Customer list workflows

A customer list workflow turns a customer list into a recurring job for your team. You choose how often the list is worked through, and at the start of each period Breww opens a workflow: a checklist of the customers on the list, where each customer is marked as Completed or Declined as you go. Every workflow is also a task, so it appears on the assignees' Tasks page and calendar alongside their other work.

Workflows suit any list that somebody acts on customer by customer, for example:

• A "Monday call list" that a rep rings through every Monday.
• A "Key accounts" list that a field sales rep visits over the course of each month.
• A weekly list of customers who are due to reorder, built with a BrewwQL filter, that the sales team contacts over each week.

Both static and dynamic lists can have a workflow. By default, each customer's status is set by a person, so the workflow reflects what your team has actually done. If the aim of the list is to win an order, you can also have Breww complete customers automatically as soon as they place one (see "Completing customers automatically from their orders" below).

Setting up a workflow on a list

Go to Customers -> View -> Customer lists and create a new list or edit an existing one. Below the list's filters you'll be asked Would you like to create a workflow for this list?

• No, this is just a list keeps the list as a plain grouping of customers with no workflow.
• Yes, I regularly complete an action for each customer in this list (such as contacting them) reveals the workflow settings.

When you choose Yes, fill in the following:

• How often is this list worked through? Choose one of:
  • On a set day each week: a one-day workflow opens on the chosen day every week (for example, every Monday).
  • Over each week: a workflow opens at the start of every week and runs until the end of that week. Weeks follow the first day of the week set for your brewery.
  • Over each month: a workflow opens on the first of every month and runs until the end of the month.
• Which day? Only shown for a set-day cadence. Choose the day of the week the list is worked through.
• Assigned users and Assigned user groups: who the workflow's task is assigned to. Only users with sales or brewery admin permissions can be chosen, and you must pick at least one user or group.
• Automatically complete customers: choose No, customers are only completed manually to mark every customer off yourselves, or When the customer has placed an order in the period to have Breww complete a customer as soon as they order. See "Completing customers automatically from their orders" below.

Save the list. Breww opens the workflow for the current period straight away, so you can start working through it immediately. The one exception is a set-day list saved on a different day of the week, whose first workflow opens on the next occurrence of that day.

The list's page shows the cadence and assignees in the Workflow card at the top (along with "Customers are completed automatically when they place an order in the period" when that option is chosen), and the customer lists index shows the cadence in its Workflow column, so it's easy to see which lists are worked through and by whom.

To stop working through a list, edit it and choose No, this is just a list. No further workflows will open, but every workflow that has already been opened is kept so the history remains available.

Who appears on each workflow

Each workflow is a snapshot of the customers who were on the list at the moment the period started. This is deliberate: the set of customers you're working through doesn't shift underneath you part-way through the period.

• Customers who join the list during a period (for example, because they now match the list's BrewwQL filter) are included from the next period onwards.
• Customers who leave the list during a period stay on the current workflow and drop out from the next period.
• If a customer is deleted in Breww, they're removed from any workflow where they're still pending. Where they had already been marked completed or declined, that record is kept so the workflow's history is complete.

Working through a workflow

You can open a workflow from:

• The View current workflow button on the list's page, shown whenever there's a workflow for the current period with customers still pending.
• The Workflows tab on the list's page, which lists every workflow for the list.
• The Open workflow button on the workflow's task on the Tasks page.

At the top of the workflow page you'll see the period it covers, a progress bar and a count of how many customers are completed, declined and pending.

Below that, there's one row per customer, showing everything you're likely to need before picking up the phone or heading out. By default, each row uses the detailed view, laid out in four columns:

• The customer: their name, type, phone number and email address, how often they typically order (for example, "Orders roughly every 14 days") and, where relevant, an ordering badge (see "Ordering badges" below).
• Their contact person: the first contact person recorded against the customer, with their job title, phone number and email address. If there are more, a "+2 more contacts" link next to the name opens the customer's quick view sidebar to see them all. If the customer has a preferred contact time, it's shown here too, for example "Contact Mon and Thu, 10:00 to 12:00".
• Their order this period: the most recent order the customer has placed during this period, with its status, date and total, and a button to view it. If they haven't ordered this period, the date of their last order is shown instead, or "No orders yet" if they have never ordered.
• Their last contact: the most recent activity logged against the customer during this period (such as a call or a completed sales visit), when it was, and who logged it, for example "Last contact: Call, Tue 15 Sep by Sam Jones". If a sales visit is planned or a task is due for the customer later in the period, a "Next:" line shows what's already lined up, for example "Next: Visit planned Thu 17 Sep, task due Fri 18 Sep".

