If you're here, you already know how amazing dynamic smart lists are! So let's dive into setting them up. You need to be subscribed to InterFace's Automation platform before you start. This is going to be a very long, detailed article to make it easy for you to build it from scratch. We're going to split it into the following steps:
Step 1: Plan your lists
Step 2: Create custom fields in FUB
Step 3: Create workflows in Automation Platform
Step 4: Create Dynamic Smart Lists in FUB
Step 5: Running a backfill for all of your existing leads
STEP 1: Identify lists you need to make dynamic. Here's the template planner you can make a copy of. Here's an example sheet that is filled, for your reference. Smart lists that can be made dynamic usually have a last communication setting of 3 days or more.
STEP 2: Once you have identified the smart lists you want to make dynamic, create custom fields in FUB with field type as "date". You can name it in a standard convention like "InterFace X days Next Follow Up", where X would be the ideal time cadence for that smart list. Each smart list with a unique time cadence should have a custom field. You can use 1 custom field for multiple smart lists as long as the time cadence is exactly same.
STEP 3: Create workflows in InterFace's Automation platform. Ideally, you'll need to create 7 workflows. Let's go through all 7 of them. Workflows have 4 components - Trigger, Filter, Utilities and Action Step. Use the Guidelines below to create the workflows. The 7 workflow steps are mentioned AFTER the Guidelines section.
Guideline 1: Standard Trigger Setup for all Workflows (using Calls as an example)
Log into your InterFace account, go to Automation Platform and click on Create New Workflow.
Click on triggers, select Follow Up Boss and choose Calls Triggers in there.
Go into a test lead in FUB and log a call, so that it becomes the most recent call record to pull data from.
Click on Test Trigger in the workflow to pull in the test data.
In case the test fails (or shows an error), go into FUB and make a test call again.
This is how the test data looks like. You can cross check the name to ensure the data is pulled in from your test lead.
Guideline 2: Standard Filter Setup for all Workflows (using Calls as an example)
Click on Filter from action steps in the workflow.
We've created frequently used filters as templates. You could use any of these. In Dynamic Smart Lists setup, we would NOT be using these.
We'll be using "Advanced Filters" to setup criteria of our choice.
On the left field, search for the filter criteria you wish to check. In this example, we'll be looking for duration of the call.
Select an operator. In this example, we'll be using "Greater than or equal to (Number)".
In the rightmost field, manually type in the criteria you wish to compare with.
You could add in more filters by using AND / OR criteria. We'll see how to use AND filters below.
Click on Test Filter.
A filter can be successful even if the filter does not satisfy, since it is trying to compare the test data with your criteria.
It says "Test Successful - Your workflow would not have continued for this test data", since "0 (ZERO) is Less Than 120".
Guideline 3: Standard Utilities Setup for all Workflows
Click on Date Calculator under Utilities from action steps in the workflow.
The first field indicates the input date. In this case, we'll be using "Today's Date", since we want to use the date on which the workflow is run.
Use "Select Operator" to add or subtract days. For workflows, we need to add days. In the third field, manually type in the number of days. In this example, we're adding 7 days for standard Hot list. Click on Test Trigger and confirm the new calculated date.
Guideline 4: Standard Action Step Setup for all Workflows
Click on Follow Up Boss under action steps in the workflow.
Select Populate Custom Fields.
In the left field, select the custom field to populate, which would be the custom field you created for a particular timeframe of smart list.
In the rightmost field, select the new_date from the Utility step which calculated the date for your particular smart list.
Click on Test Action. If the test is successful, go into FUB to check if the custom field got populated.
In Follow Up Boss:
Let's dive into each of the 7 workflows:
Workflow for Calls more than 2 min
Using the Guideline 1: Standard Trigger Setup mentioned above, set up the trigger step with callsCreated.
Use Guideline 2 to setup second step as a Filter. Here's how the filter should look.
Use Guideline 3 to setup Utilities step. We need to add in multiple date calculators, each for a time frame as per your template planner. Using this example sheet as a reference, we're going to add 5 utilities steps, accounting for each of the custom fields (for each of the smart lists). We're going to add 7, 14, 30, 60 and 90 to today's date.
Next, in the action step, using Guideline 4, select populate custom fields. Since we need to populate 5 custom fields (each with a date), we'll add 4 rows to the 1 existing row.
Populate each of the custom fields value by mapping the correct Utilities output from the above steps.
Verify the output steps before you proceed:
Click on Test Action and ensure the values fed into the custom fields in FUB, inside your test lead.
Now, turn on the workflow.
Workflow for Calls less than 2 min
Using the Guideline 1: Standard Trigger Setup mentioned above, set up the trigger step with callsCreated.
Use Guideline 2 to setup second step as a Filter. Here's how the filter should look.
Use Guideline 3 to setup Utilities step. We need to add in multiple date calculators, each for a time frame as per your template planner. Using this example sheet as a reference, we're going to add 5 utilities steps, accounting for each of the custom fields (for each of the smart lists). We're going to add 2, 3, 6, 10 and 14 to today's date.
Next, in the action step, using Guideline 4, select populate custom fields. Since we need to populate 5 custom fields (each with a date), we'll add 4 rows to the 1 existing row.
Populate each of the custom fields value by mapping the correct Utilities output from the above steps.
Verify the output steps before you proceed:
Click on Test Action and ensure the values fed into the custom fields in FUB, inside your test lead.
Now, turn on the workflow.
Workflow for Outbound Texts
Using the Guideline 1: Standard Trigger Setup mentioned above, set up the trigger step with textMessagesCreated.
