Conversational Commerce - Beyond Bots

by Paul Ace

Posted on Apr 16, 2021

Conversational Commerce (C-Com) is about using smart automation and conversational tactics in your marketing. Host Will Francis chats with expert Paul Ace of Amplify C-Com about how the conversation should work as a deft balance of human vs automated experience, how it applies through the funnel both for B2B and B2C, micro-commitments, and, as always, the importance of data.


 

TRANSCRIPT

[00:00:01] Will: Welcome to, "Ahead of the Game," a podcast brought to you by the Digital Marketing Institute. This episode is a big Q&A where we explore an area of marketing through a leading industry expert. I'm your host Will Francis and today I'll be talking to Paul Ace about Conversational Commerce, or C-Com as he refers to it, to learn how we can employ smart automation and conversational tactics in our marketing. Paul is the founder of Amplify C-Com, which helps businesses acquire customers through a blend of mostly automated experiences alongside some human interaction too. We'll talk about how those two elements work together, how Paul discovered this channel and his previous career as a wedding singer, and what tactics he employed, and what you can try right now to automate and improve your sales funnel. Paul, welcome to the podcast. It's great to have you on.

[00:00:53] Paul: Great to be on a podcast with a fellow Brit as well. Well, it's few and far between.

[00:00:58] Will: Well, look, you know, you live and breathe Conversational Commerce. I think a good way to start the conversation would just be to sort of set out the terms really. Just take a minute to fully define for us what Conversational Commerce actually is.

[00:01:13] Paul: Yeah. So if you go back like 10, 20 years ago, and you look at how internet marketing was done then, it was literally like people learned what these things were like landing pages and being able to just get someone to opt-in and buy something, and that was about as far as it went. Well, as time has gone on, expectations have got higher and higher and higher and higher. And this need for personalized communication and instant gratification has just been massively important. So over the last four or five years, you know, some people call Conversational Commerce like chatbots, but it's far beyond that. Conversational Commerce is about creating a 80% human-like experience, and then a 20% human experience. That's the way we look at it. So what that means is for someone who is going...for example, let's say you go to a website, and you're looking and browsing on there, and then you got a message that pops up, say, "Hey, I just wondered if you need any help." Now at that point, that's automated, but then the conversational part of it might then...maybe the first two messages might still be automated based on the replies, but then from there, then it might hand over to a human to finish that conversation off. So Conversational Commerce is really looking at that hybrid between using state-of-the-art automations that are out there that can recognize what people are saying, and respond in a human-like way. And then at the same time also then handing over to humans at the right time to offer that amazing customer experience to close, one, increase conversion rates and to offer a better customer experience.

[00:02:52] Will: So is it clear where the kind of handoff between automation and humans is?

[00:02:59] Paul: If it is, then they're not doing it right. So we look at...that's why we don't say we do an 80% automated experience, we do an 80% human-like experience.

[00:03:11] Will: So it appears to be 100% human, ostensibly.

[00:03:15] Paul: Yeah, somewhere very close, right? So, for example, if we're using something like SMS, the first message will be just, "Hey, it's Paul from Amplify. Just wanted to see if something went wrong. I noticed you started checking out." And then they reply to you from that, and then the first response might pick up a keyword that they've said, "Oh, I've struggled with the checkout." And then you might have an automated response that goes on that. However, you might roll over straight onto a human at that point. So what I would do is go, "What went wrong?" And then from there, then they go, "Oh, well, I was asking a question about this." And you're like, "Great, cool. I can answer that for you." And then that sale that previously would have gone, "Why did they leave?" "I don't know." Then that turns into something that, well, turns into one you built rapport with them. And secondly, you might even actually end up getting them to spend more than they were originally going to, because they go, "Oh, that answered my question." It's like, "Great. Oh, by the way, did you know that when you get that you could also get this as well for this?" And they're like, "Oh, wow, I didn't know that. Let me give you a discount code for that right now."

[00:04:21] Will: So the value add for the business running C-Com, as you call it, it's about both capturing people when they come to a website, when they start to enter your funnel and making sure you don't lose them, they don't leak out of the funnel, but also potentially about upselling to them, and kind of building some sort of deeper relationship with them commercially, right?

