Paul Sokol, THE Automation Authority

Over a decade ago, I was responsible for releasing a Campaign of the Month. Each and every month I had to research, design, build, test and write the instructions for how to get one simple automation model out at scale.

This was one of my favorite parts of my job!

After over a decade, I've decided to bring this back and make it better than ever. And, for right now, these automation models will still be 100% free to install and use. The return of the Campaign of the Month begins… Show more

Over a decade ago, I was responsible for releasing a Campaign of the Month. Each and every month I had to research, design, build, test and write the instructions for how to get one simple automation model out at scale.

This was one of my favorite parts of my job!

After over a decade, I've decided to bring this back and make it better than ever. And, for right now, these automation models will still be 100% free to install and use. The return of the Campaign of the Month begins with a super lean and powerful automation: the RFM Calculator. Show less

On this latest guest appearance, I go deep into customer journey automation with Keap's CEO Clate Mask #CRM

CRM data is a prime example of the “garbage in, garbage out” concept. The better and more well-thought-out your database fields are, the more value they can have to your customer’s journey and business overall.

In this post, we will share 3 ways to supercharge your CRM data. Even if you are familiar with some of these ideas, we encourage you to read between the lines a little more closely.

The devil is in the details.

Loral Langemeier and I have known each other for many years. We finally got a chance to sit down on her podcast to rap about automation and the future of business.

I was invited to do a quick spot to share a little bit about advertising & marketing.

In this blog post, we are going to break down the fundamental advertising strategy known as the OAC. To attempt to launch a campaign without making sure each of these three components is explicitly defined is to set yourself up for failure. Or, at the very best, the actual launch will be super delayed and take way too long to get out the door.

NOW is the time to double-check that your email authentication for SPF, DKIM, and DMARC are configured! Not sure what those are, then definitely read on…

Why? In February Google and Yahoo, two of the biggest email providers, are going to STOP delivering emails that don’t have those email standards configured properly.

I was quoted in the conclusion of this product update blog :)

I've known Tim Hyde for years and we are both big automation nerds. This podcast appearance let me go deep in to my favorite topic: customer journey design. By thoughtfully orchestrating your customer journey, you set the stage for lasting success. If you’re seeking ways to revolutionise your operations and establish genuine connections with customers, this episode is for you.

Todd Westra runs a super cool podcast-type live stream where he brings on experts to chat about different business topics. This was a particularly fun guest appearance because it involved myself from the small business lens, and Sasha who comes from the big enterprise/corporate lens.

Pull up your chairs fellow professionals and let's chat about business Compliance & ethics! This is super valuable, we promise :)

In this session, Shoan, Craig and I give some behind-the-scenes around the next Automated Marketing Summit.

This is the original partner-only presentation that I gave back in 2020 on how to generate leads through Facebook at Keap's #PartnerCon

Shoan and I connect over our love of music and being a little polarizing. So when he asked me to be a guest on his live podcast, I was thrilled!

I'm not going to say that pattern recognition fuels marketing/sales success, but when you can recognize the patterns then you can achieve marketing & sales success ;)

The community rose to the challenge for a quick shortcut keys masterclass, so Paul decided to give a teaser from the full master class training.

At the core of any process comprise these three components: Governance, Risk Management, and Compliance.

Jesse Jackson has a podcast about Bruce Springsteen. In this different kind of podcast appearance, I talk a lot more about music, my family, and Keep Children Rockin!

They asked me about what it means to be an "Offer", so I flat out went off!

I always enjoy talking about Offer and Target Audience distinctions. This is a good nerdy one 🤓

I'm a mission to change the stigma around mental illness. My brain deals with borderline personality disorder.

If you'd like a peek into what its like with this obscure disorder, listen on your favorite channel below!

Apple: https://podcasts.apple.com/gb/podcast/199-managing-a-borderline-brain-with-paul-sokol/id1478184933?i=1000563244949

Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/episode/2YTpKGE4vTGz4gu5dxCG9w?si=Jdsz_MtgSjuRb_96W6IUwQ

Anchor:… Show more

I'm a mission to change the stigma around mental illness. My brain deals with borderline personality disorder.

If you'd like a peek into what its like with this obscure disorder, listen on your favorite channel below!

