing? And I’m like, he’s doing great. Thank you. Like I’m listening now. You caught my attention and that’s the whole point, right? Yeah, go ahead. Damaris. I know you’re going to say something too.
Yeah, well, now I’m trying to remember what I was going to say. I think what I was going to say is even if you’re just like, not if you’re just starting and you really don’t know what to do with your email list yet, at least select we have an option. That’s that. The c s v file, you can click on the c s V file option and that way you’d at least start collecting emails and information.
Even if you don’t have like a vision, you don’t know where you wanna go with it, yet you at least start collecting some data. And I just wanted to sort of throw that tip out for everybody. I love that. I love that. How about we move on to the next one tool? Me? Well, as many of you guys know, I’m, I’m, my job role is, is heavily, heavily relies on customer support.
And so my, my tool will definitely come from that perspective of the business. We specifically use. A chat system that helps not only our customers, but helps us to as as business owners. So we use intercom. And so for businesses out there in whatever stage you’re in, everybody’s different having some sort of customer support, some sort of chat system, some way that your customers are able to reach out to you for help I think is very, very important because.
It’s probably obvious for everybody else listening. You’re not really going to grow your business if you don’t know what your customers want, what kind of help they need. And they feel supported like with us specifically in chat, we have live hours that, you know, I’m in there helping customers with whatever, whatever they need, the questions can vary for, for customer support to integrations, tech, confusion, whatever it is.
I think that that would sort of be my, my tool for sure, to start thinking about that, especially as a company’s growing and you’re starting to get more customers and it’s becoming harder to track and all of those things.
Oh, I was just going to say that, like, I think it’s huge. Like no matter what stage you are in your business as a business owner, you want to see your customers succeed. Like you don’t want them to just purchase and then you hope that they’re gone. Like you want them to succeed. So giving them a way to contact you if they’re having troubles, if you can, you know, find a good way to always be there, always be there to support them with any questions they have.
I think that’s huge. Yeah. So I was going to say that I have a theory about why I think chat. Functionality on your website is so good to have also popular among the masses is our generation grew up with text messaging and you know, there’s something about it changed a lot, right? Like I think.
Especially when we were growing up, who remembers using AOL instant messenger? Hello. That was like having actual conversations with people. Right. But as that sort of evolved into text messages, I remember using text messages, like It was an instant messenger because it is the same idea, but now I use it as just like, Hey, going to send someone a quick note.
We might have you know, a quick conversation, but it kind of ends there. There’s no need to like say goodbyes in text, but the chat functionality from companies. Feels a little similar in which it’s like, Hey, I have a problem. Here’s my note on that, you know, send me something quick. And so this is where I think also the sort of bot functionality is a good thing to have because it can give supporting resources.
To your customers when you’re not there during live hours. But if you are, or if there is that type of, you know, resource that you can have somebody live chatting with people, then that’s great because they get their question answered. It’s done and it’s good to go. And now they’re super happy, but. My theory is, is that we, our generation loves chat functions because we love texting and we grew up with instant messengers.
Yeah. And to even expand to what you’re saying in our chat function, honestly, more than 50% of the time, our customers find the answers. Like as soon as they chat in art, certain articles come up that may be related to what they’re looking for. They’ll just click on that help doc and then they don’t even need me.
They just read the instructions and they go about their business. And so that’s sort of ties into what you’re saying. We sometimes just look for those tools to help and get us in the door and then we can figure it out on our own. But of course there’s times where. Additional assistance is needed, but it’s interesting that you say that because the data is definitely strongly shows that it’s used as a tool to just get the help that you need.
And then keep it pushing. Like, that’s just a generation that we’re in right now. Why do you guys all being? Oh, sorry. I was going to ask a question, but do you want to finish? No, go ahead. I was going to ask, like, why, why do you think chat? Like, is so much more easier to use than having a very clear contact me link.
And you can fill out the contact form and submit, like, what Besides my theory of us loving instant messenger, like, what do you think is so different about those two? Well, if you’re asking me, I have a theory too. I think that we’re in a, we’re in a stage. I don’t know if it’s generational or whatever you want to call it, but time is a very, very important thing in, in our world, in our environment right now.