[00:04:45] Paul: Yeah. So it's actually...the great thing about C-Com is you can use it at every part of the sales process, right? So if you are selling something that is a high ticket product and you want to pre-frame that sale...so let's say, for example, someone was gonna get on a sales call together. Before that sales call, you may have an automation that's set up that says, "Hey, Will. Just want to check that you're still okay for the call today." And then you reply, "Yes." And then from that, it recognizes that and says, "Oh, great. Can't wait to see you there." Right? How human does that feel, but you can automate that. So then when they get onto the call, it's like, "Oh, thanks for reaching out and making sure I was good for the call." And so that's pre-sale. On sale, you know, like the what went wrong style can work really well. And then post-sale, well, how do I create a better customer experience? So for example, we've had things before where a customer will go and spend $500 or $1,000. And from that, you wanna make sure that that customer is looked after, especially in the first...I'm just about to start to read a book by Joey Coleman, which is like how to "Never Lose a Customer Again," and turn customers into loyal followers in 100 days. And using those kinds of processes, right? If you look at the first 30 days after someone buys, what if you could send a voicemail to their phone that just said, "Hey, Will. It's Paul from Amplify. I know you bought a couple of weeks ago. I just wanted to check, how's everything going? Did you get everything you need? Did you get access? Do me a favour, just drop me a reply to this email and I'll help you out if you've got any questions at all. I just want to make sure you've got what you need. Have a great day." And they're like, "Wow, the owner rang me," right? And you can do that at scale. You could have 1,000 customers a day and still do that.

[00:06:37] Will: It's amazing, isn't it? And the chances of them ever buying from one of your competitors again goes down dramatically when you can do that, right? And that's the other thing as well, scale. That's what it's about, isn't it? You could do this, you could do Conversational Commerce yourself, but you'd be able to serve about two customers, so it's about being able to scale it. Is there any potentially any limit to that? I don't suppose there is, is there?

[00:07:03] Paul: So, you look at it different of what scale you're at. So I take the example of personalized video messaging, and this is how wide Conversational Commerce is. So it could be personalized video messaging, it could be conversational SMS, it could be messenger bots, it could be voicemails, it could even be back and forth email conversations, whatever it is, whatever the platform. But in terms of personalized video messaging, now we used to have an econ business selling bridesmaid dresses. I would send a personal video message to every single person who requested a sample of the bridesmaid's dress, every single one. And we had an automation that set it up. Basically, I got a notification on my phone that said, "Record a video." Bang. Done. It took 30 seconds. However, if we were selling 1,000 dresses a day that wouldn't have been sustainable. So, what would I have done? I would have moved that part of the conversation down the funnel. So I would have, for example, gone, "Okay, well, let's only take buyers that have spent $500 with us or £500. Let's take them, and we know that those people if we can build rapport with those, they turn into $1,000 buyers. So how about I record a personalized video message to those people who've already bought and then say to them, Hey, I just wanted to check, how was your purchase? I love what you've done with...I saw some of the photos, maybe even that you've worn the dresses. We've also got this. Just let me know if you're interested in learning more?"

[00:08:36] Will: Well, that's the thing. I mean, as the old saying goes, it's 10 times cheaper to sell to someone you've already sold to, right? So it's about...it's about post-sale and building loyal... What I really like about that example you gave about the personalized video messages, you took all the heavy lifting of, "Oh, and there's an email, a new order, or a new request for a sample, and I'll have to go to my phone app and record a video, then put it in some other app to edit it." You'd put all the kind of...the automation and the hard work in the hands of tools so that basically, you were just left with the sole task, the bare minimum of like human intervention, basically, to get it fulfilled. And I think that's part of it as well, isn't it? It's about leaving only on the table the tasks that only humans can do, but everything else is like a machine and the cogs are moving in some sort of...but that sounds...I mean, as I'm saying, I don't really know how that works. So what are the sort of...what are your go-to tools? What are the kind of off-the-shelf or available tools that would be available to our listeners that you could achieve this kind of stuff through?

