I recently wrote on the Maes Consulting Group blog about how to set up a sales pipeline process in Infusionsoft.
A little known (and if actually know, still largely unused) fact about the sales pipeline is that it can also be used for tracking fulfillment processes. This is especially handy when you have a lengthy or complicated fulfillment process that has been difficult to track in the past. Even if the process isn’t lengthy or complicated, you still don’t want good paying customers to fall through a crack, get missed, and not receive what they expected.
So even if you have a relatively short fulfillment process (2-4 steps), you may have a strong need to track it every step of the way for each and every customer. You may want to see where they are at any given point, identify any roadblocks causing their fulfillment process to stall, know which department is currently working on the order, etc. or a , or even a short one. The point is to be able to track successful delivery to the customer, and determine exactly where the customer is in that process at any time.
Fulfillment Tracking Example
The Canyon Sign Company makes yard signs for realtors. They have a new client who ordered 20 signs to be shipped directly to their office. The fulfillment process looks like this:
- Client artwork requested
- Client artwork received
- Artwork sent to art department
- Proof received and sent to client for approval
- Client approval received
- Sign creation in progress
- Waiting for quality control inspection
- Passed quality control inspection
- Packaged and awaiting shipping
- Shipped and tracking # entered
- Confirmed customer is happy
The owner of Canyon Sign Company wants to track where customers are in the fulfillment process and catch anyone who isn’t moving along on schedule. He’s able to view the fulfillment stages to see how many customers are in each stage and if any customers are overdue for a stage move. This tells him if anyone is falling behind.
The owner also wants to trigger automation at certain stage moves. For example, at stage #7 he wants to send the client an email update that their signs are almost done, and also to notify the quality control inspector that there’s a job waiting for inspection. When the quality control inspector checks off his task as completed, automation takes over again and sends the customer an email letting them know their sign will be shipping soon.
When the stage is moved to #10, the customer is automatically sent another update email that includes their tracking number.
To get started with designing your own Fulfillment Pipeline, you can download my worksheet here. Visit the Maes Consulting Group blog for detailed instructions for setting up your full sales pipeline.
Vania Clark-Butler is an Infusionsoft Certified Consultant (ICC) and self-proclaimed power user since 2005. Process oriented, she shares Infusionsoft best practices to help you get set up the right way to optimize your software. For fun, she enjoys cooking, Kundalini yoga, business podcasts, and spending time outdoors with her husband and their two exuberant boxers exploring the Arizona desert. - See more at: http://www.automatingsuccess.com.
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