Moving from Convertkit to FloDesk
I am not a bandwagon jumper. Just want to make that clear upfront, ok?!? ;-)
When I saw a large part of the creative community start to talk about this new email provider called FloDesk I took a step back and gave it a good glance up and down.
I have never been a first adopter and like to let other people deal with all the ups and downs when it comes to jumping on something NEW + EXCITING.
But it’s been a few months now (it’s December of 2019 as I’m writing this) and I am hearing more + MORE positive things coming from everyone who already made the jump….
PLUS I’ve been personally seeing FloDesk emails hitting my inbox…and man do they look pretty and branded and welp…just overall way more appealing than other emails.
Makes me want to READ + CLICK.
And hey…that’s the whole point of sending emails in the first pace right? Connect with your reader and hopefully encourage them to interact with your conversation starter!!
So I decided to make the switch from Convertkit to FloDesk and I’m trying to document the process of moving everything over to help guide you if you are in the same boat!!
FloDesk is still in beta
It’s important to realize that FloDesk (at the time I am writing this) is still in BETA mode. It hasn’t fully launched yet. And while this means that you can get in on a KILLER intro price ($19/month for life baby!!!) there might be some limitations or things you can’t do YET or things that work a bit differently from other older and established email providers.
It is VERY important to realize this going in. If you expect everything to work 100% perfectly, well then you probably have a tough time in life in general, but when it comes to moving your subs…just understand this is a new company and they are still working out some kinks, and in the process of releasing new features as they grow and listen to their subscriber base.
Convertkit to FloDesk
It’s important to realize that if you are just signing up for FloDesk for the first time or if you are moving from another provider like Mailchimp, everything I share here might not be 100% relevant to you. BUT I’m sure what I’m doing will still relate somewhat to your situation.
I am going to be MOVING around 1100 people from Convertkit over to FloDesk.
I have been using Convertkit for a few years now and I have a LOT of history in CK that honestly I’m fine getting rid of. I’ll be deleting some cold subscribers and exporting some of my segments just so I can retain SOME history but for the most part I will be starting FRESH in FloDesk based on how I have my welcome sequences currently set up.
The best way to start
From what I can tell from all of the research I have done as I have started playing around in FloDesk is that if you are moving people OVER from another system, there is a preferred ORDER in which you should do things OR you might end up having to implement some workarounds.
The only way right now to force a new subscriber through a welcome sequence ( a series of automated emails that go out) is to add them to a segment.
That is the only trigger currently available.
This may change in the future, but it’s an important thing to understand right now.
—-> So, because of that, it’s important to create any WORKFLOWS (series of emails) FIRST
—-> Then create segments and add people to them.
That’s if you are going to be sending through people who are already on your list through a workflow in FloDesk.
I won’t be doing this because everyone on my list has already been through one of my workflows so they don’t need to go through them again.
How I will set mine up
I currently have five “starter” welcome sequences based on different freebies/subjects that I talk about
General (no opt in freebie) - this is for someone who simply wants to sign up to my list and doesn’t get a download in return. It is a workflow with essentially ONE email in it welcoming them and giving them an option to join into another workflow through opting in for one of my freebies.
30 to do steps to start your photography business ebook - based on a popular blog post I have
Lightroom Survival Kit - for those looking for help with Lightroom
7 tips for photogs using Squarespace - for those looking for help with Squarespace and Blogging
10 steps to uplevel + uncomplicate your business - for those looking for general help with business.
For most people this is probably overkill, but I tend to talk about a lot of different things and I want people to get the best and most relevant information possible.
So, essentially I will have 5 welcome sequences and 5 “forms” or opt in pages for those sequences.
And in order to assign people to them, when someone opts in to a form they will be assigned to a segment in FloDesk (this is similar to a “tag” in Convertkit.)
Segments
Segments are essentially your way to divide up people on your list so you can send them the info they need. A lot of business owners won’t really need to worry too much about segments but if you have a more robust list or talk about different subjects having segments will help.