Apple: https://podcasts.apple.com/gb/podcast/199-managing-a-borderline-brain-with-paul-sokol/id1478184933?i=1000563244949

Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/episode/2YTpKGE4vTGz4gu5dxCG9w?si=Jdsz_MtgSjuRb_96W6IUwQ

Anchor: https://anchor.fm/psykhe/episodes/199--Managing-a-Borderline-Brain-with-Paul-Sokol-e1irpn6 Show less

"Warning: This Is For Advanced Automation Fans Only!!!!

I figured out how to do some black magick with Zapier to hit (any) API which means you can pretty much do whatever you want programatically.

In this example, I use Zapier to hit Keap's API to move an Opportunity stage 👀"

Every once in a while I get random outreach to do things regarding marketing.
DailyAdBrief finds people that are experts and then interviews interviews them for a couple minutes real quickly to educate their audience.

In this power-packed appearance I dig into what a customer profile is and the 4 critical parts of it.

This covers a basic sales pipeline for an advanced sale.
Its worth a peek to see what kinds of automation you can do with sales automation.

Pipelines are my favorite.

We’ve seen this question a LOT and in different ways. The hard part about answering this is there is no one solution to it. Looking for the people who need a real estate agent? Well, you’re going to have to try a different strategy than the consultant over there, who is looking for people that require their professional services. When you have a well-defined customer profile, you can make better decisions about where to find buyers.

I've technically been an independent consultant for for close to 2 decades at this point. Even in college and as early as my senior year of high school I was getting paid to help people with technical things and stuff for their business.

These days I understand that any serious consultant needs to have a proper customer database.. And since it's 2022, that database needs to do more than just hold data. It needs to work like a virtual person helping you on the back end.

Even though I'm only a six figure CEO, I was invited to be a guest on the Elite Momentum podcast which is designed for 7-figure businesses and larger. These tips can help you grow and scale quickly!

If you know any real estate agents who are struggling, this guest post I wrote for Keap might help them close more deals :)

This is a great case study into how mental wellness can impact business. Super vulnerable and I'm grateful to Greg for doing this.

This appearance covers a lot of super simple tricks that someone MIGHT use...and you probably won't find this interesting ;)

In this 2nd part of our Aphotheosis case study, I explain the "Triple Boost" strategy.

As one of Keap's premiere cheerleading Certified Partners, I was blessed with an opportunity to lead a Business Booster.

And in this one, I go over my core business model framework: The Business Stack

Everyone should be able to get value out of this one!

I feel like I've been friends with Jaleel Manns forever. We both geek out on this kind of marketing and automation stuff.

So when he invited me to talk about FB Ads on his Marketing Velocity Podcast, I knew it was going to be a good one.

Years ago @voyicks helped one of the top
@KeapGrowing
real estate partners scale their automated campaigns to multiple accounts for their inner circle users to benefit.

He picked up a thing or 2 about #realestate along the way, specifically, how to maximize a #CRM if you are a realtor.
Years ago our I helped one of the top Keap real estate partners scale their automated campaigns to multiple accounts for their elite inner circle of users to benefit. I picked up a thing or two… Show more

Years ago @voyicks helped one of the top
@KeapGrowing
real estate partners scale their automated campaigns to multiple accounts for their inner circle users to benefit.

He picked up a thing or 2 about #realestate along the way, specifically, how to maximize a #CRM if you are a realtor.
Years ago our I helped one of the top Keap real estate partners scale their automated campaigns to multiple accounts for their elite inner circle of users to benefit. I picked up a thing or two about #realestate in the process. Specifically, how to maximize a #CRM if you are a realtor. Even if you don't sell property, this guest post will give you ideas on how to scale your relationships with automation! Show less

Chris Davis is my kinda dude! He is all about automation so on this podcast I got to geek out hard on advanced marketing automation tactics. This is one you don't want to miss!

I've known Misty for years and I absolutely love her! She is a powerhouse Keap Certified Partner so when she invited me to be on her podcast, of course I said yes 🤸‍♂️

I can't remember how Josh and I got connected. I'm glad we did though! As a published author who also specializes in marketing, I wanted to help other authors. So this podcast appearance is focused on books and such. However, its packed with great information anyone can use!

Jade burst onto the scene, like full on grain silo explosion, a couple years ago and we immediately became besties. This lady is a firecracker and she caught me at the end of a long day, so this interview goes all over the place. It's a lot of fun 😁

I didn't write this post but I was featured along guys like Jay Baer for my hilarious Out-of-Office vacation message.

In this first part of a massive case study, I show how we built a massive list of leads for a Kickstarter launch.