[00:09:47] Paul: Yeah. So Bonjoro is something that we got introduced to about three years ago. And Bonjoro is literally an app on your phone. It links up with Shopify or, you know, you can use...I know a lot of people use Zapier, you know, to then link to pretty much anything. So, I'll link it to any order page, and then it just sends a trigger that says, "This person has just ordered." Pulls through the details of their name and their email, and then it just comes up on phone, you go, "Okay, great, I'll record a message." Or you can even link it, for example, to your calendar. So we've done that in the past as well where you're about to get...and I can't remember if I did one with you or not when we got on our first call, but some people, if I've got the capacity to do it at the time, they'll book a call, and then it'll go, "Oh, you've got a new call booked in." And I'll go, "Okay. Hey, really looking forward to our call tomorrow. It's gonna be great, and if you've got any questions, in the meantime, just let me know." And then even better is if their email has got their company website in it, then I'll have a quick look at the website first, "Noticed, this on your site as well. Awesome work on that." Right. So they're like, "Oh, wow, this person has actually done their homework."

[00:10:59] Will: Yeah. That's it, isn't it? It's about being more informed when you go into the sales process, right? You know, as part of that as well. Okay, so this sounds great. But do you think it only works for purely e-commerce companies, i.e people who sell stuff on a website, or can it work for other companies as well?

[00:11:20] Paul: It works for anyone who would make more sales if they had a conversation with a customer, which is most businesses, right? So I know, we spoke just before we started recording about a car dealership, okay? One of our clients...so I said, "Hey, we've got this new SMS process that we are doing." And she said, "Oh, I actually just bought a car over SMS."

[00:11:48] Will: Wow.

[00:11:50] Paul: Right. And spent a significant chunk of change on pretty much a brand new car, because the sale...she was like, "I don't wanna be on the phone. I haven't got time." But if she can have back and forth text message with someone that throughout the...like, let's say you start to build a report, "What kind of thing are you looking for? Okay. Great, great, great, great, and then they don't respond. So that's when we go back to automation, and go, Okay, cool, we'll set an automation to trigger a follow-up if they didn't respond after this amount of time. And then we bring them back in, and as soon as they get a response, great, back to the human again. So we're not doing the heavy lifting of the manual follow-up, all we're doing is speaking to people who are actively going, "Yes, I'm interested in what you've got." So if it's a car dealership, great. If it's a consulting firm, great. If it's an e-commerce store, great. Doesn't really matter what it is you just position the message slightly differently, human psychology is the same.

[00:12:48] Will: Yeah. And would you say that if I was to, you know, ask you to make a distinction between B2B and B2C? The application of that there?

[00:12:57] Paul: So, you know, I've done it in both. Like, I say, I've had a bridesmaid's dress business. And we've also had...I used to be a wedding singer. So, like that Conversational Commerce where, for example, someone would go and opt-in for our email list at a wedding fair. And then the day after, I would go through all those emails and send a personalized video message to them. And then if it's B2B, we've done a lot with that. We just helped a client with pretty much a dead SMS list. He was like, "I'm not really doing anything with it." We pulled $70,000 out of that in 48 hours, just by having back and forth conversations.

[00:13:39] Will: I think part of it, it sounds like part of it then is also getting over the fear of bugging people with communication. I think that I come across business owners who would hear stuff like that and feel like, well, it's gonna involve me spamming some people, or it's gonna involve some people asking to unsubscribe. But that's just an inevitable fallout of messaging people at scale, isn't it?

[00:14:02] Paul: Well, it is and it isnt. So it's about filtering the people who are interested, right? So, if I've sent you...let's say you've just opted in for something and you've gone, "Hey, hand raised, I'm interested in this thing." And I've sent you a message and said, "Hey, what went wrong?" And then from there, you've replied, but then the second response you didn't reply. So, maybe you said, "Oh, this is what went wrong." It's like, "Oh, have you tried this?" And then you didn't reply after that, then it's my duty to make sure I follow up with you to make sure you've got what you need. However, if you're just gonna go every day sending SMSs or messenger out just going, "Hey, why have you not bought yet? Hey, why have you not bought yet?" That's just gonna annoy people. I mean, I actually went through someone else's sequence the other day, who I know is doing really, really, really well. They're doing over $1 million a month at the moment, and they've scaled significantly, I found their process just a little bit too heavy, right? So they followed up with me straight away, and it was like, "Hey, I'm online." And then about an hour later it was like, "It's really me." And then about three hours later, it was like, "Do you not wanna talk?" And I was like, if I wanted to talk, I would have talked. But I just let it hang on all of it because I was like, "I want to see what happens if I don't respond."

