Autopilot

Pluspunten

It seems to me that Autopilot does only one thing - but it does that one thing REALLY well. I tested Autopilot briefly for a few weeks as an alternative to the drip program functionality in our Marketing Automation software. I was extremely impressed with how easy it is to build a drip program (called a "Journey" within Autopilot), as well as with the breadth of logic and functionality offered. Autopilot really sets itself apart with some amazing - seriously amazing - integrations and functionality that our Automation platform doesn't offer, such as sending SMS text messages or physical postcards.

I really like that Autopilot offers in-app chat support, and that you generally don't need to wait longer than 5 minutes to get someone to help you out.

Minpunten

During the few weeks I tested Autopilot, I found a few issues that prevented me from really continuing to use the software for my use-case. The integration with Salesforce was clunky and un-intuitive, and most concerningly, it seemed that when the platform saw leads that already existed in Salesforce, it would stop them from progressing through the drip program. This was a real frustration, and I ended up just disconnecting Autopilot from the CRM in order to finish my test.

Another concern we had was that after testing the emails I had configured using mail-tester.com, there was an error identified that could only be resolved by getting a dedicated IP address - something which adds a significant additional monthly cost to the cost of the program.

Pluspunten

Autopilot has a large number of email templates that allow us to track the embedded link of our committed users. In addition, Autopilot allows the Marketing team to create a coherent funnel, with intelligent and easy-to-use segments. Another thing is that it is able to cover a large number of tasks, such as sending email newsletters and creating an advanced link based on various factors, such as default fields, potential customer owners, rules, among others. Another thing is Autopilot support, which offers an in-app chat service within the same application, so we can usually get in touch with them in just a few minutes.

Minpunten

There is much to be desired from the Autopilot WYSIWYG editor, which I hope can be improved with the next updates. Some actions related to APIs are very limited, so it would be good if they could provide a little more freedom. In addition, Autopilot allows very few integrations, and it would be excellent to work together with other marketing automation software to work faster.

Pluspunten

I love the fact that it tracks my whole business from lead generation (that helps me fill in routes based on a map) to setting up the contract (with recurring services and pre-scheduled packages) to crew management (with photo uploads and clock-in/clock-out of jobs and contacting customers) to invoicing (which can be automatic) to receiving payment (even by credit card on the mobile app!). Keeping records on paper and trying to run schedules for weekly, bi-weekly and tri-weekly services would be a nightmare! This really is an AutoPilot software. It is a complete solution that tracks everything which allows it to be the ultimate solution for reporting. I can look at sales close ratios, revenue per lead source, job completion times against budgeted hours, past-due invoices and so much more! I have worked with the system from Property Maintenance Technician to Sales Rep to General Manager and have not been disappointed.

Minpunten

Their asset management portion is in its beginning stages and is not incredibly useful at the moment, but they continue to build on their system and I suspect that they will soon have a robust equipment and vehicle management system.

Pluspunten

Autopilot is a marketers dream tool. You can create a 'journey' for almost any task, from sending out an email newsletter to creating an advanced nurture journey based on segmentation, rules, lead owners, default and custom fields, website actions and much, much more. If you use tools such as Salesforce and Segment then you can get even more out of the tool with less work, but I personally don't use either and I still get a huge ROI on the product. They also just updated the email building tool which was a very welcome update.

Minpunten

It would be great if the tool worked with other CRM's than just Salesforce. Some of the actions and triggers, particularly when it comes to API triggers are quite limited so some improvements with that would be great. The price can get quite high with large numbers of contacts and the business plan selected (A/B testing, API triggers and more). I would also like to see an end-user subscription management feature added so that I can fully move away from other email tools (i.e. MailChimp) whilst being compliant with the likes of GDPR.

Pluspunten

Two features really stand out to me, and prove the usefullness of Autopilot: the UI and the analytics.

The graphical UI for building email journeys is very intuitive, and super easy to use. However, it's also super powerful. We've pluged in Salesforce, several different databases, and our customer support system, and using the fun shapes on the Journeys page. It's as simple as dragging objects onto the staging area and connecting them. In just a few minutes, you can have a analytics-focused email campaign ready to go, all without a bit of code.

And once your journey is started, and your email send, the real-time data you get from your targets extremely granular. We get updates down to the second for events as small as vertical scrolling and mouse hovers over hotlinks. It's very impressive.

Minpunten

Autopilot feels very heavy in the browser. I really can't explain why it's as slow as it is sometimes. Pages can take up to 30 seconds to load, and that's on high end desktop workstations. I know there is a very complex backend for Autopilot, but on occassion the slow performance is inexcusable. It could just be that we manage dozens of journeys and hundreds of thousands of entries at the same time, but Autopilot can be quite slow.

Also, sometimes the autofill feature in autopilot is erratic. This is a minor complaint, but you will notice it if you use Autopilot a lot.