Exporting Subscriber Data from ManyChat
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How to Get Custom Field (CUF), Tag and System Field Information
When it comes to getting data out of a Facebook Messenger bot built in ManyChat, there are two personas that come to mind,
- “Oops — I forgot to export those, how do I catch up?” and
- “Wha? What do you mean I can’t export email and phone [system fields.”
Bot owners may just want basic information such as lead generation demographics and contact information. Some may want a more complex data set that includes custom fields, system fields or tags.
For the basics, many users can be well served by using ManyChat’s built in Google Sheets integration to insert/update rows by PSID (subscriber id). That is of course, if they built this data extraction capability into their bot from the start.
If they didn’t (see “Oops” above), then they will be forced into unnatural acts.
One example would be to create a flow that exports user information into google sheets (see the “Actions” blocks below). When there are more than 100 subscribers, many have been advised to build a randomizer with a smart delay of 1–2 minutes and have more than one path to the export. This is done because of ManyChat and Google Sheet API limitations.
To initiate this, one would then run a broadcast to this flow for your entire active subscriber population.
We just finished a 16,000 user export (using another method), but if we were to take the aforementioned method….
- 5,333 users (1 minute delay) ~ 5,333 minutes
- 5,333 users (2 minute delay) ~ 10,666 minutes
- 5,333 users (3 minute delay) ~ 16,000 minutes
The next approach is to create an integromat flow (zapier at the number we noted above would be very expensive)
This method — for 16,000 subscribers would encompass (at most) 7 operations per subscriber for about 112,000 operations. That would cost over $50 in Integromat. In Zapier, this would temporarily move you into $299 territory (please correct me if I am wrong).
The proper way to do this is to set an insert/update row action to Google Sheets after each input or triggered action creates a custom field entry.
Custom Field Exports
Custom fields are covered in section above and should be identified and mapped as needed. In short, not every custom field is needed so act accordingly.
Tag “Exports”
What about tags? Well tags either exist or they don’t. If tracked, they need to be individually identified and a decision must be made (for every user) to mark “true” or “false” — indicating whether or not they’ve been attached to a subscriber.
System Fields
There are some experts that say as system fields are populated, a rule should be set to populate that system field into its “proxy” custom field so that it can be exported — thus doubling the data storage. This can also be achieved in an inline action where a custom field can be populated by a system field once the system field is updated
The system fields are an interesting collection of fields. This is a listing of those from my last export:
ManyChat System Fields
- status
- first_name
- last_name
- name
- gender
- profile_pic
- locale
- language
- timezone
- live_chat_url
- last_input_text
- optin_phone
- phone
- optin_email
- subscribed
- last_interaction
- last_seen
- is_followup_enabled
Our Direct Approach
We’ve taken an alternate approach and created an export service.
The requirements are tailor-made to you as the specifics of the custom fields, system fields and tags you want. We run the custom export and deliver a *.csv file to your inbox. And fast.
That 16,000 subscriber list? 56 minutes. Curious about it, click the link below to find out more!
Full disclosure it’s a paid solution and it will take you to my snarky facebook messenger bot. The other solutions will work — they just take time and effort.