Use Guideline 2 to setup second step as a Filter. Here's how the filter should look.
We've added a row in filter using AND logic. The status indicates Inbound or Outbound, while the text.systemname ensures automated texts sent via third party apps are excluded from being considered as outbound communication.Use Guideline 3 to setup Utilities step. We need to add in multiple date calculators, each for a time frame as per your template planner. Using this example sheet as a reference, we're going to add 5 utilities steps, accounting for each of the custom fields (for each of the smart lists). We're going to add 3, 4, 8, 14 and 21 to today's date.
Next, in the action step, using Guideline 4, select populate custom fields. Since we need to populate 5 custom fields (each with a date), we'll add 4 rows to the 1 existing row.
Populate each of the custom fields value by mapping the correct Utilities output from the above steps.
Verify the output steps before you proceed:
Click on Test Action and ensure the values fed into the custom fields in FUB, inside your test lead.
Now, turn on the workflow.
Workflow for Inbound Texts
Using the Guideline 1: Standard Trigger Setup mentioned above, set up the trigger step with textMessagesCreated.
Use Guideline 2 to setup second step as a Filter. Here's how the filter should look.
No need to calculate any dates, as inbound texts should have "today's date" populated so they appear in the lists on the day on inbound communication.
Next, in the action step, using Guideline 4, select populate custom fields. Since we need to populate 5 custom fields (each with a date), we'll add 4 rows to the 1 existing row.
Populate each of the custom fields value with Today's date.
Verify the output steps before you proceed:
Click on Test Action and ensure the values fed into the custom fields in FUB, inside your test lead.
Now, turn on the workflow.
Workflow for Outbound Emails
Using the Guideline 1: Standard Trigger Setup mentioned above, set up the trigger step with EmailsCreated.
Use Guideline 2 to setup second step as a Filter. Here's how the filter should look.
We've added rows in filter using AND logic. The status indicates Inbound or Outbound, while the email.actionPlanId and email.emailTemplateId "= Not Exists" ensures automated emails are excluded from being considered as outbound communication. email.campaignOrigin "does not contain Bulk" indicates batch emails being excluded from outbound communication.Use Guideline 3 to setup Utilities step. We need to add in multiple date calculators, each for a time frame as per your template planner. Using this example sheet as a reference, we're going to add 5 utilities steps, accounting for each of the custom fields (for each of the smart lists). We're going to add 3, 4, 8, 14 and 21 to today's date.
Next, in the action step, using Guideline 4, select populate custom fields. Since we need to populate 5 custom fields (each with a date), we'll add 4 rows to the 1 existing row.
Populate each of the custom fields value by mapping the correct Utilities output from the above steps.
Verify the output steps before you proceed:Click on Test Action and ensure the values fed into the custom fields in FUB, inside your test lead.
Now, turn on the workflow.
Workflow for Populating Custom Fields for New Leads
Using the Guideline 1: Standard Trigger Setup mentioned above, set up the trigger step with personCreated.
Next, in the action step, using Guideline 4, select populate custom fields. Since we need to populate 5 custom fields (each with a date), we'll add 4 rows to the 1 existing row.
Populate each of the custom fields value with Today's date.
Verify the output steps before you proceed:
Click on Test Action and ensure the values fed into the custom fields in FUB, inside your test lead.
Now, turn on the workflow.
So, we've created 7 workflows - 2 for calls, 2 for emails, 2 for texts and 1 for populating custom fields in new leads with today's date.
STEP 4: Creating Dynamic Smart Lists in FUB
Using the example sheet as a reference, we now need to create the smart lists from scratch. Go into People section in your FUB account and click on All People. Remove existing filters (if any). Start by adding the relevant custom field into the filter with setting as "more than 12 hours ago".
Now, since we're creating the Hot list, you'll add the remaining filters as per your choice.
You can replicate your existing Hot smart list filters, except for any communication filters. No need to use any native FUB communication filters like Last Communication, Last Text Sent, Last Call Made, etc.
Click on SAVE. Name the smart list and share it with your team.
Similarly, you'll need to create the smart lists as planned in your Planner in Step 1.
ALL CUSTOM FIELDS WILL HAVE MORE THAN 12 HOURS AGO AS THE FILTER SETTING, IRRESPECTIVE OF THE TIME CADENCE. This is because we're populating the follow up date, which is in future.
STEP 5: Backfilling your existing leads' custom fields
You need to export all your leads, update the custom field dates in a CSV file, and reupload the contacts back into your FUB account. This wouldn't work completely, as contacts with emails would get duplicated, creating a mess. So MAKE SURE you exclude the contacts without emails. And such contacts without emails would have to be updated from the backend via API.
We know all of this sounds daunting. So we offer to do the backfill for you at a small fee.
ADOPTION STRATEGY
The best way to adopt these lists is:
Have a couple of tech savvy agents use both lists (your existing and new) for 7-10 days. If there are any issues with the new lists, they'd run into it and point it out to you.
These agents can compare the lists at the end of the day to ensure leads have correctly fallen off the new lists, and the number matches on both lists.
If you don't have older lists to compare with, just have them use and monitor the lists for any issues related to leads falling off and then coming back on the list after a few days - based on the activity they do.
Only when you are satisfied with the new lists should you shift your entire team on using them.
We'll be more than happy to examine your setup and help you debug or adopt, wherever you feel you need assistance. Feel free to drop an email to support@interface.re Make sure you attach your template planner so we know what you're trying to build!