Introduction
Post-purchase flows are a powerful way to enhance the customer experience after they complete a purchase. In this guide, we'll walk you through setting up and managing post-purchase flows with Rebuy, from creating widgets to activating flows and testing their performance.
What Are Post-Purchase Flows?
Post-purchase flows allow you to display offers and personalized content to customers after they complete a purchase. These flows can be used to boost conversions, offer upsells, or enhance customer loyalty.
Key Things to Know Before You Start:
Up to 40 Flows: You can create up to 40 post-purchase flows, and they can all be live simultaneously.
Flow Prioritization: Flows are evaluated from top to bottom. The first flow that matches the customer’s criteria will be displayed.
Example:
Flow A - Does not match
Flow B - Does match and WILL respond (present the offer)
Flow C - Is not evaluated
Widget Setup: Ensure that you've set up and activated your post-purchase widgets within Shopify before starting.
Video tutorial
This step by step video will walk you through how to set up a post-purchase widget, post-purchase flow, and how to enable Rebuy as your post-purchase provider in Shopify.
Step 1: Create Your Post-Purchase Widget
Before building your post-purchase flows, you'll need to set up a widget to display your offers. Follow our guide to build a widget, and then proceed to the next steps below.
Step 2: Create a New Post-Purchase Flow
Navigate to the Post-Purchase Flows page in Rebuy.
Click "New Flow", and give it a name.
Once created, you’ll be taken to the flow workspace, where you can select the widget(s) to display.
Choose your preferred widget(s) from the dropdown menu and click Save.
Tip: You can create multiple flows and have them live at once, but make sure each flow is properly prioritized based on your goals.
Reminder, you can have up to 40 flows built and all of them can be live at once. The post-purchase flows will be prioritized from a top down approach. In layman's terms, it will act as a large data source ruleset. When activated, all the flows will be assessed from the top to the bottom, displaying the one that meets the criteria first.
Step 3: Activate Your Flow
To make your flow live:
Go back to the main Post-Purchase Flows page.
Toggle the flow to active.
Complete Step 3 in the guide to enable Rebuy as your post-purchase provider within Shopify.
Managing Multiple Flows
Once you’ve set up multiple flows, they will appear in two sections: Active Flows and Inactive Flows.
To activate an inactive flow, simply drag it into the active section or toggle it on.
You can rearrange the order of active flows by clicking and dragging, adjusting their priority.
If you haven't created multiple flows yet, simply follow the aforementioned steps again to build them according to your preferences.
Enabling Additional Flows
You can have up to 40 active flows at once. There are two ways to enable them:
Drag and Drop: Click and drag the flow from the "Inactive" section to the "Active" section.
Toggle: Simply toggle the flow to "Live" to activate it.
Adjusting Flow Priorities
You can easily adjust the priority of your active flows by clicking and dragging them. This allows you to control the order in which they’re evaluated.
The evaluation process works like a data source rule: all flows are considered at the same time, but only the first flow that matches the customer’s situation will be presented.
Upsell and Downsell Post-Purchase Offers
This guide explains post-purchase checkout extensions, which let merchants add extra steps to the post-purchase experience. These extensions display multiple offers based on whether the customer accepts or declines the initial offer.
Testing Your Flows
Once you've created your flows, assigned widgets, and set them to active, it's time to test them.
Testing Steps:
Add Items to Cart: Go to your store and add items that should trigger the initial offer widget in one of your flows.
Open Developer Tools: Proceed to checkout and open your browser's developer tools:
Right-click on the page and select Inspect.
In the developer tools window, click on the Console tab.
(See image below for reference)
Review Flow Information: Look for a printout titled Rebuy Post-Purchase Flows and expand the table view.
In the table, you'll find:
The priority of your flows.
Each flow ID for easy identification.
A true/false value indicating whether your cart items match that flow.
The widget ID for the initial offer widget of each flow.
