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Insert dynamic rules and personalisation for subject lines and from names
Insert dynamic rules and personalisation for subject lines and from names

Use personalisation and dynamic rules to determine what subject line and from name a contact should see.

Gareth Burroughes avatar
Written by Gareth Burroughes
Updated over a week ago

In the same way that you can use personalisation and dynamic content in your email content, you can also use these tools for subject lines and from names.

  • Personalisation — inserts data stored against your contacts, for example, FIRSTNAME or ACCOUNT_MANAGER.

  • Dynamic rules — are logical rules used to determine what should display, for example:
    If the contact's country is United Kingdom show New t-shirt colours released, otherwise show New t-shirt colors released.

This means you can send one campaign with multiple targeted messages for different groups of customers. Which message each group receives will depend upon the rules you set.

Personalise your campaign subject line and from name

When creating your subject line, you can insert a placeholder for a contact data field. To do this, select the personalisation icon next to the Subject line or Friendly from name field.

This will show a list of all of your contact data fields.

subject-line.png

Select the contact data field and a placeholder will be added at the current place in the subject line or from name.

The placeholder will be in capitals with an @ symbol at either end (e.g. @FIRSTNAME@ for inserting the first name).

subject-line-with-name.png

This will automatically update the preview panel below it.

Dynamic rules on subject lines and from names

To use dynamic rules for campaign subject lines and 'from' names, select the Campaign settings option on the same 'Provide a few campaign setup details' screen.

You can enable dynamic content for:

  • Just the subject line, or

  • The subject line and the from name

If you only want to do a dynamic from name, but not the subject line, then enter the same subject line for all variations.

You'll now be able to create rules, variations and default content.

campaign-settings-options.png

Elements of dynamic content

Dynamic content consists of three main elements:

  • Default content

    This is the default subject line, or default from name, that your contacts will see if none of the rules that you set apply. This can contain personalisation (see above).

  • Variations

    These are the alternative versions of the subject line or from name that you want contacts to see who meet specific criteria set in your rules. This can contain personalisation (see above).

  • Rules

    These are the criteria you set to determine whether contacts see the default content, or a variation. For example, these rules could be GENDER must be equal to "Male", or AGE greater than 65 (rules can be more complex than this).

Create your default subject line and/or from address

If you haven't already done so, enter a default subject line and/or from name.

Create a variation

Select Variations in the top left corner of the dynamic content box, and then select + New variation.

block-new-variation.png

This will bring up a box with details of your new variation. First of all, give the variation a name; in the image below we have named the variation 'Women's VIP clothes discount'.

Next, you need to set a rule based on one of your default or created contact data fields. To do this, click select another contact data field.

variation-rules.png

This opens up the rule builder.

Select from one of the default contact data fields or one of your created contact data fields to base your rule upon. Below the contact data fields, after selecting one, you can set what rule is applied.

For text type contact data fields, you can set rules for:

  • Equal to

  • Not equal to

  • Contains

  • Does not contain

  • Starts with

  • Ends with

  • Is empty

  • Does not begin with

  • Does not end with

  • Is not empty

For date type contact data fields, you can set rules for:

  • On

  • Before

  • After

  • Is empty

  • Is not empty

And for number based contact data fields, you can set rules for:

  • Equal to

  • Not equal to

  • More than

  • Less than

  • At least (that is greater than or equal to)

  • At most (that is less than or equal to)

  • Is empty

  • Is not empty

And for Boolean (yes/no) contact data fields, you can set rules based on the answer being 'yes' (true) or 'no' (false).

select-gender.png

Once your rule is set, select OK.

You can add multiple rules to be very specific about what subject line and/or from name to show each contact.

Between each rule is the 'And'/'Or' toggle. 'And' indicates that all rules created must be true for a contact to see your variation. You can toggle to 'Or', which indicates only one of your rules needs to be true for a contact to see your variation.

When all of your rules are ready, select Apply.

You now have a campaign with two subject lines and/or from name variations. You can see what variation is currently being displayed by its name to the right of 'Variations'.

To switch between variations, select Variations in the top left-hand corner of the block and select a variation from the dropdown.

variation-switch.png

In this dropdown you can:

  • Add another variation

  • Select the variation you want to view and work with

  • Edit the rules for the variation (by selecting the Edit pencil icon)

  • Duplicate the variation (by selecting the Copy icon)

  • Remove the variation (by selecting the Remove red cross icon)

You can also rearrange the order of the rules by dragging the variation names up or down. The 'Default' variation will always be the last one in the list.

On your selected variation, enter the subject line and from name (if you've also selected from name from 'Campaign settings') that you want to display to those contacts who match the applied rules.

Using dynamic rules in conjunction with other features

If your campaign is set up for split testing, each split version will need to have dynamic rules set up as required.

If your campaign is set up to use ReMail, the same dynamic subject lines will be used in the ReMail. You won't get the option to edit the subject line of the Remail, like you can when using a static subject line. If you want to be able to change the subject line of the ReMail, you'll need to ensure you're using a static subject line in the 'Create' step.

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