ActiveCampaign
App Experience

ActiveCampaign
App Experience

ActiveCampaign
App Experience

ActiveCampaign
App Experience

How marketers discover, connect, mange, and configure apps on ActiveCampaign

How marketers discover, connect, mange, and configure apps on ActiveCampaign

How marketers discover, connect, mange, and configure apps on ActiveCampaign

  • 01 Problem & Goal ————

  • 03 Solution ————

  • 04 Outcome 🌟 ————

  • 05 Reflection & Future Plans ————

Problem & Goal

The Setting: The average marketer uses 12+ apps to conduct their daily business. ActiveCampaign wants to integrate those apps into AC to provide a seamless way for marketers to conduct their business the way that works best for them. This positions ActiveCampaign as the hub of a marketer's entire strategy.

Problem Space: While ActiveCampaign historically supported app connections through intermediaries like Zapier and Piesync, these solutions created additional costs and a subpar user experience. The goal was to make apps a first-class citizen within ActiveCampaign by showcasing powerful new native integrations and providing a streamlined app experience.

Objective: Design a new app connection experience that streamlines discovering and configuring apps on ActiveCampaign.

Research

Research

• Survey and Interviews: A survey sent to active app users identified pain points and engaged the most frequent users. Follow-up qualitative interviews provided deeper insights into the challenges marketers faced with the existing app ecosystem.

• Journey Mapping: An end-to-end user journey highlighted pain points in app discovery, connection, and usage. Hypotheses were developed to address these issues.

• Prototyping: Sketches of potential solutions were translated into prototypes in Figma, tested with users, and refined iteratively based on feedback.

Passkeys are a phishing-resistant, drop-in replacement for passwords. They rely on biometric verifications like FaceID or TouchID and can be used across different devices, platforms, and ecosystems.

Using a passkey is a bit like using a password manager, since a user’s credentials are stored in the cloud and easily accessible from any connected device, just like other cloud-synced features like a user’s photos, contacts, emails, and documents.

“The average marketer uses at least 12 apps, how can we integrate all those apps seamlessly into ActiveCampaign?”

Solution

The AC App Experience has several major parts: the App Marketplace, apps in Automations, and the connect and configure flow for setting up and managing apps.

App Marketplace

The new App Marketplace provides:

• Enhanced Search and Browsing: Improved discoverability through categories and onboarding flows.

• Updated UI: Unified visual language with consistent depictions of apps across the platform and marketing materials.

• Streamlined Listings: A user-friendly design for app listings that simplifies installation.

App Marketplace

The new App Marketplace provides:

• Enhanced Search and Browsing: Improved discoverability through categories and onboarding flows.

• Updated UI: Unified visual language with consistent depictions of apps across the platform and marketing materials.

• Streamlined Listings: A user-friendly design for app listings that simplifies installation.

App Marketplace

The new App Marketplace provides:

• Enhanced Search and Browsing: Improved discoverability through categories and onboarding flows.

• Updated UI: Unified visual language with consistent depictions of apps across the platform and marketing materials.

• Streamlined Listings: A user-friendly design for app listings that simplifies installation.

App Marketplace

The new App Marketplace provides:

• Enhanced Search and Browsing: Improved discoverability through categories and onboarding flows.

• Updated UI: Unified visual language with consistent depictions of apps across the platform and marketing materials.

• Streamlined Listings: A user-friendly design for app listings that simplifies installation.

A Unified Experience

The majority of users were discovering apps through the marketing site by using Google. However, there was no way to actually connect an app from the marketing site.

This project added a flow that allowed users to auth and connect an app directly from the marketing site. This opened up a major new channel for app connections.

Connect and Configure

The connect-setup-map flow ensures a seamless process for connecting and managing apps:

• Authentication Options: Support for username/password, OAuth, and API key authentication.

• Data Mapping: Powered by ActiveCampaign’s Layer technology.

• Custom Objects: Apps can now create custom data structures within ActiveCampaign, offering unparalleled flexibility and functionality.