At the bottom, you’ll see which flow ID will be displayed. Use the printout to verify your flows are working correctly. If needed, adjust your rules to ensure the flows are triggered in the correct order.
Flows are read from top to bottom. The first flow to match is the flow the customer will see. In the image above, the cart items matched true on flow 9416 and flow 9719. Flow 9416 matched first, so that flow will be shown.
Viewing the Live Post-Purchase Offer
To view the live post-purchase offer, you must place a test order. This is because the post-purchase page is behind Shopify's paywall and can’t be accessed otherwise.
Two-Step Process to See the Post-Purchase Offer:
Step 1: Rebuy Requirement
Checkout with items that match a data source in your post-purchase flow.
Step 2: Shopify Requirement
The order must meet all of Shopify’s post-purchase limitations.
Advanced Features
How to Decrease the Time for Order Hold in Post-Purchase Offers
The maximum order hold time setting will allow merchants to set the duration they want an order to remain on hold before it can be fulfilled, offering more control over post-purchase workflows.
This timer is separate from the widget timer. The widget timer is a visual countdown to encourage purchase, while the order hold timer determines when the order status changes.
Follow these simple steps to configure the order hold timer in your post-purchase flows:
Go to Post-Purchase Flows:
Navigate to the Post-Purchase tab.
Click on Post-Purchase Flows.
Select the flow you want to edit.
Open Settings:
In the flow settings, click on the dropdown menu.
You'll see the Maximum Order Hold Time setting, which is set to 60 minutes by default (Shopify's default).
Toggle On/Off:
If you want to enable the timer, toggle it on.
When enabled, the order will stay on hold until the timer expires. This means the customer’s order will remain in an “on hold” status until the time runs out or they complete the post-purchase flow.
Set Hold Time:
You can configure the maximum hold time between 1 minute and 60 minutes.
This timer controls how long an order remains on hold before it moves to unfulfilled status.
Notice: Impact of High Order Traffic on Hold Timers
Please note that during times of high order traffic, there may be delays in the order hold timer. While the timer is set to a specific duration, the system may experience some lag, and the order status may not transition as exactly specified.
Example Flow with Order Hold
Timer Starts: Once the shopper reaches the first post-purchase offer, the maximum order hold timer begins.
Order Status Transition: When the timer reaches 0, the order will move from “On Hold” to “Unfulfilled” status in Shopify. At this point, shoppers will no longer be able to add to the order or accept new post-purchase offers, even if those offer timers are still valid.
Action After Timer Expiration: Once the hold timer runs out, and the shopper clicks “Pay Now” or “Decline Offer” for a post-purchase offer:
Before being redirected, a banner will appear on the page and the shopper will automatically be redirected to the Thank You Page (TYP).
A banner will appear on the page stating: "Offer Period Over", signaling the end of the offer period.
A/B Testing Post-Purchase Flows
Rebuy allows you to A/B test your post-purchase flows. This helps identify the best-performing offers for maximum conversion rates. Learn more about A/B testing here.
FAQs
What is the Additional Analytic Event Delay?
By default, there's a 500ms delay to allow pixels to execute fully. This is useful for tracking purposes, especially when using pixel tracking for post-purchase analytics.
When will I see performance metrics?
Metrics like Total Visitors, Revenue, and Conversion will appear on the Active Flows page within 10-15 minutes after setting your flow live.
What is the difference between the order hold timer and the widget timer?
The order hold timer controls the length of time an order stays in the "on hold" status before transitioning to "unfulfilled." The widget timer, on the other hand, is a visual countdown displayed to the customer to encourage acceptance of the post-purchase offer.
What happens if I don't set the hold timer?
If you don't enable the order hold timer, the system will default to Shopify's 60-minute hold before transitioning the order status to unfulfilled.
Can I set a different hold time for each post-purchase flow?
Yes, the order hold timer is set per flow, so you can configure a unique hold time for each post-purchase flow.