Building Offer Workflows

A workflow is your offer flow: which offer a customer sees first, and what they see next depending on their answer. You build it on a canvas, the same way you’d sketch it on paper.

The parts of a workflow#

The trigger#

Every workflow starts with the Post-purchase trigger: “a customer just paid”. It’s added for you and you don’t need to change it.

Offer steps#

Each Offer step is one offer page. To name the offer, click the pencil on its card. That name is what your reports show, such as Best offer on the Home page, and renaming the offer renames it there too. An offer you haven’t named shows its Discount name, or its discount (for example “10% off”).

Click Configure offer on the offer’s card to set:

• Discount name — the name of the discount itself. It appears on the order for Fixed Amount, Buy X Get Y and Free Shipping offers, as the discount or shipping line name.
• Discount type and Discount value — Percentage, Fixed Amount, Buy X Get Y or Free Shipping. On Free, only Percentage can be picked. See Discount types.
• Max Products in Offer — how many recommended products the customer can pick from (default 3, or 1 on Free), up to 1 on Free, 3 on Growth and 10 on Pro.
• Enable time-based discount and Duration (minutes) — an optional countdown, on Growth and Pro.
• Show this offer only when — optional targeting rules, on Growth and Pro. See Targeting rules.

Options your plan doesn’t include are locked and name the plan that has them. See Plans and billing.

Accepted and declined branches#

Every offer has two exits:

• Offer accepted — what the customer sees after saying yes.
• Offer declined — what they see after saying no, or when the offer is skipped because its rules don’t match the order.

Connect another Offer step to either exit, or leave it empty to end the flow there.

How many offers a customer sees#

A customer sees at most three offers in a row, which is Shopify’s limit for post-purchase offers. Each answer sends the customer down one branch, so a workflow can hold more offers than one customer sees: up to seven, a first offer, one on each of its branches, and one on each of theirs.

The editor won’t connect an offer that would be a customer’s fourth in a row. It shows “A customer can see at most 3 offers in a row, so this offer can’t be added here.” Connect it to an earlier offer instead.

On the Free plan a workflow has one offer: an offer step can’t be connected to a second one, and a customer sees only the first offer.

Post-purchase trigger
   └── Offer 1: 20% off
          ├── accepted → Offer 2: free shipping on one more item
          └── declined → Offer 3: $10 off a cheaper product
                            └── declined → Offer 4: 10% off a small accessory

Turning a workflow on and off#

• A new workflow starts as a Draft. Customers see nothing from a draft.
• Open the workflow and click Turn on workflow. It becomes Active and customers start seeing it.
• Turn off workflow sets it back to Draft.

Only one post-purchase workflow can be on at a time. If you turn one on while another is on, xPostio shows which one will be turned off and asks you to confirm.

The editor saves your changes automatically as you work, and you can also click Save changes. On an active workflow, every save goes live at checkout straight away. To prepare changes without showing them, turn the workflow off first.

The Workflows page#

The list shows every workflow with its status and results: Accepted, Declined, Conversion (accepted out of accepted plus declined) and Revenue. Use the All / Active / Draft views to filter, and click a name to open its page.

Tick workflows in the list to act on them:

• Archive workflows turns them off and marks them Archived.
• Duplicate workflow, with one workflow ticked, makes a draft copy of it.

On a workflow’s page you’ll find its totals, the flow with each offer’s own accepts, declines and conversion, and the Edit and Turn on / Turn off actions. The More actions menu has Duplicate, which makes a draft copy named “(Copy)”, and Delete.

Tips#

• Start with one offer. Add a second one once you see how the first performs.
• Keep the decline branch cheaper. A customer who said no to $60 may say yes to $15.
• Use rules to target (Growth and Pro). A free-shipping offer for orders over $100, and a percentage offer for everyone else.

Next: Discount types →