[00:15:27] Will: Yeah.

[00:15:28] Paul: Because that's what I do, I just go through and geek out all day going, "I wonder what happens if I do this? Wonder what happens if I do this?"

[00:15:35] Will: Right. Okay, so it does require a lightness of touch, I suppose, doesn't it? And it's definitely not about spamming people, it's about doing what a human would do, essentially, isn't it? You know, and it's about having a kind of a natural timing and flow to follow-ups whether they're automated or not basically, I suppose.

[00:15:55] Hello. A quick reminder from me that if you're enjoying our podcast series, why not become a member of the DMI, so that you can enjoy loads more content from webinars and case studies to toolkits, and more real-life insights from the world of digital marketing. Head to digitalmarketinginstitute.com/aheadofthegame. Sign up for free. Now back to the podcast.

[00:16:18] So, you mentioned that you used to be a wedding singer, which I presume is quite an entrepreneurial thing. I mean, is that how you got into this? How did you get into Conversational Commerce?

[00:16:29] Paul: Yeah. So I was a wedding singer. And at the time, I just started to venture online a little bit where it was like, Okay, what if we created...I learned about lead magnets and what if we could create something to generate some leads online instead of just doing wedding faires all the time? Because honestly, they knacker you out. By the end of the weekend, you're like, "Oh, wow." So we created this thing called the Dream and Secrets Box, which was basically an info product with all the details about what I did, but also loads of information, loads...we also partnered up with a lot of other local suppliers and got $2,000 worth of vouchers in there as well. So we were like, "Hey, you get these books, these gifs, all that stuff, $2,000 worth of vouchers for $12.95." I think it might have been in pounds back there, my brain works in dollars because all our clients are in the U.S. But yeah, it was like $12.95. So it was a no-brainer for people to get it. And we sold like 250 of them. And then made...we built a group of three and three and a half thousand brides. And then I started experimenting with things called...like messenger bots when they first came out. And then I got more and more into this conversational side of things and realized, you know, like, that's really what makes a sale is people building an actual community and rapport and feeling like every single person is a human beating heart. And that's what gets forgotten in marketing sometimes, it's just like, "Oh, this is how many leads I've got." No, this is how many potential human-beating hearts you've got on your list right now."

[00:18:11] Will: Yes. That's true because it's about quality of lead, isn't it? And you know, anyone can get the biggest number of leads, but it's about having the right people who have got the right intention. Right. So that's got an interesting idea, you put together basically a super package of just mega useful resources and vouchers as a lead magnet. And from there start to see the value of like bringing people into a funnel, and then what you could do with those people over time by basically staying in touch. You probably realized at some point, I can't keep up conversations with these 250 people and had to start automating it out of necessity really.

[00:18:47] Paul: Yeah. There was a bit of that. And also, I wanted to enhance the customer experience. So I've always been a bit of a mad scientist, like, if I can figure out weird ways to do stuff out, I'll do it. So one of the things that people were saying all the time in our Facebook group was, "I don't know who to invite to my wedding." Right? That whole, well, should I invite them? Should I not invite them? So I was like, "Ah, what if we built a bot that told them who to invite to the wedding?" That was one of the first things that I built. And it was called Dot The Bot which was a guestlist decider. So it would go through and it was like, you know, do your parents say they should be invited. And then if they said, "Yeah," they should but they didn't, I was like, well, your parents should pay for them to come then. And then it would go down the list and it'd be like, "They're not getting through the chapel doors." And it was like all gift-based and everything as well, and brides loved it. And then we started to do other things like...I did a Spin The Wheel Bot. So basically, you go on Facebook, you comment and say spin...and this is when on Facebook, you could just do one-word comments and like, you know, engagement the hell out of it. And they'd say spin and then it would open up Facebook Messenger, they click a button. It would then do a gift where something was spinning around and then it would do a random outcome based on that, which then got on to the sales page. So we were getting leads for like 20 cents.