Being event geeks, we followed this launch closely to see what we could learn. We were especially interested in their email campaigns. So, naturally, we joined their mailing list as soon as it became available. In this case study, we are doing a deep dive into each of the six emails we received, and the tactics we found.

I was included in a group of 18 experts like Mari Smith to make predictions on video marketing for 2021.

It's 2020 and most ad platforms are doing the same marketing tricks!

In fact, recently LinkedIn released the ability to do video remarketing and I was blessed with an opportunity to write a guest post about it for Social Media Examiner!

If you have a website and you don't already have (at least) Google Analytics and the Facebook pixel tracking visitor behavior, stop what you are doing right now and follow along to this tutorial post!

There is a free user analysis tool provided by Facebook called Audience Insights. This tool gives you a looking-glass into the mountain of user data available. Not all the user data, but certainly enough to do the job. Unfortunately not many people know how to use it.

Did you know you can get free Wordpress hosting? Yup! In fact, the Be Pro website has been hosted for free ever since we started. We recorded ourselves building the site from scratch and turned it into this case study :)

There are lots of ways to be a savage when it comes to promote events on social media, virtual OR in-person. My buddy Jeff Hunter was the perfect person to share all these tips and tricks with :)

I make no attempts to hide that I was diagnosed with borderline personality disorder. In fact, I believe it is part of my duty to help transform the conversation around mental illness and well-being. Which is why in this very non-business guest appearance, I get super vulnerable about what it's like to have this kind of unique neural wiring.

One of the most powerful tools for growth is a proper sales pipeline. This way, you can manage all your prospects as they move through your sales process.

Even if you don't use a tool like Keap/Infusionsoft, this guest post I wrote will give you insight into the KPIs you can use to determine how effective your acquisition process is :)

Dynamic Creative is one of my favorite ways to drive traffic from Facebook. And in this post I blew the lid off how they work and give some ad angles to try.

I got an opportunity to speak at #PhxStartupWeek and teach The Business Stack, the ultimate business model that can work for ANY business :)

I've known Brian for years, so when he invited me to be a guest on his podcast talking about in-person events and selling tickets online, I had to say yes!

Jason and I met by chance, and had more than a few things in common. So he invited me to be a guest on his podcast to get nerdy about event marketing :)

Shoan and I have bonded over music time and time again. We also happen to work in the same space. This was a fun guest appearance because we touch on a bunch of different things.

Around the end of the year, list re-engagement becomes a popular topic. So to help out the Monkeypodders, I threw some more wisdom into the proverbial hat.

My old friend Troy Dean wanted to do another podcast with me where we dig deep into email marketing. Particularly list hygiene. This one is packed with nuggets of gold!

I was diagnosed borderline in late 2018. Learned a lot about myself, and new tools, since then. This is a real up close and personal guest appearance with Matana.

This was a really fun guest appearance because Troy and I get really nerdy into marketing and automation :)

I met Réal at Keap's PartnerCon 2019 and we instantly connected. He invited me to be a guest on his podcast and, well, the rest is history. In fact, this episode was so powerful, he invited me back to do not one but TWO more appearances :)

This is a little technical hack that leverages looking at the raw HTML of an email. This trick can work with most other CRMs as well :)

Over the past few years, I came to realize how important habits are for a successful business. And how failing/failed business neglected the important ones.

Abdo reached out to me because of my automation passion and interviewed me for the Startup Circle podcast-type show.

Liam Austin runs these amazing online summits and he invited me to provide a guest post about a super important topic!

Over the years, I've mastered HOW you plan out a campaign before even writing a single word of copy. This focus allows for rapid implementation and handling of issues before they become critical. And I lay the whole process in this guest post!

One of my favorite new toys lately is a piece of free software called Open Broadcast Software, which does a BUNCH of cool stuff!

Not only is this podcast episode packed with valuable insight, you'll also learn more about my charity efforts!

I got wind of Tim's podcast through a client and loved what he had going on, and he was kind enough to have me as a guest.

The guys at Novak Solutions are heavy into all sorts of wild solutions for various Infusionsoft extensions. While they were working on some data reporting bits, they invited me to write a post about some of the best native reports available in the system.

I met Vicki at ICON17 and she invited me to be a guest on her show. Watch me accidentally curse on a good wholesome live broadcast >_<

There are many different tagging philosophies and this blog post is a collection of different viewpoints, including one of my most popular (and oldest) guest posts.

