Zen Kitty Treasures review for Privy ‑ Pop Ups, Email, & SMS

Dec. 6, 2019

PLEASE READ IF YOU ARE CONSIDERING PRIVY I would love to give this app a higher rating. The app itself works well. So kudos to the developers. It has done what I wanted. My issue is CUSTOMER SERVICE. I run 4 shopify stores, 3 of which were using Privy. On BLACK FRIDAY, 2 out of our 3 stores were shut down WITHOUT NOTIFICATION. We only received a message saying "You've hit your monthly traffic limit. We're reaching out to let you know you've reached your 5,000 pageview limit for this month.* This means that all of your campaigns have been paused, and are no longer collecting email addresses or driving sales for your online store. Your pageview counter will reset at the beginning of the next calendar month. To ensure your campaigns stay active going forward, click this link to upgrade your account." This was the only email from them which went into my "other" or unfocused email. No warning beforehand. I received an email from them on November 23, 2019 that tells me my campaign results which states only 2 signups, no redemptions. No mention that I was anywhere close to the 5000 page threshold. (Here is another opportunity for Privy to let customers know that they are approaching their limits.) Please let me state that I don't have an issue paying for a product that works. My issues are that when I questioned the calculations on a brand new store, they dismissed me and gave me only a pat answer that we calculate differently. This answer was given to me 3 times each time I reached out. I asked for someone to contact me to discuss what had happened and I heard from no one. I also take issue with that fact that we were shut down without notification on one of the busiest sales days of the year. Here is what Privy told us we had: Store 1 (which has 200-300 visitors per day) - 5300 page views Store 2 (0-15 visitors per day) - 5200 page views Please note that this is buried under the setting tab. Store 2 campaign window (by Privy) 439 views on the ONLY campaign running. Not sure how that extrapolates to 5200 page views. Google analytics said store 2 only had 1800 page views for the entire month. (not unique page views) so that is a 300% markup. Privy was not running for that entire month on Store 2. I can understand differences from Google analytics but not that substantial. Google analytics also is not using their numbers to get payment from me. I have made some suggestions to hopefully help other people that I hope that Privy takes into account: • I would suggest that you provide a meter on the front page (not buried under settings) that tell people how many page views that they have had. Show a progress bar to let them know if they are getting close. That way when they are going in to set up or adjust campaigns they will see it. • I would also suggest from a customer service perspective, send out warning emails at perhaps an 80% threshold to customers when they are getting close so that they don’t get shut down during a major sales day. • Alternatively or preferably in addition to the above email, have a pop up on Shopify that warns people. (Your shut down email went into my “unfocused” and on a busy day operating a store, that message would possibly go unnoticed. ) I would also ask that on the busiest sales day of the year that you NOT shut down customers without warning. We didn't notice right away and we were spending a significant amount of money on Facebook, Instagram and Google advertising in order to get sales and to build our email lists. Our advertisements said, "sign up to get a discount" We lost sales because the signup option was not there for them. This was not a good experience for us and we are actively looking for another app that will replace this. I will reiterate that the app itself works well. I will also reiterate that I don't mind and do pay for apps to help build our stores. It is the CUSTOMER SERVICE that was the issue. I am writing this review so that others will not get caught the way that we did and lose sales because Privy "pauses" your campaigns on your busiest sales day and holds you hostage until you pay. And when questioned on their analytics, they did not answer in any way that would make sense for Store 2. Please be aware of this before using.