[00:20:13] Will: Wow, that's interesting, isn't it? I mean, do you think were they the kind of, like all these new things, were they slightly the wild west days where, you know, you could sort of be chuck stuff together and get quite good results, whereas it must be...maybe it's a bit more competitive now, is it, and a bit harder to...

[00:20:30] Paul: It's more compliance, to be honest, now than anything. I don't think it's that hard to stand out, because you just need to remember that people are humans. And also when you take it beyond just being functional and make it entertaining, that's what people want, because it's social media. One of the best books that I've read on gamification is "Actionable Gamification" by Yu-Kai Chou. And I got the chance to interview him about 18 months ago, and he was like...the guy has just got it dialed in. So, if you're ever looking to gamify your sales experience to make it better, have a read of that book. It's a 12-hour Audible, but it's worth it.

[00:21:10] Will: Wow, interesting. And I suppose, yeah, it sounds like it's about being sticky and engaging in better ways than your competition. And that's partly through conversations that are partly automated like you say, interactive elements, gamification, which can be a similar thing. I get that. So what are the tools you would go to, you know, if someone's listening and thinking, I might build a chatbot. What are the kind of best tools for doing that?

[00:21:40] Paul: Yeah. So we've always used ManyChat.

[00:21:43] Will: That's kind of the biggest one, I think, is it? One of the biggest.

[00:21:45] Paul: They got a tonne of venture funding as well, which I think, you know, obviously help their growth, but they were already doing things in the right direction. And they are moving with the trend of, you know, they've now got SMS on there, they've got email, they're launching Instagram on there soon as well. By the time you listen to this, they may have already launched it. So there's a lot of flexibility there. And then we've got our own two-way SMS platform that we use to do those back and forth SMS conversations and voicemail drops and all those kinds of things as well.

[00:22:20] Will: Yeah. Okay. ManyChat. Yeah. And building a chatbot can essentially be kind of like building a tree of options, can't it? A bit like a kind of choose your own adventure type thing with multiple-choice options, but as you say, people can then have responses that are triggered by certain keywords. Yeah, so I've got a problem with my kettle, you know, could be like, that triggers a very certain response, because that kettle keyword is in there, for instance, right?

[00:22:47] Paul: Exactly. And that has gone a lot further now as well, really, because we have things like dialogue flow, so, you know, for example, you could go into Starbucks. I don't know if they've actually got this, but the concept of it, you could go into a coffee shop and on your phone, you could say, "Hey, I want a skim latte with [inaudible 00:23:07], chocolate on top and two sugars. Now with the natural language processing that can recognize all those parameters, and say, Okay, cool. So they said coffee, they said [inaudible 00:23:23] and they wanted two sugars, and then that would pull that information, put that through their own system, and by the time they get to the counter, they can go and check out in that way, or even better, they could go actually, "Can I have one sugar," and then it would recognize the fact that they've said they want to change the look of that parameter and then change it out.

[00:23:42] Will: That's incredible really, isn't it? Okay, so on your website, you know, you talk about your C-Com system, you know, it sounds like you have a quite specific system that you roll out for your clients. Just give us a sort of high-level overview of the kind of main moving parts of that that would be interesting to hear about.

[00:24:07] Paul: Yeah. So we look at it, like I say, from an 80% human-like and that 20% human experience. So we have a series of automations and proven frameworks that we already know that have worked, and we tried them with a number of different clients. So then we take those, we install those. And now what we've just started doing is installing our own customer service team as well to handle all that a human rollover.

[00:24:35] Will: And what are the kind of...I mean, what are the typical components there? We talked about lead magnets, which just to for clarification are, you know, downloadables that you exchange an email address for, usually something like that, automated chat systems of some sort, either through a chatbot, or maybe through SMS, or email. Are there any other things as part of this kind of wider C-Com landscape that I should know about?

[00:25:01] Paul: Yeah. So, we've done this with normal straight-to-product funnels, we've done it with webinars, we've done it with challenge funnels, with...

[00:25:13] Will: What's a challenge funnel.

