Kit CRM review

The kit is a virtual assistant/ chatbot that directly talks to you and manages your Facebook and Instagram ad campaigns. It integrates with your Shopify store and Facebook Ad Manager to run successful Facebook Ads and Instagram ads.

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From getting product information from Shopify to creating ads, selecting a target audience, and setting an ad budget, Kit handles everything independently.

While it sounds ultra-convenient, most digital marketing agencies would have run out of business if it were that easy to automate marketing.

It’s a free tool offered by Shopify, and it is most suitable for small business owners who want to start marketing their products but don’t have the skills to create effective Facebook ads. But is Kit even worth your time? Let’s find out:   

About the company

Launched in 2014 as a CRM tool, Kit was acquired by Shopify in 2016 to strengthen the company’s conversational commerce section. The kit also offers API that lets you interact with the other apps available on the Shopify App Store.

Strengths and weaknesses

Pros

• Directly communicates with you in simple English
• Automatically creates and publishes Facebook and Instagram ads
• Seamless integration with Shopify and Facebook
• Pulls product data from Shopify without any manual assistance
• Offers insights and suggestions on the best marketing goals
• Free of charge

Cons

• You can customize product information but not actual ads
• Kit does not create a custom audience from scratch for the ads
• Publishes single image and carousel ads only
• You cannot set a customized budget or duration. You can only select from the list of options given by Kit.
• Email marketing, discount coupon code, and social media posting features are available but very restricted.
• More suitable for small businesses that don’t have the budget to hire digital marketing experts just yet

Features

The kit is a virtual assistant powered by AI that you can directly chat through Shopify Ping, Facebook Messenger, or SMS to quickly create Facebook and Instagram ads.

Unlike other CRM tools that require navigating through an often confusing interface, Kit’s AI talks directly with you to understand your requirements and create ads. Of course, the interface is still there if you want to go behind the scenes and make changes.

After being acquired by Shopify, Kit has been deeply integrated with the e-commerce giant, which allows users to easily pull product information from their Shopify store and create ads.

One of the best parts about Kit is that you no longer have to log into Facebook separately and deal with its complicated interface for creating ads; you can handle everything through Kit instead.

Finding the right products to advertise

You can market priority products, new products, recent best sellers, or products with less-than-average sales. So, instead of you analyzing data to find out the best products to market, Kit does it for you since it’s directly integrated with Shopify.

Products in your Kit account are the ones that you want to advertise on priority. You can change the title, description, and product image of the priority products to change how they appear in ads.

You can also let Kit target customers with products that they have previously viewed through Facebook dynamic ads.

Posting ads on Facebook and Instagram

Based on the products you want to target, the virtual assistant will automatically create an ad, set up a target audience, and publish your ad on Facebook. Before publishing, it sends you a preview and only posts the advertisement after you approve it.

The kit generates only image-based ads for Facebook and Instagram — So single image, and carousel ads are all you get. There is no way to create a video or any other ad with Kit.

Also, the ads are linked directly to the product pages. You cannot connect your ads to a specific landing page.

Facebook dynamic ads are where Kit pulls information about your store visitors and creates customized dynamic ads featuring products in which users have previously viewed or shown interest.

Dynamic ads are a great way to target customers who already know about your brand but aren’t convinced yet to purchase. Kit automatically creates a custom audience based on the website visitor data.

It is better to create a custom audience since Kit’s global audience cannot be narrowed down to one country.

Finalizing the ad budget

The kit gives you a list of budgets that you can select from. However, there is no way to provide your custom budget. Also, the total number of days the ad campaign runs depends on your budget. Ads with a budget of less than $30 run for two days. All the other ads run for seven days.

Creating a custom audience

The kit uses both custom and lookalike audiences on Facebook to find and target people with ads. But this also means you need a minimum of the following for the ads to work.

• At least 100 Facebook likes
• For the custom audience, you need at least 20 customer email addresses linked to their Facebook account.
• For lookalike audience targeting, you need at least 100 customer email addresses linked to their Facebook account.

The tool cannot create a new audience from scratch, which is a big problem, especially for brands targeting new demographics or customers.  

Adding discounts

You can create discount codes on Kit and then promote them through Facebook or Instagram ads. The kit allows you to set the discount type, amount of discount, minimum order to qualify for the deal, and the name of the discount code.

But unfortunately, the other parameters are set by default, and there is no way to change them.

• The duration of the discount will always be seven days from the day you create it.
• Customers can use the discount code multiple times, and this number cannot be changed.

Sending out email campaigns

You can also set up email marketing campaigns with Kit; you have to select an email template and the products you want to include in the emails. You can also send ‘Thank you’ emails with Kit to show your appreciation towards your customers.

Though, with restrictive email marketing features, this is more like an extra add-on feature than a standalone one.

Publishing social media posts

When you have finished your advertising posts, you can use Kit to directly publish product links on your brand’s social media page. But with no options to customize the posts or schedule them, this feature is even more restrictive than email marketing.

Pricing

While Kit is free, you can only use it if you have a Shopify website (which you need to pay for). You would also, of course, be paying for the Facebook ads that Kit runs.

Integration

Since Kit has now been acquired with Shopify, it seamlessly integrates with your Shopify website and works as an extension.

The kit also closely integrates with your Facebook Page and Ad Manager. It can pull data about customers who like your page, create ads, and publish them through your Facebook account.

Support

The kit offers email, chat, and phone support to its customers. However, it doesn’t state anywhere if the license is 24/7, like Shopify.

Final Verdict

As a free tool, Kit can be an excellent add-on for small business owners who don’t know much about digital marketing. But the device is somewhat restrictive and not as intuitive as you would want it to be. As your business grows, you may want to look into hiring an actual human to handle Facebook and Instagram ad campaigns.

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