Zapier - new paid member info to CRM
One of the best uses of Zapier automation with Skool is sending new subscriber info to your CRM of choice to manage info, future sales, or anything outside of Skool. This can be a great setup for admins who have some infrastructure outside of Skool that they want to keep organized and updated without manually doing so.
We know many admins use a CRM platform to mange communities and courses, so for this guide I'll be using Hubspot (popular free CRM) as my "Action" app and having Skool (the "Trigger" app here) send a new subscriber's first name, last name, and subscription email once they complete subscription signup. To start, I'm going to click to create a new Zap from my Zapier dashboard:
Search for "Skool" for your Trigger app Then click in the "event" dropdown menu and select "New paid member":
Click "continue" and you'll be asked to select your Skool account (typically you have to do this once and then your info is saved for future zaps). Click on "connect new account" which brings up the account access modal:
This is where you'll need to copy that API key from your Zapier settings modal in Skool as well as the back half of your Skool group URL. For the example below, for my Skool group URL "https://skool.com/als-referrals-2732" I just need to copy and paste "als-referrals-2732" in the second box below the API key:
Click "continue" and this modal should disappear (it will display an error if there is something off with your API key or group URL), now you'll see that your Skool account is connected:
Click "continue" to get to the "test trigger" phase.
Important note: to test the trigger, you will need to have had someone (or a test account) who recently subscribed to your group so there is a primed first name, last name, and subscription email address recently added to the database. If done correctly, you'll see at least one test record that includes a unique transaction ID, date, first name, last name, and email:
Click "continue with selected record" so you can now decide how the data will format/what it will do on the action app.
For the "action" portion of the Zap, I want to create a new contact in my contact list in Hubspot, so I choose Hubspot in the list and "create contact" as the action:
Clicking continue brings up the account selection menu which works the same as setting up your Skool account. Note that every third party app verifies their accounts differently, so in the case of Hubspot I simply had to provide my login email and password to connect the account:
Important note: at least for the case of Hubspot setup, I needed the fields/categories of my contact list in Hubspot set up in advance for the option to populate those fields to show in the "set up action" section of Zapier. A Hubspot contact list typically defaults to name, email address, and a few other standard fields. Before moving to the next step, I adjusted the fields in my list to mirror the data I'd be sending to Skool. You can add fields in Hubspot by clicking on "edit columns" on the contacts page, then "create a property," and once that new property is created, you'll need to go to "edit columns" again and select that new property to add to your contact list. More from Hubspot here:
This is important to make sure your list is formatted correctly especially if you want to get creative with Zapier. For this use case, having categories in your contact list to send specific info to (like first name, last name, email address) will suffice!
For reference, my Hubspot list in this example looks like this:
Now in customizing the actual action, I simply scroll down the list of fields available for this type of Zap. Where I find first name, last name, and email is where I'll click and select that piece of data coming from the Skool trigger. It will look something like this:
Note that if you get to this step and realize you need to reformat something in the third party app, it's super easy to make your adjustments and go back and re-link your account.
Once that section seems complete, click "continue" to test. Zapier will now send the test data (pulled fro a fresh subscriber) over to Hubspot and should populate correctly. Note that tests will go pretty fast, so you should see this appear in Hubspot in a few minutes (and after a few refreshes).
Yay - success! Now I know the connection is set up correctly and I'm ready to set this on autopilot. Now all I need to do is click "publish zap" and name it in the top left corner.
You also see your published zap is "on" but you can toggle it off at any time:
Boom - you are set! Now anytime a new person joins my group via paid Skool subscription, their name and subscriber email all port over to my CRM contact list. Zapier typically checks for new data every 10-15 minutes so you'll notice your list refreshes with new info at that cadence.
For troubleshooting any issues that come up during your Zap build, the most important info to confirm from the Skool side is that your API key and group URL are correct. Typically other issues will stem from the Zapier or third party app side with biggest culprits being:
- Required fields in Zapier not populated (or populated with an incorrect data format)
- Third party app account or list not initially set up to accept all incoming data fields
- General formatting (Skool data did not arrive in your third party app as expected) and requires a little tinkering within the "action" setup portion
Some great resources to help you get the most out of Zapier are Zapier University, the Zapier Help Center, and my personal favorite (duh) - the Zapier Community.