And so I think that using things such as forms and things that. Require time there’s a time constraint to it right later in the future, whatever the case is can hinder at times because people just don’t have the time. The luxury of time is like. Insane I cannot even tell you how many times people will chat in.
They are literally asking me for a specific thing. I give him the thing and I never hear from them again. Like, it’s gone like the wind. You know, and that’s really, it’s just a time constraint. The chat feature really eliminates that when they go in and log in in the live office hours or whatever it is that we, whatever chat system you guys are using out there it just answers the question and eliminates that time constraint that people have in their head.
So that’s my theory. I feel like email can come across as too formal sometimes. Like, even if you think about it, like in a company, I feel like pre COVID, not a lot of like companies that were in office were using things like Slack or like Microsoft teams, you know, like I remember at, yeah, in my previous roles, like.
We all communicated via email, even though we were all sitting physically in an office together. We, all our communication was via email. And then, you know, we got teams and all of us were like, Oh my God, this is so much nicer. Like, I don’t have to be like, hi, so and so. Hope all is well, like, blah, blah, blah.
Even though I could walk across the office and talk to you about it. But like, everything’s just, that was quicker than an email is quicker than doing that. But now like chat and like. Instant message style things are way quicker and just, yeah, things like that. Anything like that. I really agree with you, Jess, that we like texting and that’s why we like chat, because you can talk to someone from a different generation.
Like my grandma’s a great example. She never contacts customer support. If she has a problem with something or like anything, she’s like, I’m going into the store and I’ll talk to them. And I’m like, you do you, but. We could, you know, solve this right now, but she needs a whole Saturday afternoon to get it done.
But that’s fine. I think for me, it’s the multitasking. If you have your chat feature, like right there, you don’t have to leave the platform. It’s it feels instant, even if it’s not right. Like how many times have I chatted in and I have to wait for an email back because I’m out of hours. Like, no problem.
It feels instant. And I agree that it feels easier to send the message through also. Cause it’s literally just like, here’s the one question that I have. I’m not trying to be like, hi, so and so this is what I’m doing. You know what I mean? And. So for me, it’s like I, and how many times also have I been like, I lost the chat, right?
Like I chatted in and then I went away to a tab multitasking and then forgot, but still got the answer because I had put my question in there. So I think for me, you’re not stuck on the phone. You’re not stuck at the store in traffic, getting to the store. Everything is instant and you’re able to multitask.
Because time is of the essence. Absolutely. And yeah, people just don’t like to talk on the phone anymore. I can’t tell you how many people across a lot of generations are like, Oh, I can’t order DoorDash on the app. I’m not ordering from there. Like I’m not calling and speaking to somebody. I don’t know why.
Cause we’re used to texting. Probably. Or it just seems faster than waiting on hold for a call. Or like if you, I remember even just last week, somebody had emailed in. To our hello at email asking to speak to someone. And I was like, you know, actually it, it might be faster if you email in your questions that here you could book a call.
And even then, when you book a call, it’s like, well, I got to wait now for like, at least the next day. You know, like, I can’t, I can’t speak to someone right now, whereas, like, chatting in, it’s right there, you know, it’s already happening, and you could already get your issue resolved. Exactly. There’s so many times where.
I have like a question about something on some like software that we’re using and they’re like, okay, like, you can also book a call with this person and I’m like, chat was just helpful for the fact that you instantly directed me to the person that I need to book a call with. Like, there have been times, like, you know, when you call a customer service line and you cannot get to the department or the like, person that you’re trying to get to, because I feel like chat also, like, skips through all that nonsense and gets, like, Yeah, exactly.
And also with chat, like we were talking about bots and things like chat bots, instant messaging Is that segmentation also, because you can track what people are asking, what systems they like features of the tool they’re using, how they’re using it, right. Use cases, the type of business that they’re in.
You can gather that all of that from a chat conversation, probably even more, and then use that in your CRM to segment people and then send the right emails to them so that this. ongoing relationship that you really understand this person and know who they are and get them continues forever. Really.
You’re also getting like direct voice of customer because they’re they’re typing in using their own words, you know? Yeah, I can’t even tell you how many times Something keeps coming up and I’ll just slack Jackie is like, Hey, this keeps coming up. Can you, can we look out for it? Or this system is new. I haven’t heard from it and it keeps coming up.
