|| Note: Due to iOS 15 Privacy Changes, Email opens have become less reliable, and Optimove suggests that users split responses based on 'revenue gained' / another KPI or 'link clicked' instead.
The following article will showcase use cases for making the most out of Streams.
To build a stream, you will use the Visual Streams Builder.
Use the Visual Streams Builder when your stream’s campaigns must be ordered in a particular sequence (interconnected campaign flow) or if they are somehow related. For step-by-step instructions on building a Stream with the Visual Streams Builder, click here.
Visual Stream Builder Use Cases
Using the Visual Stream Builder allows you to leverage a blank canvas to easily map and create interconnected campaign flows (streams).
The Visual Stream Builder is a great tool when creating streams that are time-delimited, have a limited number of steps, or have a clear order for the series of steps. Below are example use cases of different ways to use the Visual Stream Builder.
|| Please note: By default, campaigns created as part of Streams are subject to overarching prioritization and exclusion rules. For the limited scenarios where you would not want this to happen, please see the relevant use case below.
Creating a Single Treatment Stream
One potential use is to create a Stream of campaigns without testing it against a competing one or control group. For example, you can create a welcome stream, providing your customers with a unified onboarding experience using a series of pre-determined communications.
How to set up a single stream:
- Go to the Stream Builder page under Execute.
- In the toolbar you can complete the following actions:
- Define your streams’ settings and objective.
- Choose the stream's name.
- Select the date range for the stream to run.
- In the canvas, name Treatment A and place 100% of the customers in this Stream. At this point, Treatment B will become unavailable.
- Modify your target group and map out your flow.
How to interpret stream analysis results
Setting a single stream (100% allocation to one treatment) would result in not having a KPI comparison and a migration graph to analyze results with.
A/B Test Stream
Streams allow you to test different flows against one another. Similar to A/B testing, you can test two different flows for the same customer target group to evaluate them and identify the one that generates the highest uplift.
For example, for cross-sell and up-sell streams, you can evaluate the performance of a single-channel approach using only email, as opposed to a multichannel one, using both SMS and email.
How to set up an A/B test stream:
- Go to the Stream Builder page under Execute.
- In the toolbar you can complete the following actions:
- Define your streams’ settings and objective.
- Choose the stream's name.
- Select the date range for the stream to run.
- In the canvas, name Treatment A and and Treatment B and allocate a specific percentage of your customers to each. For example, divide them equally between them (50% in each).
- Click “Apply” and map out two different flows for each stream.
How to interpret stream analysis results
An A/B Test Stream would lead to a KPI comparison or a migration graph, depending on the objective chosen in the setup phase.
KPI comparison:
Migration graph:
Creating Test/Control Streams
Dividing your customers to test and control groups in a campaign is the only way to measure the incremental uplift each campaign has on your marketing efforts.
With Streams, you can measure the incremental uplift of an entire flow of communications.
Streams allow you to split your customers between test and control. The majority of customers will be in the test flow and will receive the campaigns you choose to deliver along that specific flow; while the remaining customers will be excluded from all campaigns.
For example, to measure the effectiveness of post-transactional campaigns on customer loyalty, you can test/control a post-transactional flow. To do so, use Streams to select your target group and exclude a representative group of customers from the entire post-transactional flow.
How to set up a test/control stream:
- Go to the Stream Builder under the Execute section.
- In the toolbar you can complete the following actions:
- Define your streams’ settings and objective.
- Choose the stream's name.
- Select the date range for the stream to run.
- Name Treatment A and Treatment B, indicating one stream as a test and the other a control, and determine the percentage of customers you would want in each, such as 90%/10% or 80%/20%, etc.
- Choose your target group and to map out Stream A’s flow. To leave Stream B, your control stream empty, add an exit point at the beginning of Stream B.
How to interpret stream analysis results
The Test/Control stream analysis would lead to a KPI comparison or a migration graph, depending on the objective chosen in the setup phase.
KPI comparison:
Migration graph:
Lock Customers into a Stream
Although in most cases you will want to let your customers plot their own journeys, effectively enabling customers to jump between flows, there are cases in which you would like to lock customers into a specific flow to ensure they follow a specific experience.
To lock customers into a specific flow, use Streams to visualize the multistep campaigns and then manually prioritize the resultant target groups. This will ensure that customers within the stream, will receive the stream’s campaigns in cases when there is a conflict between a campaign within the stream and one outside of it. You can lock customers to an A/B Stream, a Test/Control Stream, or a single flow by following the steps in any of the previous use cases.
