Use the coupon in a Flow campaign

Now that it's time to actually send the coupon! We already mentioned that a Coupon must be in an active flow to be used correctly, in the introduction artcle.  If you already have created and designed your coupon campaign then now it’s time to use it in a flow!

Here are the steps:

• Create a Flow campaign. 
• Pick the Coupons block  (If you need more details on how to use the coupon block, I strongly suggest you check that article)  and from its settings browse and find your previously created campaign.
• If you are satisfied with the chosen coupon campaign, activate your flow! This however won’t send any communication, because there isn’t any entry block connected from where contacts can enter, and the coupon isn’t linked to an SMS.
• Now, if you have already created an SMS campaign, enter the campaign and add a link to a coupon.
• Once you send this SMS, the contacts will have access to the coupon! You can check the progress from the coupon and SMS reports.

Now, what we've done is our coupon is in an active flow, and we just link to it from our SMS campaign. 

However, you can also create a full flow campaign with the SMS and Coupons blocks and include other connections as well. 

You can create a full flow campaign for example like this: 

• Add any entry block, in our example, we’ll add the contacts block and choose our customers. 
• Connect the Contacts block with an SMS block, and choose your SMS campaign. 
• Add the coupon block and choose the coupon campaign.
• Now, save the flow, and simply link the coupon to your SMS campaign, just like I mentioned before.  

Note: Once you are linking to a coupon learn more about the pricing. 

Link to a coupon in Flow 

After you add a coupon to a Coupon block, it is important to know that any links will lead to the Coupon block, not the coupon itself. Let's explain:

Let's say you have a running SMS campaign (not in a Flow). The sent SMS messages have a link that links to a coupon published in a Flow. The key part here is that the link is not to the coupon, but to the Coupon block. It is a fixed link. This means that no matter which coupon you put in this Coupon block (while the SMS campaign is running), the SMS will link to the one that is currently in the Coupon block. 

And it's a good thing that the link leads to the coupon block, this is actually very helpful. For example, let's say you realize that the SMS link leading to a coupon is broken. You can quickly fix that - simply edit/change the coupon from the Flow and your already-sent SMS message will lead to the fixed link! 

It is the same case with an SMS campaign linking to a coupon block in a single Flow.

Linking in duplicated and ready-made Flows

A flow campaign with your coupon block and be fully duplicated or shared to branches, which means that the SMS linking to the coupon will also be duplicated.  

Once you duplicate/copy the flow the link will be copied too, but the block itself will be unresolved, and you'll need to finalize or swap (resolve) the coupon. A coupon block campaign can also be swapped with a different one. The linking results will still be the same because again, the connection is between the Flow blocks and not their containing documents.

And that's it! Now go ahead and create those gorgeous coupons! 🤩 

If you are interested you can go ahead and read more about How to Win at Mobile Coupon Marketing! 📱