[00:25:14] Paul: So a challenge funnel is where someone will go and pay like, for example, $27, $37, to be part of a five-day challenge where they get taught the basics of the thing, and then off the back of the challenge, then they get, say, "Hey, would you like to go even deeper and even further with it," and then they go into a high ticket product from that. So we've just done another million-dollar launch with doing a challenge funnel with a client. And some of the success around that as well is the fact that we built conversation on the back end of it. So when people have already had that touchpoint with everyone in the community over five days of the challenge, and then they get a personal message from one of the owners that then starts a conversation and rapport to say, hey, just what questions you've got, what's holding you back about moving forward with this? And they're like, "Oh, it's this or this or this." And you just handle those objections there and then like you would on a sales call, but without the pressure.

[00:26:09] Will: Yeah. I mean, the challenge funnel, it's a sort of lead magnet in a way, isn't it? It's a way of bringing people in and getting their information at low stakes so that you then can actually start a proper conversation with them with whatever channel they use, whether it's SMS, email, whatever. But yeah, you have to be able to initiate it, don't you? And that initiation is basically about getting someone's email address or phone number one way or another. That's kind of the thing that's gonna actually drive any C-Com system however it's set up.

[00:26:46] Paul: I mean, I'm more of a fan of a buyer is a buyer, so if you can bring someone in on a low ticket product, even if they've spent $27 with you, the percentage of those people that are gonna become a high ticket buyer is significantly higher than someone who has never bought anything. So, I've seen people do free challenges, and some people are doing really well. Personally, when we've done free challenges, there's a lot of risk on the front as well. So, for example, if you do... And we've seen the numbers difference from an engagement perspective. If you do a free challenge, then you might end up with 20% of those people actually go and do anything in the challenge. The rest of it...because it's just another opt-in, right? Because they feel like they've done something. But if you've gone and spent $37, you're gonna be like, "Okay, I'm going to go and commit to this."

[00:27:40] Will: That's very interesting. And then of course, once those people have spent money just even though it's a small amount because they've spent money with you, it's so much easier to actually spend money with you again, psychologically, isn't it? And...

[00:27:51] Paul: It's like cheese.

[00:27:52] Will: Okay.

[00:27:55] Paul: So, imagine you're going to the supermarket. And now you don't see many of these at the moment because of COVID, however, remember the old cheese sample sections, "Hi, would you like to try the cheese? How many times?" Well, why would they do that, firstly? Why would they do samples? Because people tried the cheese to get a taste for it. Once they get a taste for it, and it's a good experience, then they're gonna go and have more of it. So what we look at is if their first buying experience is a great experience, then they're gonna come back and buy more. So that's the most important thing is don't go and scam your customers on the first rung of the ladder because they're never gonna buy from you again. So just make sure that first experience is the best experience it can be.

[00:28:37] Will: Okay. Yeah, cool. That's good. Some people listening are gonna be sole traders, you know, single entrepreneurs. Can a sole trader, a one-person business with almost no budget get started doing this stuff?

[00:28:51] Paul: Yeah. 100%. So, you know, for us most of the time we're working with clients that are already doing $1 million a year in revenue plus. However, you don't need that to get started. For example, the first thing you want to do is if anyone opts in for any form or anything, your first email that you should add into an automation is a, "Hey, what went wrong? Hey, it's Will from Digital Marketing Institute. So I just wanted to check, did something go wrong? Did something break? Just let me know."

[00:29:28] Will: So, a kind of a customer care type check in.

[00:29:31] Paul: Yeah, but not a stock, "Hey, I noticed you didn't complete your order," right? That's like, "Oh, this is automated." But, "Hey, it's Will. I just wondered if something went wrong. Can you let me know?"

[00:29:45] Will: Yes. Yeah. I get you. I get you. So yeah, that would be...I mean, that's cart abandonment you know what I mean, a quick win, isn't it? Yeah, absolutely. Okay. And, you know, you talk about some quite impressive numbers with your clients, like, give me an example. What are the most dramatic turnarounds you've personally seen with your clients when implementing this kind of Conversational Commerce system?

[00:30:11] Paul: Yeah. So we've had clients go from $35,000 a month to about $250,000 in 12 weeks. We had another client we did a challenge with and then for the first challenge we did together the previous one, they'd done $35,000, and then the next one, they did $293,000. We've done multiple seven-figure launches with clients and ongoing stuff, so there's quite a lot of...it works.