Apps in Automations

Integrating app-based triggers and actions into this experience enhances functionality:

• Triggers: Automations can start based on events from third-party apps (e.g., a new lead in Salesforce).

• Actions: Automations can perform app-based tasks, such as updating data or triggering outbound actions when conditions are met.

This integration brings third-party tools directly into ActiveCampaign’s core automation workflows.

Outcomes

The results of the initial release of App Studio resolved or severely reduced several major issues faced by developers and the internal dev ops team:

10%

Increase in retention for users with app connected

10%

Increase in retention for users with app connected

10%

Increase in retention for users with app connected

10%

Increase in retention for users with app connected

20%

Increase in click-trough connections from marketing site

20%

Increase in click-trough connections from marketing site

20%

Increase in click-trough connections from marketing site

20%

Increase in click-trough connections from marketing site

2x

Increase in monthly app connections

2x

Increase in monthly app connections

2x

Increase in monthly app connections

2x

Increase in monthly app connections

person speaking
person speaking

“Apps let me use the tools I like in the way that’s most comfortable for me. It’s made ActiveCampaign so much more powerful.” ~ Rasmus V, Marketer

Reflection and Future Plans

Reflection and Future Plans

While this rework of the app experience made huge strides and showed market metric improvements, there's always more that can be done.

Some of the plans on the roadmap include:

  • Enhanced custom objects support for apps: A new UI that will make setting up custom objects during app connection even easier.

  • Continuous marketplace improvements: Working closely with the marketing and site teams we want to continue to align these experiences and streamling the connection process.

  • App 'Starter packs': One-click combinations of apps, automations, and custom objects that will give marketers a major head-start on their marketing endeavors and make ActiveCampaign even more sticky.

Many more ideas are also being explored and the roadmap is constantly evolving based on user feedback. By continuing to iterate and improve upon the app ecosystem we can create a world-class integration experience that makes ActiveCampaign even more powerful.

While this rework of the app experience made huge strides and showed market metric improvements, there's always more that can be done.

Some of the plans on the roadmap include:

  • Enhanced custom objects support for apps: A new UI that will make setting up custom objects during app connection even easier.

  • Continuous marketplace improvements: Working closely with the marketing and site teams we want to continue to align these experiences and streamling the connection process.

  • App 'Starter packs': One-click combinations of apps, automations, and custom objects that will give marketers a major head-start on their marketing endeavors and make ActiveCampaign even more sticky.

Many more ideas are also being explored and the roadmap is constantly evolving based on user feedback. By continuing to iterate and improve upon the app ecosystem we can create a world-class integration experience that makes ActiveCampaign even more powerful.

While this rework of the app experience made huge strides and showed market metric improvements, there's always more that can be done.

Some of the plans on the roadmap include:

  • Enhanced custom objects support for apps: A new UI that will make setting up custom objects during app connection even easier.

  • Continuous marketplace improvements: Working closely with the marketing and site teams we want to continue to align these experiences and streamling the connection process.

  • App 'Starter packs': One-click combinations of apps, automations, and custom objects that will give marketers a major head-start on their marketing endeavors and make ActiveCampaign even more sticky.

Many more ideas are also being explored and the roadmap is constantly evolving based on user feedback. By continuing to iterate and improve upon the app ecosystem we can create a world-class integration experience that makes ActiveCampaign even more powerful.

While this rework of the app experience made huge strides and showed market metric improvements, there's always more that can be done.

Some of the plans on the roadmap include:

  • Enhanced custom objects support for apps: A new UI that will make setting up custom objects during app connection even easier.

  • Continuous marketplace improvements: Working closely with the marketing and site teams we want to continue to align these experiences and streamling the connection process.

  • App 'Starter packs': One-click combinations of apps, automations, and custom objects that will give marketers a major head-start on their marketing endeavors and make ActiveCampaign even more sticky.

Many more ideas are also being explored and the roadmap is constantly evolving based on user feedback. By continuing to iterate and improve upon the app ecosystem we can create a world-class integration experience that makes ActiveCampaign even more powerful.

Additional Information