For example, for a new customer welcome series, you may want to guarantee that a customer receives all the campaigns throughout the welcome series to educate the customer or generate brand awareness. To do so, use the Visual Stream Builder to create your stream, and then assign the resultant target groups with the highest priority available.
How to lock customers to a specific stream:
- o to the Stream Builder under the Execute section.
- In the toolbar you can complete the following actions:
- Define your streams’ settings and objective.
- Choose the stream's name.
- Select the date range for the stream to run.
- Name Stream A and Stream B and divide your customers into each one based on the selected strategy: A/B testing, Test/Control, or single Stream.
- Start to create your flow.
- A target group with the New lifecycle stage will automatically be created. To modify your target group, simply add additional selection criteria. Then, map out your flows.
- Go to the Target Groups page, select the Streams folder, and locate your onboarding Stream folder. Assign the highest priority to the target groups in this folder.
|| Please note
Locking customers into a stream by manually prioritizing its campaigns above all else might lead to broken journeys. Broken journeys occur when customers continue to receive automated messages from a specific flow even after their status has changed. To avoid this, use auto-priority when prioritizing target groups within a stream.
Read more about broken journeys in this article.
How to interpret stream analysis results
As long as there's no 100% allocation to only one treatment, the analysis will include a KPI comparison or a migration graph, depending on the objective chosen in the setup phase.
KPI comparison: 
Migration graph:
Hybrid Streams Use Cases
Track and Trigger customer? You can combine both triggered and scheduled campaigns in your stream flow! Follow these guidelines, or read on for example use cases.
|| Open Beta: This capability is currently in Open Beta and may not be available to all customers. For information beyond this article, please reach out to your Customer Success Manager.
Nurturing Flow for Reactivated Customers
In this use case, we’ll demonstrate how you can combine both triggered and scheduled campaigns in a dedicated nurturing flow.
When a churned customer performs an action and becomes reactivated, we have a rare opportunity to make the most out of the interaction and encourage continuous engagement with the brand.
Testing different treatments that combine triggered and scheduled campaigns is an ideal way to experiment with messaging, offering, and even timing, and find the best way to interact with reactivated customers. The use case below kicks off with a Triggered campaign.
Below is the final result of our flow. Scroll down and watch the video for more information on how we set up this flow.
How to set up this stream:
- Go to the Stream Builder under the Execute section.
- In the toolbar you can complete the following actions:
- Define your streams’ settings and objective.
- Choose the stream's name.
- Select the date range for the stream to run
- Name Treatment A and Treatment B based on the selected strategy.
For example, let’s name the stream “Purchased (Realtime) vs. Control Churned Customers”. Then, determine the percentage of customers in each treatment (for example, 90%/10% or 80%/20%). - Click on “Create Stream” to open the Visual Streams Builder, and create your flow.
- Build a target group. To modify your target group, simply add additional selection criteria.
- Map out your flows.
- Go to the Manage Target Groups page, select the Streams folder, and assign the highest priority to the target groups in this folder to make sure that these customers receive your flow.
Video Transcript
We will kick off with a Triggered campaign sent to reactivated customers upon purchase completion.
For this campaign, we will offer a free gift on their next purchase, in hopes that this will encourage a second purchase.
Let’s add a flow control - wait one day - and add a scheduled campaign.
Remember, Triggered campaigns can't be followed by another campaign on the same day.
Our new scheduled campaign aims to encourage our customers to revisit our site.
The email includes a reminder of our previous incentive.
For customers that didn’t complete a purchase, we will add an exit point, as this flow is dedicated to reactivated customers.
Back to the customers who completed a purchase.
Let’s wait 6 days and add an Attribute Split.
For this use case, we created a calculated attribute to use in our Attribute Split – The number of Purchases over the last 7 days.
Now, customers who made their second purchase over the last 7 days, will receive a scheduled campaign with an exclusive gift.
Let’s set up this scheduled campaign. The customers who didn’t purchase will exit our flow.
Announcing a Flash Sale to Increase Net Revenue
In this use case, we'll go over how you can combine both triggered and scheduled campaigns in a dedicated flash sale flow.
When launching a sale, it is crucial to utilize relevant customer interactions to encourage a purchase.
Testing different treatments that combine triggered and scheduled campaigns is an ideal way to experiment with messaging, offering, and even timing.
In this example, we created a stream that combines triggered and scheduled campaigns, during a 24-hour flash sale.
Below is the final result of our flow. Scroll down and watch the video for more information on how we set it up.
