I first met Kylie as an alumni member of Troy Dean’s WP Elevation training. We then both found ourselves members of an online business accelerator group called The Association. It seems we were destined to work together eventually!
Kylie runs her agency, Kylie Martin Creative, in Karoonda, South Australia. She produces amazingly beautiful brand and website design. Knowing I’ve worked with membership type organizations for over 15 years, Kylie reached out for me to develop a new online sign-up/free membership form for her client, Mallee Sustainable Farming (MSF).
History & Discovery
After discussing Mallee with Kylie, we realized they fit the model of an “information” website rather than a “membership” website. MSF staff had researched and was considering signing up for Wild Apricot software. This software is geared towards the “membership” model. Because Mallee has no paid membership, no members-only protected content, no need for a membership directory, etc. I advised that it wasn’t appropriate for them and would have been overkill for the expense.
All of Mallee’s information and events are free. Since Mallee receives government funding and offers research for the rural sector, they needed to collect demographic information on the sign up form.
The staff used a tool they were familiar with, and had created a Google Form as a way to collect the demographic details and add subscribers to their information flow. Staff then manually reentered the information into their Mailchimp email marketing account; using this as a pseudo-CRM. This was taking too much time away from staff working on value-added tasks.
Requirements
Mallee Sustainable Farming is targeted primarily for farmers, but other occupations could subscribe as well such as farm workers, advisors and researchers, agribusiness and government professionals, media, and students. Form questions needed to be applicable to the right person completing the form. A farm owner would complete specific questions about their farm, whereas a media representative would not need to.
Mallee staff also wanted to be able to send targeted email communication based on subscriber preferences: E-newsletters, Research Updates, and Events. An additional requirement was the ability to send SMS (text) event reminders to subscribers in the future.
Creation
Working directly with Kylie we mapped out how the new sign-up form needed to work. There needed to be additional questions that weren’t previously included in the Google Form. We also wanted to ensure that fields would show or hide based on answers to specific questions. This is the easiest way to include many questions covering multiple scenarios in one large form.
Here’s an example of how this works. On the new form, under the Occupational Information heading they ask, “Are you a farm owner?” Depending on the Yes or No answer they have the ability to ask follow-up questions. When the answer is yes, Mallee can collect further information such as the enterprises, the size of the farm, and where it is located.
Now, people who are not farmers have a better user experience. There is no need for them to answer these questions.
Next, we managed the transition from Mailchimp to our recommended new use of ActiveCampaign. Our services included scrubbing the subscriber list of old/inactive contacts, creating the new list(s), and setting up branded email templates matching different communication preferences.
End Result
Kylie’s client now has a streamlined, powerful online form that is directly connected to their email marketing service. They no longer have to manually enter information, as we also built-in custom fields to the system. Mallee staff can now send targeted emails to their subscribers based on their selected preferences, as well as set up automated response emails.