I discovered a hack a few years ago that allows you to turn ANY link inside Infusionsoft into a proper unsubscribe link. Never shared it anywhere publicly so I figured Greg's blog was the best place for that knowledge to live :)

Greg Jenkins asked a bunch of experts what they thought about #ICON17, and I was part of that group :)

The final post in this series deals with ways to use automation once someone has become a paying member.

I've known Jorge for years and he recently had me as a guest on his podcast :)

This 2nd post in the series talks about different ways to use automation to drive more sales and closing conversations.

Kim and I have been in each other's networks for many years and she invited me to be a guest on her podcast where we get nerdy about automation :)

This is the first of a three post series targeted at in-person fitness offerings.

Mark is like an older cooler version of me: musician, electrical engineer by trade and marketing/sales wizard. He's also cool enough to have a podcast which he gracefully had me as a guest :)

I hadn't written a guest post for Greg in a while so I put on my future hat and tried to be clairvoyant.

In the heat of the 2016 election, there were some marketing lessons I observed that worked out perfectly as a guest post.

At PartnerCon, I was feeling good, so I setup an ad-hoc live stream to talk about the new Quote campaign goals and some friends happened to show up :)

Through a mutual friend, I got connected to Micky at Kahuna Accounting and he invited me to do a guest post about automation and some ideas behind how it can help with your accounting operations.

My good friend Wes invited me to be on his podcast and we talk about a bunch of cool stuff around automation :)

My original post to Greg was too long so he broke it up into two parts

I wrote a two-part blog post about different species of pipeline I've seen in the wild and what you can do about it from an automation perspective.

Music is really important to me and so is continuing the musical tradition. In this guest blog post, I share some ideas on how to keep music in your child's life if their school cuts the music program.

John runs a podcast about systems and processes. This was a fun opportunity to focus less on sales/marketing and more about, well, systems and processes :)

I've built and seen thousands of different campaigns. From that experience, I've distilled out some fundamental principles to keep your automation clean.

Pulling campaign data can be very confusing. That's why I wrote this reference blog post.

My good buddy and former coworker Greg wanted to know more about the story of how the Infusionsoft Cookbook came to be. So if you were wondering, here it is!

Often, people forget (or sometimes disregard) how automation can bolster a sales team's efficiency and productivity. In this blog post, I share some tactics for using automation in this manner.

Hatch invited me to another fun round of campaign strategy and philosophy!

Jacki wanted to interview about marketing processes :)

My universally recognized expertise in Infusionsoft caused a very unique and exciting opportunity: the chance to write THE book on small business automation strategy using Infusionsoft. Whether you are a beginning or a seasoned veteran of the software, you WILL find value, I promise :)

Hatch invited me to be a guest again and get philosophical on campaign strategy.

Most pieces of software have powerful features that most people don't know about or don't understand. Infusionsoft is no different so I wrote a guest post for Monkeypod outlining, in my opinion, the five most underused features of the software.

I've seen a LOT of businesses migrate CRMs in my day and its so easy to accidentally shoot yourself in the foot. So I wrote this blog post to help people avoid those kinds of painful mistakes.

Jordan Hatch is the original Infusionsoft mastermind and he decided to bring back his own brand of mastermind calls. He invited me to be a guest on his first episode and it was a great chance to get super nerdy about campaigns!

On this podcast guest appearance, I provide a rare glimpse into how I use Infusionsoft for my band and show promotion.

Greg asked me to write about my email marketing pet peeves and, naturally, I thought about the ninja turtles. Read the first part of the post and it will make sense why.

One of the biggest mistakes I see small businesses make when doing lead generation is skip or fast-forward through identifying their target. In this guest post, I explain what an avatar is and how that knowledge should drive lead generation.

People are used to automation by now. "Give my name and email for a free video? Sure!" However, automation has SO MANY different applications, I decided to share some weird ways you can use it you probably haven't thought of :)

In this Monkeypod guest post, I do my best to try and expose common mistakes Infusionsoft users make and how they can be avoided.

In this last guest post of the series, I blow the lid off how EASY it is to sell using Infusionsoft AND which free campaign can get you started ;)

In this second of three guest post series, I share about how to track email engagement AND the free campaign you can use from the marketplace.

Greg Jenkins is a really good friend and former colleague of mine who started his own company. This is my first guest post where I share my favorite free campaign in the marketplace.

I was blessed to be a guest on Steve Sipress' podcast, whom I've known for a really long time. I'm on episodes 85 through 88 and we cover all sorts of different topics from my story, video email, and marketing in general.