[00:30:42] Will: It's quite a jump, isn't it? I mean, I suppose what I'm trying to get my head around is it that...it's not that they're reaching more people, it's that they're losing less people. They are patching up the leaks, rather than, you know, pouring more water into the system or something.

[00:30:58] Paul: It's both. So if you think about it, then let's say right now, it costs you $100 to get a customer, but your average cart value, how much someone spends with you on average is $60. Now, if you're going to apply Conversational Commerce, and also look at, okay, how could we add maybe another upsell in there, or what else could we do to the customer experience to improve that? And then you can get that average cart value up to $100, but you know when you spend $100 and you get $100 back that then those people in three months' time go and spend another $5,000 with you, you're gonna do that all day long, right?

[00:31:44] Will: Yes.

[00:31:45] Paul: What happens a lot of the time is the people that we...when we start working with them, they don't have that, right? So it's always like they're going in the hole too much at the front to be able to confidently scale. So yes, it is putting more fuel on the fire, and at the same time, it's also about scaling everything up because of the increase in conversion rates. So you can get a bigger return on your ad spend for no extra money spent.

[00:32:16] Will: Yeah. And I mean, arguably the quickest win, you've said it's both, but I would imagine the quickest win is patching the leaks, right? Because if people are already driving potential customers into a funnel, but a lot of those customers are dropping out for one reason or another, just patching up those leaky pipes or whatever seems to be the immediate quick win there. So I can see why you get those results with your clients. It's great, it's impressive. I'm sure this is really interesting for our listeners, and it's been really fascinating to hear about this. So I really like to give people kind of practical things to do and takeaways, you know, from the episode. So what are three things that our listeners could do right now, literally, as soon as his podcast episode ends, to improve their own business results using conversational tactics?

[00:33:08] Paul: Yeah. So firstly, I'd say go and add in that what went wrong message, right? Because then you at the very least, you're gonna find out why people are not buying.

[00:33:19] Will: Now is that specifically cart abandonment, that's specifically people who've started the checkout process, but don't complete it.

[00:33:26] Paul: So it could be a normal front-end product, you know, like an e-commerce product. Or it could even be like a higher ticket product. It could be off the back of a webinar, it could be even in a local setting. You know, "Hi, it's so and so from the Local Travel Agent. I know you requested details yesterday. I haven't heard back from you. Just wondered if something went wrong." It doesn't really matter what it is.

[00:33:54] Will: Yeah, I get it. So it's about never letting people remain unfollowed up if that's the right way to say. It's always making sure...

[00:34:02] Paul: And then people have an emotional attachment the other way around, right? So, if I sent you a message and said, "Hey, Will. Did something go wrong or something break? Let me know and I'll get it fixed ASAP." You're going, "Oh, God. I don't want him to think that something has broke. I don't want him doing work he isn't supposed to be doing," so then you message me back in and you'll either say, "No, nothing was wrong. I just had a question about..." or "Yeah, something broke."

[00:34:27] Will: Yeah. Okay. I get that. That's good. So what's the second tip?

[00:34:31] Paul: Second tip is micro-commitments. And we haven't had chance to speak about micro-commitments much, but micro-commitments are massively important.

[00:34:38] Will: Tell me about that.

[00:34:39] Paul: So, micro-commitments are about getting people to say small yeses throughout the conversation. Does that make sense?

[00:34:48] Will: Yeah.

[00:34:48] Paul: Yeah. That's a micro-commitment.

[00:34:49] Will: You just...

[00:34:50] Paul: I got yah.

[00:34:51] Will: Got me.

[00:34:52] Paul: Okay. So what you're doing all the time, and we do this in the sales and the marketing and the way you're writing the conversation. Like for example, if I said, "Hey, Will, what's your goal with this podcast, Will?

[00:35:08] Will: Our goal is to educate as many marketers globally as possible.

[00:35:11] Paul: And you want to educate as many marketers globally as possible, because you wanna make that impact and that legacy in the world, right?

[00:35:18] Will: Yeah, absolutely.

[00:35:19] Paul: There you go, a micro commitment. So just getting you to say yes all the time and getting you to do that buy-in and what I did then as well is what did I do? I took your phrasing that you told me and then took the phrase and expanded on the phrase.