How to set up this stream:
- Go to the Streams Builder page and click on Create New Stream.
- Select your objective. In this case, we chose to increase Net Revenue.
- Define your stream’s settings.
- Choose the stream's name.
- Select the stream’s date range.
- Name Treatment A and Treatment B based on the selected strategy. For example, let’s name the stream “Flash Sale flow vs. Flash Sale Control”. Then, determine the percentage of customers in each treatment, (for example, 90%/10% or 80%/20%).
- Click on “Create Stream” to open the Visual Streams Builder and create your flow.
- Build a target group. To modify your target group, simply add additional selection criteria.
- Map out your flows.
- Go to the Manage Target Groups page, select the Streams folder, and assign the highest priority to the target groups in this folder, to make sure that these customers receive your flow during the sale.
Video Transcript
Once you’re finished setting up your target group, simply start creating your flow.
We will kick off with a sale announcement, so let's add a scheduled campaign.
Now, on the same day, let’s add a triggered campaign.
To do so, we will add a website visit trigger, so that any customer that visits our site will receive a real-time campaign.
Now let’s choose a channel.
Customers who visited our site will get a webpage popup, letting them know about the sale.
For customers that didn’t visit our site, we will schedule a product recommendations campaign the next day.
Back to the customers who visited our site.
As soon as they visit our site, we have a popup trigger in place.
Now, let’s wait one day, add an Attribute Split, and then set up another scheduled campaign.
For this use case, we created a calculated attribute to use in our Attribute Split – Number of Purchases, Yesterday.
Any customer who purchased yesterday will now receive a scheduled campaign with a thank you email and an exclusive invite to our members' club, so they’re always informed when a new sale is launched.
The customers who didn’t purchase will receive an email acknowledging that they’ve missed our sale, but we can still encourage them to try out our products and enjoy a free shipping coupon or any other incentive.
Announcing a Happy Hour on a Specific Game to Encourage Bets
In this use case, we will demonstrate how you can set up a dedicated flow for a happy hour campaign on a specific game.
In other words, we’ll describe how you can launch an exclusive offering (e.g., bet $10 get $10) for a specific game, in a specific time range (6 pm-12 am).
Launching a happy hour can be a great tactic to encourage players to try out new games and to increase the number of deposits and bets. However, while running a happy hour, it is crucial to utilize any customer interaction to maximize betting.
Testing different treatments that combine both a triggered campaign and scheduled campaigns is an ideal way to experiment with messaging, offering, and even timing. In this example, we created a stream that combines a triggered and a scheduled campaign, during a happy hour that is scheduled on your site within a certain timeframe.
Below is the final result of our flow. Scroll down and watch the video for more information on how we set it up.
How to set up this stream:
- Go to the Streams Builder page and click on Create New Stream.
- Select your objective. In this case, we chose to increase Net Revenue.
- Define your stream’s settings.
- Choose the stream's name.
- Select the stream’s date range.
- Name Treatment A and Treatment B based on the selected strategy. For example, let’s name the stream “Happy Hour flow 1 vs. Happy Hour Control”, and determine the percentage of customers in each treatment (90%/10% or 80%/20%, etc).
- Click on “Create Stream” to open the Visual Streams Builder and create your flow.
- Build a target group. To modify your target group, simply add additional selection criteria.
- Map out your flows.
- Go to the Manage Target Groups page, select the Streams folder, and assign the highest priority to the target groups in this folder, to make sure these players receive campaigns during the happy hour.
Video Transcript
Once you’re finished setting up your target group, simply start creating your flow.
We will kick off with a happy hour announcement, so let’s add a scheduled campaign.
For the happy hour email, we will specify the exact game and the timeframe of the happy hour.
Now, on the same day, let’s add a triggered campaign.
We will add a website visit trigger so that any customer who visits our site during the happy hour will receive a real-time campaign.
Now, let's choose a channel - let’s go with a webpage popup, letting our users know about the happy hour.
For customers that didn’t visit our site, we will schedule a happy hour reminder on the next day.
Back to the customers who visited our site.
They received our popup, and now, let’s wait one day, add an Attribute Split, and set up another scheduled campaign.
For this use case, we created a calculated attribute indicating a bet on the game that took part in the happy hour.
Let’s use it in our Attribute Split.
Any customer who played the happy hour game yesterday will receive a thank you email and an exclusive hint about the next game that will take part in our happy hour special, to keep them engaged.
The customers who didn’t participate will receive an email reminder about the next happy hour.