Will asked me to reflect on what I had learned about video email since I started working at Infusionsoft.

This is a 22 minute podcast I did with my colleague Danny Iny where we get super nerdy about email marketing!

Somehow, the PR team got me connected to Peter for some insight into stuff you can do with customer data. I answered some of his questions and this article was the result.

This is my slide deck from my #ICON14 presentation about automation workflow and processes.

Making new connections at live events is probably one of the best things you can do to ensure a great ROI from your time (and possibly financial) investment. However, it is far too easy to let new connections slip through the cracks. Which is why we built this campaign to ensure that everyone you meet gets the proper follow-up :)

Infusionsoft is amazing as an all-in-one sales and marketing software for small business. However, if you want a membership site too, you'll want to use CustomerHub which is the only fully automated end-to-end solution designed specifically for Infusionsoft. You can do all sorts of cool stuff like offer people free trials to try and get them to become a paying member. That is exactly what this month's campaign is all about !

Having a list of emails is good, but that is merely one channel. The more channels you can be present and in front of prospects/customers, the better. The free campaign for this month is designed to help people take people on their email list and get them following on a specific social channel.

Having a list of contacts that you mail regularly is good, but the reality of the situation is that over time, people will lose interest. It is one of those unavoidable realities of email marketing. As a result, it is a good practice to cull the herd periodically. This free campaign for January is a simple, out-of-the-box resource for taking people who aren't engaging with your emails off your list.

Infusionsoft isn't just about marketing automation; process and workflow automation is a huge function as well. Even though streamlining your coffee run may sound a bit silly, it is actually a cleverly disguised lesson in awareness and great example of how something as mundane as going for coffee can be made more effective.

This was actually the November campaign of the month, but the post itself got pushed back due to the holiday editorial calendar. This particular campaign deals with socially sharing your newsletter and collecting leads organically when people view the shared content.

I was blessed to be a guest on Jake Hower's podcast where I do a deep dive into the most useful free campaign templates in Infusionsoft's marketplace.

This past quarter, I was tasked with coming up with a list of new marketing campaigns that we (Infusionsoft) can offer customers for free. This is the first "Campaign of the Month" which shows how you can use a direct mail piece to drive leads.

As the curator of all the campaign templates in our company's marketplace (for now), the more I can promote consumption of them, the better. This blog post actually contains a video where you can watch me build a complete end-to-end marketing funnel using nothing besides Infusionsoft and four of the campaign templates in the marketplace.

I absolutely LOVE Evernote and got a chance to write a guest blog post with a method for using it as an expansion of your brain. If you use Evernote (or want to), I'd read this one right now!

Infusionsoft is a piece of software for sales and marketing automation. Last year, we released an industry changing update to how automation is done. Old-school automation is known as legacy and had been the same for nearly 10 years. I wrote this blog post to help people migrate their old stuff to the visual campaign builder because there is a serious need for this information!

Inside Infusionsoft, there is a very powerful part of the system known as Opportunities. This is basically the sales pipeline management module. While managing a sales pipeline is primarily a manual process, you can leverage automation to supplement a sales rep's activity. However, this can be a pretty confusing topic for people, which is why I wrote this post to lay down the fundamental concepts around it.

In preparation for giving my talk at InfusionCon 2013, I needed to dig into the sales process a bit more. I picked Wes Schaeffer's brain and he helped me understand that 'qualified' is an often misunderstood and misused term. This guest post for Wes' blog introduces my PAIN formula for determining if a prospect is truly qualified or not.

Database segmentation inside Infusionsoft happens with 'Tags'; you can think of a tag as a list or a segment. The technical setup of a tag is easy, however coming up with a meaningful and strategic way to organize the tags is a whole different kettle of fish. In this blog post, I give my expert view on how pretty much any business using Infusionsoft can organize their tags for success.

A big problem with maintaining good email list hygiene is handling addresses that Hard Bounce (the email address no longer exists). Usually, these contacts just sit on someone's database taking up space. In this blog post, I show you how to build an automated system (using Infusionsoft's Campaign Builder) that notifies you when an email hard bounces so you can recover a good email address.

"Warning: This Is For Advanced Automation Fans Only!!!!

I figured out how to do some black magick with Zapier to hit (any) API which means you can pretty much do whatever you want programatically.

In this example, I use Zapier to hit Keap's API to move an Opportunity stage 👀"

This is wildly fascinating to read now, given that the whole AI catalyst hadn't happened yet...