Maybe we should look into it. I just did that the other day, you know, but it’s things, things change. I mean, things change so rapidly, you know, sometimes. Having some sort of chat feature and having your customers tell you, Hey, this is what, this is the new thing that’s happening. Help me with it. Helps us keep up with the trends and the things that are changing.
So we don’t stay behind, you know, so. I want to say something you could do specifically in intercom because it’s the only chat, like bot we’ve ever, I’ve ever used personally, but I believe something you can do is, so let’s say somebody Like you always see the same question. You could type that into the search bar and find all the conversations that people like different customers have come in with that same question.
And then we could actually see like, okay, how common is this? You know, how are they wording it? Like, where are they getting stuck? What, what is the confusion about it? Where is like, one, if that happens in a call, unless you record the call, it’s hard to log that information. If it happens through email, kind of the same idea, like it would be a little bit clunky.
But, I would say like, that is also like a really cool thing that you could do with the chat. Be sure is be able to look up those conversations that you have but also vice versa because the customer can come in and search Within the chat what they’re looking for like type in that keyword And our help docs will appear and if we see in the stats, right that people aren’t clicking those help docs Then we know people with this specific question.
Our help docs are not helpful We have to create new versions or update them to actually answer this question so that we can answer things faster. So it goes both ways as well. When customers chat in, we know exactly what we need to improve for them. Exactly. I, that point also makes me think that it can totally guide like your website design and just like user experience.
If 40 percent of the people that come into chat are like, how can I contact someone besides through chat? Or like, how can I log in to view my like, previous orders or purchases? Then you know, that clearly there’s something going on that people, it’s not easy enough for people to log in and find that information.
So it can also guide like how, yeah. Like your Shopify store or anything like that is set up. I love it. And just to make this come full circle, you could probably find your quiz title in the chat search, right? Like what is the number one asked question that everyone’s always asking you back and be your quiz title.
Yeah, I wanted to say how all three of those tools actually work really well together. Your quiz would like be your top of funnel, right? Like those are finding the people who are not, who are in your target market, but not in your actual audience yet. And then that can go into your CRM where you can log all these notes and information.
You could segment people, you could send emails and so on, which will then lead to your chat functionality. Once they are further down the funnel, maybe they’ve purchased from you. Maybe they’re about to purchase from you, but they definitely know who you are. They have questions. And now they’re asking.
You for more information, which can then go back into your CRM or help you make a new quiz. Optimize. Optimize. Love it. I also wanted to call out to you how part of all of this, like what I heard in was like the common theme and all three of these tools and a lot of the tools that I think should be implemented in a business.
I know we didn’t cover everything, but personalization, right? All these tools are meant to help you personalize the experience for your customer. Whether that is a quiz that leads them to the right place, whether the CRM that keeps a note of exactly who this person is so you know what to say to them when you speak to them, and then also the last thing for the chat functionality, it’s like, okay, how do I help?
You specifically with your problem and make you feel heard and help you with your situation
I’m thinking as an outsider if I listen to this episode and I’m like, okay, I can implement one thing Which one am I gonna pick? This is hard I know, I’m sorry, that was supposed to answer, the whole, the whole podcast was supposed to answer that and we gave them three instead. We gave you options. Lots of options.
I think like and I would love to hear what you guys think about this as well. You definitely, in terms of implementing one tool, I think number one, you want to think about, well, what am I trying to do here? You know, am I trying to really hit the people who are at the top of my funnel, find new people?
Or am I trying to give a better experience to people in the bottom of the funnel? And like for a CRM, you know, that’s mostly to make your life easier too. Yep. Take care of like all the admin work. Yeah. And make things easier down the line when you have hundreds of thousands of customers. Exactly. Exactly.
I know us for one before we had HubSpot, we were working off Google sheets and it was tough, it was a tough time, but we, we survived. Gotta start somewhere. We survived. Well guys, thank you so much for answering. The one tool that our customers should implement or suggest to implement. If you guys have any questions about any of that, you know, you can always reach out to us on social media.
You can email us at hello at tryinteract.com If you have any feedback or questions about things that we should talk about on the podcast, we’d love to hear it. And before I forget, because I know I cannot leave an episode without mentioning this request, a quiz through AI at AI dot try and rack. com.