I’ve covered our internal support process and analyzed SaaS support and success before, but when it comes to Twitter support, there’s not much data out there.

From what I’ve learned in this study, I’d say that could be because it’s not something the company wants to do.

Is it a necessary evil, brought about by frustrated customers, or is it companies meeting customers on their level?

When you think about users interacting with companies on Twitter, you probably imagine companies trying their best to calm down users so angry they need to vent their frustrations publicly.

I got the idea for this study when I saw the sheer amount of damage control Outlook have to do on Twitter because of their product, and set out to analyze other software giants and how they do Twitter support.

Since Twitter is entirely open to the public and can’t be edited, I thought it was begging for a study on how SaaS companies support their users on Twitter. That’s for a couple of reasons. One, because no one has published data or written a post like this before. And two, because I enjoy writing studies on SaaS companies, like this and this on pricing pages, and this on landing pages.

Here’s my study into the effectiveness and uses of Twitter support at SaaS companies.

Continue Reading

According to the Laboratory for Social Machines from MIT Media Lab, Donald Trump was the most influential force on the 2016 election.

More than any television news stations, newspapers, or other public bodies. Donald J Trump, as an individual, was the most powerful influencer on the nation.

This influence was driven by his huge social media following. In March 2016 he had 6.8m Twitter followers, 6.3m Facebook likes, and 4.1m views on his YouTube channel. Now, he has over 22m Twitter followers.

But his eventual success lay deeper than just finely crafted tweet storms.

Continue Reading

We need to find email addresses for the launch in 2 weeks – about 400 should do.

Damn…

Nobody likes to hear that the next week of their time will be spent researching, selecting, and verifying hundreds of email addresses. It’s boring enough to make you complacent, but any mistakes are costly.

In other words, it’s one of the tedious marketing processes which we all love to hate.

After all, 400 emails are no good if they’re all blocked by spam filters.

I knew there had to be a better way than Googling the target audience, so I tested 9 email lookup tools and managed to find one with 92% accuracy.

Continue Reading

According to the Powering Productivity report from Planview and Loudhouse, poor processes are the primary cause of company inefficiencies (44%).

Even the largest companies in the world struggle with poor processes, resulting in poor performance and lost revenue.

But these problems are not always the fault of design.

Bad processes don’t just come from poor process management, but often evolve naturally within companies over time. From NASA to SpaceX, processes can become corrupted without anyone noticing.

This phenomenon can be known as the normalization of deviance.

Continue Reading

When we started building Process Street, we thought we knew all the features our users would need.

We were quick to learn that we’d left an awful lot out…

After a year of continuous development, we’re rolling out Process Street 2.0 — a whole new app with a ton more functionality, including:

• A rebuilt UI from the ground up
• Form builder and automation
• Task assignments and due dates
• Run links and checklist sharing
• Zapier, Google Apps, and Microsoft integrations
• Easily complete tasks and checklists

Process Street isn’t just a checklist app anymore. It’s a complete platform for workflow automation, business process management and reporting. Continue Reading

Silicon Valley darling and unicorn health insurance startup Zenefits lost over 50% of its value through 2016.

Why? Poor process management.

Process management might not sound thrilling, but it’s damn important.

Process management refers to how all the different systems within your business link up together to form a coherent whole.

If they don’t link up, they won’t make sense.

And if your business doesn’t make sense… well, you get the stretched metaphor. It’s not good.

Before we dive into what process management is and how it functions, let’s take a look at the high-profile example of poor process management in action.

That’s right, I’m talking about the cautionary tale of Zenefits!

Continue Reading

Outsourcing is nothing new. Manufacturing, support, accounting, marketing, and more have all been outsourced for decades to save time and money (although modern outsourcing only really started with IBM).

After all, why bring on an accountant full time when you can outsource your taxes once a year?

Outsourced services have doubled in value since 2000, and with benefits like saving time and money.

Weighing the outsourcing pros and cons, however, shows that it isn’t some magic pill which will make difficult work disappear.

Not only that, but everyone has a different opinion of the types of outsourcing – how the hell do we weigh the pros and cons when nobody agrees on what it even is?

So, to make things easy, we here at Process Street have summed up the advantages and disadvantages of outsourcing vs insourcing, and (if the former) tips on some different kinds of outsourcing you can use.

It’s time to outsource the work you don’t need to do and focus on getting done what really matters.

Continue Reading

Ever had to listen to yourself repeating the same instructions to coworkers?

Are you struggling to remember how to complete a task you last tackled a month ago?

Remember feeling frustrated by the time and effort wasted?

It doesn’t have to be this way.

Picture this:

Continue Reading

In this episode of Business Systems Explored, we talk to Dmitry Dragilev about the systems behind the marketing successes he’s engineered for startups like Polar and JustReachOut.io.

For startups, failure to get traction quickly can mean the difference between a multi-million dollar exit and another Silicon Valley tombstone.

Since it’s so vital to get exposure from the outset, you need to get the press, early adopters, and Google on your side.

This episode is all about how to do that: an interview with the growth hacker and startup PR expert Dmitry Dragilev.

Listen to the episode to find out where to start with an audit of your marketing site, how to write content that will force Google to pay attention, and Dmitry’s best hack for startup SEO.

Links to listen

• Listen on iTunes (iOS)
• Stitcher (Android)
• Listen on Business Systems Explored website

And remember, if you like the show, please leave us a review and rating.

Click below to subscribe on iTunes:

Continue Reading

Most companies turn to Gmail or Outlook to manage their workplace email. 13% of public companies use Office 365 or G-Suite (formerly Google Apps). The remaining 87% use a combination of the two, or a private email setup.

Some companies choose Google or Microsoft because they prefer one’s cloud office suite—which includes calendars, and collaboration on spreadsheets and documents—over the other. (We compared Office 365 with G-Suite in another post.)

But if you use other productivity tools and are deciding between Gmail or Outlook solely for email, you want to choose one that helps you speed up your workflow. Gmail set its initial bar high, and Microsoft clearly took notice. Given Outlook’s 2016 update, it is now more equipped to compete than ever.

Here are five game-changing differences between Gmail vs. Outlook.

Continue Reading