[00:35:35] Will: Yes.

[00:35:36] Paul: So where people go wrong a lot of the time with conversation is they don't use the words that the prospect is using. So if someone...imagine you get a customer complaint. Someone rings up, "I am so annoyed right now." And you go, "I really understand that you're frustrated." "I'm not frustrated, I'm annoyed." Right? And it works the same the other way in a positive intent. And so if you just said, "Hey, I wanna educate as many marketers in the world on a global level." If I said, "Hey, you just wanna help people out," you know, "as much as you can." You're like, "That's not really what I wanna do." But because I've repeated back what you've just said to me, you're like, "Yeah, he gets me."

[00:36:17] Will: Yeah. It's funny isn't it that? Yeah.

[00:36:18] Paul: When you're having that conversation, it needs to be like repeat back to them what they say and then expand upon it. And then if that hits where you like, "Yeah, yeah, I do want to do that because of that." And if you did that, you'd be able to do this as well, right? And you're like, "Yeah, I would."

[00:36:33] Will: So, I get that. That's really good advice. So that would be a way to structure if you were gonna build, let's say, a chatbot, or a conversational flow. A way to structure it is to create yeses. But I think you could do that through other channels. It feels like there are other channels, subtly, you could do that in just pieces of marketing.

[00:36:51] Paul: Everything. It's not for a certain platform even if you're writing emails. If you're writing an email, don't write it as in, I'm writing a broadcast, write as, "Hey, have you ever felt like this? You probably have right? And then this happens, and now you're probably thinking this. Am I right?"

[00:37:12] Will: And people are nodding their head without knowing. And yeah, it's resonating with them, isn't it? More strongly. That's a very good point in terms of messaging. I like that.

[00:37:20] Paul: Yeah.

[00:37:21] Will: Okay, what's the third thing someone could do straight after listening to this podcast?

[00:37:26] Paul: Now you put me on the spot. So third thing that you could do...

[00:37:32] Will: You know, to implement the sort of...just to improve their results through conversational tactics in some way.

[00:37:39] Paul: Yeah, go and sign up for some of the platforms that we mentioned, you know, like, if you want to enhance your customer experience if you're a sole trader, go ahead and get Bonjoro on a trial for 14 days and take everyone who in the last 90 days has replied and said they're interested in something but not bought. Go and record them a quick video message to say, you know, "Hey, checking in. I know you requested this information a while back. I just wanted to see if you need any help or support?" Or "Have you solved that problem now? If you have let me know, and I'll take you off this list. Here to help."

[00:38:16] Will: Yes. I think that there are two really good points in there. One is a lot of these services have free trials, and I'm always telling people that in my workshops, like go and avail of them, you get to use really great software for free. The second one is play around. I get the sense you're a tinkerer, and I think you said you're a bit of a mad professor. You've spent a lot of time playing around and experimenting with these tools. And there's not really a shortcut to that. I think you do have to just get your hands dirty and get stuck in really don't you?

[00:38:49] Paul: The only shortcut to it is finding someone who's already done it.

[00:38:52] Will: Which is you.

[00:38:53] Paul: Maybe.

[00:38:54.] Will: So come and find you and pay you to do it. Exactly. Well, that's great. Thanks so much, Paul, for this very insightful chat. And I learned a lot, and I'm sure our listeners did too. Just to close, tell everyone where they can find you online.

[00:39:10] Paul: Yeah. So you can go to amplifyccom.com. So if you want to amplify your business with Conversational Commerce, then go to amplifyccom.com and there are free resources on there to help you out.

[00:39:23] Will: There are indeed, and they're great. Thanks very much, Paul. Really appreciate your time.

[00:39:27] Paul: Thanks very much, Will.

[00:39:30] Will: If you enjoyed this episode, subscribe wherever you get your podcasts. And for more information about transforming your marketing career through certified online training, head to digitalmarketinginstitute.com. Thanks for listening.

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Paul Ace
Paul Ace

Paul Ace is the founder of Amplify C-Com which helps businesses customers acquire customers thourhg mostly automated experiences, alongside a certain amount of human interaction. 

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