For example, if you are a wedding photographer who talks to brides AND you also offer education to other photographers you’d probably want a segment for BRIDES and a segment for PHOTOGRAPHERS. The info you share in email with these two groups will likely be pretty different so you can ensure that people aren’t getting emails or info that is not relevant to them.
Now, if you have a bride who is also a photographer, they might end up in both segments and that is totally fine!!
Segments also give you a good idea about what a subscriber is interested in or how they got on to your list. I might have people who are interested in all of the subjects that I discuss and I’ll be able to see that by seeing what segments they are a part of.
You can have as many different segments as you like! And you don’t need to create an ALL SUBSCRIBERS segment because FloDesk already does that for you!
Domain Setup
I went through the process of authenticating my domain in FloDesk and made a video of that process!
I currently use Squarespace and my domain is through GoDaddy so that is the process I went through.
This article on FloDesk is also helpful when it comes to authenticating your domain.
Forms
A form in FloDesk is pretty much the same thing as a form in Convertkit but they are WAY easier to design and much much prettier. Forms in CK were my LEAST favorite thing about their system because I found myself having to create multiple forms to do different things and designing them was just plain ‘ol not fun.
Forms in FloDesk are still “slightly” limited (there is currently only one design option for a full page form) but for what they have so far they are still highly customizable and pretty simple to put together.
There are three types of forms: pop up, inline and full page
I don’t need a pop up form right now so I’ll only be creating inline forms and one full page.
I already have “opt in” pages built on my Squarespace site because I didn’t like the form options in CK. So I created pages on my site that look and feel like my site and just embeded the code from the forms on CK on to those pages. I’m essentially doing the exact same thing with FloDesk.
I will have ONE full page form on FD that I want to link on instagram so people can sign up quickly to my general newsletter without having to get a freebie etc…
Adding inline forms from FloDesk on to your Squarespace site
In order to add inline forms to your Squarespace pages and have them show up correctly, you do need to add a bit of code to your Squarespace site. I will show you how to do that in this video below!
Workflows
Workflows allow you to send out a set of emails with time delays between them. This works great for something like a welcome sequence, a challenge or a set of launch emails.
Creating the workflows are pretty simple and straightforward, but here are a couple of tips before you get started:
Make sure you create your segments first. You aren’t able to create a new segment from within the workflow builder.
It might be a good idea to create and edit your emails first under the emails tab before adding them into the workflow. Selecting, editing and saving the emails from WITHIN the workflow editor can get a little dicey and you might not end up saving in the right spot and you’ll lose your work.
If you create the emails in the emails tab, when you go to create a workflow you can COPY any email that’s created INTO the workflow. **Note, it is a COPY, it’s not tied to the original email. So after you put emails into your workflow, you’ll need to edit them FROM the workflow.
After you have added the emails into your workflow you can delete them out of the email tab or you can keep them as template to potentially us in a different workflow.
Importing subscribers
Ok so the last thing I need to do to get fully set up is import my subscribers from Convertkit.
In Convertkit, I would tag people IN CROWD (main list) when they were done with their original welcome sequence. This way when I would send a general broadcast I could send it to ONLY people who were done with their welcome sequence.
Because of this, and because I have had people still opting in every day, I did two exports out of CK. One of people who are still going through their welcome sequence and then one of all people who are done with their welcome sequence.
I will add everyone who has completed into a segment called “Import from CK” and also a segment called “CW - ALL” just so that I know where they came from.
In order to import, you’ll need to download a CSV file from your current email provider and then upload that into the appropriate segment in FloDesk!
Ok! We did it! We successfully moved all of our subscribers over from Convertkit into FloDesk!!
I will report back in a few weeks with any updates/changes that I’ve noticed after having used FloDesk for a few weeks. I’m so excited to start emailing again!!!
