In this article, we will go through different automations that you can easily set up after connecting your e-commerce to Rule. In this article, you can read more about Marketing Automation for e-commerce!

We will go through:

1. Abandoned cart
2. Digital receipts

Abandoned cart

Abandoned cart is a follow-up message that is sent to someone who has added items to their cart and then left the website without completing a purchase. These messages work to remind customers of products they left in their cart, in order to entice them back to purchase what they were already so close to buying. Here you can read more about Abandoned cart. 

Before we show step by step how to set up such an automation, it is good to know the following:

1. The products need to be submitted from your e-commerce provider via an API call. Either there is an integration to Rule or you can use a third party for this that submits the data to Rule. 
2. Then you need to create a template or order one for abandoned cart. If you want to start right away, there is a ready-made template that you can use in all accounts, it is located in campaigns and is called "Cart in progress". 
3. The fields and data submitted differ between different e-commerce providers. For example, if you have Magento, the field can be submitted to Rule as "OrderNumber", if you perhaps have Centra, the field can be submitted as "Order", make sure you know what fields are submitted to Rule. 

Before we show step by step how to set up such an automation, it is good to know the following:

1. The products need to be submitted from your e-commerce provider via an API call. Either there is an integration to Rule or you can use a third party for this that submits the data to Rule. 
2. Then you need to create a template or order one for abandoned cart. If you want to start right away, there is a ready-made template that you can use in all accounts, it is located in campaigns and is called "Cart in progress". 
3. The fields and data sent in differ between different e-commerce providers. For example, if you have Magento, the field can be sent to Rule as "OrderNumber", if you perhaps have Centra, the field can be sent as "Order", make sure you know what fields are coming in as in Rule.

Set up abandoned cart:

1. Name the automation
2. Choose tag 'CartInProgress'
3. Create your email or SMS
4. Schedule them for after how long the communication should be sent after a customer has abandoned their cart
5. Activate the email or SMS
6. Activate the entire loop

When you click on "Add email" you will be presented with different templates to choose from, if you have your own "Cart-in-progress" template, use that one. Otherwise, there is a template available for everyone that you can use.

Remember that this template retrieves data/content from your e-commerce. While you are creating your communication, you will not see the items in the customer's cart in the email builder. It will only be visible in the actual communication to customers since there can be different items in different customers' carts. Below we show an example of how it will look while you are creating the communication vs how the customer will receive it.

It is worth mentioning that as long as the Cartinprogress call is correctly set up via API/Integration, the flow will be interrupted if the customer places an order before the email regarding the abandoned cart is sent.

In other words, you do not have to worry about the customer receiving a message about an abandoned cart if they have already completed it.

Digital receipts

One of the most common but also most important transactional emails is receipts. In order for Rule to send receipts, we need the "Event" that an order has been placed. Then the tag OrderCompleted is added to the subscriber, as well as order data. All of this is set up automatically when the E-commerce integration is in place.

Create a new automation

1. Name the automation loop
2. Choose trigger OrderCompleted, or Ordershipped depending on which automation you are setting up
3. Set timing for your communications
4. Activate the communication
5. Activate the entire automation loop

When you click on "Add email", you will be presented with different templates to choose from. If you have your own "Order Confirmation" or "Shipping Confirmation" template, use those. Otherwise, there are templates available for everyone that you can use.

Note that while you are creating your email, it will not look the same in the email builder as when it is sent live, as the template will retrieve order data from your e-commerce system.