Target profiles in a workflow

Welcome to Adobe Campaign! In this module, we will explain how to use campaign workflows and how to target profiles in a workflow. We will also learn about targeting and filtering dimensions, as well as how to create a targeting workflow and specify filtering conditions. Workflows are an extremely powerful tool in Campaign as they allow us to automate logical processes. There are two types of workflows, campaign workflows and technical workflows. Most of the activities for a marketing campaign occur in a campaign workflow. Technical workflows are used for operations or jobs scheduled for periodic execution on the server. For example, they let us carry out maintenance on the database and forward tracking information on deliveries. In this module, we will focus on the targeting capabilities for Campaign. Campaign workflows use queries to target profiles. To start, we need to set targeting dimensions and the filtering dimension for our query. Next, we need to select a filter. There are many different filters we can choose from that streamline our targeting. For example, we can target recipients that are included in a folder or recipients that have received a delivery. The available filter types depend on the targeting and filtering dimensions we configured earlier. Lastly, we specify the filtering conditions to identify the profiles we want to target. For example, if we select a recipient’s filter type within a folder, we need to select which folder. Now let’s talk a bit about targeting and filtering dimensions. The targeting dimension identifies the population type used by the operation and corresponds to a table in the database. When targeting for the purpose of sending deliveries, the most common targeting dimension is the recipient table. The recipient table is selected by default in the Query Activity tab. The filtering dimension is a table reference in the FROM argument of the SQL statement generated from the filtering conditions. The available filtering dimension depends on the target dimension we select. Only filtering dimensions compatible with the targeting dimension are made available. Let’s create a new targeting workflow with a variety of filtering conditions. In the Explorer view, navigate to Campaign Management and Campaigns. In the List view on the right, select New. Next, set the label. In this example, we’re going to keep the default start and end dates. Once completed, select OK. Next, let’s double click our campaign so we can see it in the full screen view and select the Edit tab. To avoid any conflicts, rename the internal name. Once completed, select Save. Next, let’s select the Targeting and Workflows tab, followed by selecting New in the top left corner to create a new workflow. In this example, we’ll name it Simple Targeting Workflows and select OK. Before we continue, select Refresh at the top. Then select Yes when prompted to save the changes. We can see our workflow has been updated here and created. Next, we need to update the properties. Select Properties and set an internal name, then select OK and Save. We may need to refresh again in order to update the workflow if it defaults back to the original. To the far left, we have the Activities side panel. We can drag and drop any of these activities onto the workflow. The name of the panel is displayed on the top just above Query. As we can see, selecting the different tabs, deliveries, flow control, and actions will populate the panel with different activities. Let’s select Targeting Activities, then select Query and drag it onto our workflow. Double click the Query activity icon, then select Edit Query. This is where we set the targeting and filtering dimensions. If we wanted to select a different filtering dimension, we can select the Filtering Dimensions dropdown and select a different dimension. For this exercise, we’re going to keep the recipients table for both the targeting and the filtering dimension. Below the filtering and targeting dimensions are our available filter types. With these options, we can quickly create filtering conditions. For example, we may want to target recipients included in a specific folder. Let’s select the recipients included in a folder filter, then select Next. Next, we need to select which recipient folder we want to target by selecting the plus icon to populate the folders. If we change our mind, we can select Previous to go back. We want to set up our own filtering conditions, so let’s select Filtering Conditions followed by selecting Next. The filter popover appears. Select the Express column and an Edit Expression icon appears. Select the Edit Expression icon and the Field to Select window appears. We’re going to target based on age, so double click on the Age attribute and change the operation to less than or equal to. Then in the Value column, set the value to 30. Once completed, we’re going to add another filtering condition by selecting the Add icon. Following the same steps as before, we’re going to select Age, set the operation to greater than or equal to, and set the value to 20. After setting our filtering conditions, we can preview our audience or target population by selecting the Preview tab at the bottom. We can also configure this list by right clicking and selecting Configure List. In the popover that appears, double click the Age column and select OK. Scrolling down, we can see that the age for our recipients is between 20 and 30. If we’re happy with the results, all we have to do is select Finish in the bottom right. We are redirected back to the Query page. Let’s rename the label of the query to Age Group 20-30 and select OK, followed by selecting Save in the top right corner. Once we’ve saved our edits, we can start the workflow by selecting the green Play icon. The Execution Status is displayed above the Workflow window in the top right. Our status is set to Paused and we can see the 287 results in the Workflow tab flashing. Right clicking on that and select Display the Target, a new popover appears displaying the results of our query. Right click Configuration List, then select the plus symbol in Targeting Dimensions, followed by double clicking Age to add it to the output columns. Select OK and the popover closes with the Age Targeting Dimension column now available. Let’s close this by selecting Close and add another condition to the query. Double click our Age Group 20-30 query in the workflow and change the label to contain prospects at the front, then select Edit Query. Following the workflow we used before to add our age expression, select the Add icon, then select Edit Expression. Scroll down until we find Status and double click it. We don’t need to change the operation however, in the Value section select Prospect. If you have not already noticed, there is an operator to the far left that is set to AND by default. If we need to, we can select it and change it. Another option to point out here is that we can generate the SQL query by selecting the Generate SQL Query link in the bottom left. Let’s try it out. This option allows us to see the SQL that is generated using the filtering conditions we’ve configured. Notice that the NMS Recipients table is the value in the form argument of the query. As mentioned earlier in this module, this means the recipient table is where the query starts in the database because we kept the filtering dimension set to the recipient table. Let’s select Close and then select Finish followed by selecting OK. Now we’re going to restart our workflow. We have a couple options to do this. We can select the Stop icon followed by selecting the Start icon again, but there’s also a restart option to the right of the Stop icon. Let’s use that option. Select Restart and if we forgot to save our workflow, it will do that automatically. In the popover that appears, select Yes and then Campaign will restart the workflow and a new flashing result number is displayed. We can double click on the result and select Display the Target again to view our results. We can see that we’re seeing 200 of 205 as indicated in the bottom right. Once we have confirmed everything is looking good, close the popover. As a best practice, we’re going to stop our workflow because we’re done executing. Select the Stop icon and select Yes from within the popover to stop the workflow. This execution status changes from paused to finished. Now we’re going to right click again on our 205 results transition and select Display the Target. Notice this time though, there are no results being displayed in the Data tab. This is because the results data is only available when the workflow is executing. Once we stop the workflow, the temporary workflow table that’s storing the workflow results is dropped in order to free up the database. This demonstrates why it’s important to stop the workflow. If we leave it running, it keeps a temporary worktable in the database and takes up space. This concludes the module on using campaign workflows and how to target profiles in a workflow. Thanks for watching!