On narrower screens, such as a phone, the contact details are left out of the row to keep it short. Open the customer's quick view to see them.

Customers are listed in order of when their preferred contact window opens, so the earliest calls come first. Customers with no preferred contact time are listed last, in name order.

Use the status dropdown on the right of each row to mark the customer as Completed or Declined. The row is tinted green or red and records who set the status and when. In the compact view, hover over the status button to see this. If you mark a customer by mistake, set them back to Pending from the same dropdown.

To update several customers at once, select their rows (or use the select-all checkbox in the header) and choose Set status from the bar that appears.

Each row also has a quick view button that opens the customer's sidebar. As well as the customer's contact people and activity, the sidebar includes:

• Recent orders: the customer's most recent orders, with the products on each, the total and a link to view the order.
• Products ordered, last 12 months: the products the customer buys most often, with how many orders each has appeared on, the total quantity and when it was last ordered. This is handy when suggesting a reorder.

You can act on what you learn during a call without leaving the workflow page:

• Select the pencil icon on a card in the sidebar to update the customer's details there and then: the Overview card (type, sales person, tags, comments and preferred contact time), the Organisation contact details card (email addresses and phone numbers), each contact person and each address. When you save, both the sidebar and the customer's row on the workflow update straight away, without reloading the page.
• Use the + Add menu at the bottom of the sidebar to log an activity, or add a task, sales visit or deal for the customer. Choosing Order (or Sample order for a lead) opens the new order steps in a pop-up window over the workflow page, so you can take the order while the customer is still on the phone. See How to create an order for a customer in Breww for the order steps.
• Select the copy icon beside an order under Recent orders to repeat it. In the Copy order window, choose whether to use the Latest pricing from the customer's current price book or The prices on the original order. Breww creates a new draft order with the same products and quantities, ready for you to check and confirm.

Searching for a customer

Use the search box above the customer rows to find a customer on the workflow quickly. You can search by the customer's name, reference, delivery postcode or city, one of their tags, or the first or last name of one of their contact people. Phone numbers aren't searched.

The search works alongside the other options at the top of the page. For example, while completed and declined customers are hidden, the search only finds customers who are still to do. The select-all checkbox and the Set status bulk action only apply to the customers your search has found.

Ordering badges

Next to the customer's name, a badge flags customers who need attention, based on Breww's order predictions:

• Overdue: the customer is likely to have placed their next order by now. Hover over the badge to see whether they are slightly or significantly overdue.
• Churn risk: there's a high chance the customer has stopped ordering altogether.
• Due soon: the customer's next expected order falls within the next 7 days and they haven't placed an order yet this period. This makes it easy to spot who's worth a call before they run low.

A customer only ever shows one badge. Overdue takes priority over Churn risk, which takes priority over Due soon. Once a customer places an order during the period, the Due soon badge is removed.

Choosing a detailed or compact view

If you'd rather see more customers on screen at once, select Compact view at the top of the page. Each customer then takes up much less room, showing:

• The customer's name, type and ordering badge.
• Their contact person's name, phone number and an email button. Hover over the name to see their job title, or over the email button to see the address. A "+2 more" link opens the quick view with all of their contacts. If the customer has no contact people, their own phone number and email are shown instead.
• Their order this period, with its status and a button to view it, or the date of their last order.
• When they were last contacted and how, for example "Last contact: Call, Tue 15 Sep".

To keep rows short, the compact view leaves out the customer's ordering pattern, preferred contact time, who logged the last contact and the "Next:" line. Select Detailed view to switch back. Your choice is remembered for your user across every workflow, so each member of your team can use whichever view suits them.

