Loading and processing categories from Shoptet in automations

Question

Why doesn’t the automation take all product categories into account when I want to send email deliveries to specific customer segments?

Answer

Due to a temporary technical limitation, the Boldem app loads only the category set as the main category for each product in the Shoptet account.

For automation purposes, it’s also useful to know that order data is uploaded to Boldem every hour.

To better illustrate with an example, let’s say the e-shop has a product Lampička that is assigned to three different categories:

• For the home
• To the living room
• To the office

The product has Do obýváku set as its default category.

If we wanted to work with a product in automation and, for example, send an automatic message to users who bought items from the Household category to offer them related products, an order containing the product Small lamp would not be included in the automation because in Boldem this product has only the default category Living room assigned.

Solution

To ensure the automation works correctly in all cases, you need to:

• when segmenting, include all categories the product belongs to,
• Run the automation with a sufficient delay (at least 2 hours), since complete order data is loaded into Boldem every 60 minutes.

Let’s look at an automation example with a thank-you.

In Boldem, we’ll create an automation that sends a customer an email after they buy from a specific category, offering related products, add-on services, user guides, and similar items.

So we’ll add the following blocks to the automation:

• Website event to define a user’s entry into an automation.
• Condition to define when the automation should continue.
• Wait to create a delay between purchase completion and message dispatch.
• Send email to dispatch a thank-you email.

Website Event Block

We’ll set the trigger — i.e., what determines when users enter the automation. In our case we selected the action when a user completes an order. We want to start it two hours after completion. That’s because order data is imported into Boldem every 60 minutes.

We also decided to trigger the automation repeatedly for the same recipient — so if the recipient makes another purchase within 24 hours, they will also receive a message about their next order.

Condition Block

A condition defines the circumstances under which a message should be sent. For example, you might not want to send the same message to everyone, but only service offers related to a specific category.

If we chose only the To the Office category in the condition settings, an order containing the product Lamp would not be included in the automation because in Boldem that product is assigned only the default category To the Living Room.

So in the condition we define all categories the product can be in.

When creating, choose the condition parameter — in our case Recipients’ activity on the website – Purchased goods from category — and enter the category name. Then click the duplicate icon to create a copy of the condition, change its category name to the next one, and repeat for all other categories you want to include.

When you’ve finished editing, save the block by clicking Save.

Wait Block

Because we don’t want to overwhelm users with many messages immediately after purchase (they’ll receive payment confirmations and similar notices), or if we want to wait for the 14-day return period to expire, we can insert a Wait block into the automation and set how long it should wait before continuing.

When you’ve finished editing, save the block by clicking Save.

Send Email Block

Select the transactional template you want to send to recipients, then save the block by clicking Save.

Testing the automation

Save the automation by clicking Done/Save and then test it. You can test either via Options/Test automation, or by starting the automation and creating a test order. However, for live testing, keep in mind you’ll have to wait for the time delay you set to elapse.

We’ll start the automation after you finish editing.

For details on testing automations, see the chapter Testing Automations.