Hiding customers you've already dealt with

By default, the workflow page hides customers who have been marked completed or declined, so the list only shows who is still to do. Use the Show completed and declined button at the top of the page to see everyone, and Hide completed and declined to go back. This preference is remembered for your user across every workflow.

Once every customer has been dealt with, the page confirms that everything on the workflow is done.

Completing customers automatically from their orders

When a list's Automatically complete customers setting is When the customer has placed an order in the period, Breww marks each customer on the workflow as Completed as soon as they have an order that:

• Is confirmed, invoiced or completed. Draft and cancelled orders don't count.
• Was created during the workflow's period.

Sample orders count. Stock transfer orders don't, and nor do orders created before the period started, even if they're confirmed during it.

An automatically completed row shows who the order is credited to and when, for example "Completed automatically from Sam Jones's order, Tue 15 Sep 10:32". The credit goes to the sales person on the order or, if it has none, the member of your team who created it. Where neither applies (for example, a trade store order with no sales person), the row just says "Completed automatically".

A few things to know:

• Automatic completions are locked. The status button on the row can't be changed, and hovering over it explains why. The Set status bulk action leaves these customers as they are and tells you how many it skipped.
• Your team's decisions come first. A customer someone has already completed or declined by hand is never changed automatically, even if they then place an order.
• Setting a customer back to Pending re-checks their orders. If they've already ordered during the period, Breww completes them automatically straight away. When you do this for several customers with Set status, the message afterwards tells you how many were completed this way.
• Cancelled orders are taken into account. If the order that completed a customer is cancelled or returned to draft while the period is still running, the customer goes back to Pending, unless they have another order that still counts.
• Past workflows are never changed. Once a period has ended, its workflow stays exactly as it was, whatever happens to the orders afterwards.
• Switching the setting on applies straight away. Pending customers on the current workflow who have already ordered during the period are completed as soon as you save the list, and every new workflow is checked when it opens.
• Switching the setting off keeps what's been done. Customers who were completed automatically stay completed, but their status can then be changed by hand again.

The workflow's task follows automatic completions in the same way as manual ones, so it completes once every customer has either ordered or been dealt with by your team.

Calling customers at the right time

When customers have a preferred contact time recorded (the days of the week and the time window they like to be contacted), the workflow page helps you ring each one at a moment that suits them.

Select Only contactable now at the top of the page to narrow the list to the customers who can be contacted right now: today is one of their preferred days and the current time falls inside their window. Customers with no preferred contact time are always included, as they can be contacted at any time. "Now" is judged on your brewery's local time, so the list is the same for everyone on your team. Select Show all customers to see the full workflow again. Like the completed and declined preference, this choice is remembered for your user across every workflow.

While the filter is on:

• If there are still customers pending on the workflow but none of them is contactable at the moment, the page tells you so. Check back later, or select Show all customers to see who's left.
• The select-all checkbox and the Set status bulk action apply only to the customers currently shown, so you can mark a batch of calls as done without touching customers whose window hasn't opened yet.

To learn a customer's preferred time while you're on the call, open their quick view from the row and select the pencil icon on the Overview card. The row updates as soon as you save.

Workflows and the Tasks page

Every workflow has a matching task, titled "Work through customer list: (list name)", due on the last day of the period and assigned to the users and groups chosen on the list. This means the assignees see the workflow on their Tasks page and calendar alongside everything else they need to do, and the calendar also shows when future workflows for the list are due.

The task's status follows the workflow automatically:

• Pending until any customer on the workflow has been marked.
• In progress as soon as at least one customer has been marked completed or declined.
• Complete once no customers are pending.

If a customer is set back to Pending on a completed workflow, the task reopens. Because the workflow is the source of truth, the task's status can't be changed from the Tasks page itself; instead, it shows an Open workflow button (or View workflow once it's complete) that takes you to the workflow page.

Reviewing past workflows

The Workflows tab on the list's page shows every workflow that has been opened for the list, newest first, with the period it covered, a progress bar, who it was assigned to and whether it's Open or Completed. Use the view button on any row to open that workflow and see exactly which customers were completed or declined, by whom and when.