Documentation Journey Optimizer Journey Optimizer Guide

Get started with campaigns get-started-campaigns

Last update: Mon Jan 12 2026 00:00:00 GMT+0000 (Coordinated Universal Time)

Topics:
Campaigns

CREATED FOR:

Beginner
User

Adobe Journey Optimizer empowers you to deliver targeted, one-time content to specific audiences across multiple channels. Using campaigns, you can execute coordinated marketing actions simultaneously, reaching your audience with the right message at the right time.

This guide provides a clear roadmap to help you understand campaign fundamentals, choose the right campaign type for your use case, and confidently design campaigns that deliver impactful customer experiences.

What are campaigns?

Campaigns are coordinated marketing actions that deliver content to a specific audience across one or more channels. Unlike journeys where actions execute sequentially, campaigns perform actions simultaneously—either immediately or on a defined schedule.

Use Journey Optimizer campaigns to:

Deliver one-time or recurring content to targeted audience segments
Execute coordinated multi-channel communications across email, push, SMS, in-app, web, and more
Trigger automated responses via API calls for real-time, event-driven messaging
Design complex marketing workflows with visual orchestration tools

➡️ Ready to start building? Create your first campaign in minutes.

Choose your campaign type campaign-types

Before you start building, it’s important to understand which type of campaign fits your use case. Adobe Journey Optimizer supports three campaign types, each designed for different scenarios and activation mechanisms:

Orchestrated campaigns

When to use: Complex, multi-step marketing workflows

Orchestrated campaigns provide a visual, drag-and-drop canvas to design and automate sophisticated marketing workflows. From audience segmentation to personalized message delivery across channels, everything happens in one intuitive environment built for speed and control.

Perfect for: Multi-step customer engagement programs, complex segmentation and targeting strategies, cross-channel campaign orchestration, brand-initiated marketing at scale, and advanced workflow automation with multiple decision points.

➡️ Learn about Orchestrated campaigns

Action campaigns (Scheduled)

When to use: Simple, scheduled batch communications

Action campaigns (also known as Scheduled campaigns) are ideal for straightforward, one-off or recurring batch communications that run at a specific time.

Two categories:

Marketing - Promotional offers, engagement campaigns, announcements, legal notices, or policy updates. Requires recipients to be opted in.
Transactional - Disruptions, emergencies, cancellations. Does not require opt-in.

Perfect for: Monthly newsletters to customer segments, time-sensitive promotional announcements, seasonal marketing campaigns, product launch communications, and service disruption notifications.

➡️ Learn about Action campaigns

API triggered campaigns

When to use: Real-time, event-driven messaging with external systems

API-triggered campaigns activate through API calls, enabling automated messaging directly from external systems. These campaigns support personalization using both profile attributes and real-time context data from the API payload.

Two categories:

Marketing - Personalized marketing communications to targeted audiences
Transactional - Messages following individual actions (password resets, cart purchases, etc.)

Perfect for: Password reset confirmations, cart abandonment recovery, order confirmations and shipping updates, account activity notifications, and real-time personalized recommendations.

➡️ Learn about API-triggered campaigns

NOTE

Not sure which type to choose? Start with Action campaigns for scheduled batch communications or API-triggered campaigns for real-time messaging—these cover most common use cases.

Prerequisites prerequisites

Before working with campaigns, make sure you have the following in place:

Audiences - Audiences must be available in Adobe Experience Platform before creating campaigns. Get started with audiences →
Channel configurations - Channel configurations (presets) must be created and available for the channels you want to use. Set up channel configurations →

Permissions - You need appropriate permissions based on the campaign type. Contact your administrator if you cannot access campaign functionalities. Learn about built-in roles →

accordion

Campaigns permissions list

table 0-row-2 1-row-2 2-row-2
Campaign type	Permissions
Action campaigns & API triggered campaigns	Campaign administrator Campaign approver Campaign manager Campaign viewer
Orchestrated campaigns	Orchestrated Campaign Administrator Orchestrated Campaign Approver Orchestrated Campaign Manager Orchestrated Campaign Viewer

accordion
How to assign campaign permissions
Navigate to the Roles tab in the Permissions product and select one of the built-in campaign related Roles. From the Users tab, click Add user. Type in your user’s name or email address or select the user from the list and click Save. If the user was not previously created, refer to the Add users documentation. Your user should then receive an email redirecting to your instance.

accordion

How to assign campaign permissions

Navigate to the Roles tab in the Permissions product and select one of the built-in campaign related Roles.
From the Users tab, click Add user.
Type in your user’s name or email address or select the user from the list and click Save.

If the user was not previously created, refer to the Add users documentation.

Your user should then receive an email redirecting to your instance.

Your campaign creation workflow workflow

Building successful campaigns follows a clear, repeatable process. Here’s your step-by-step workflow:

1. Plan your campaign

Before starting, clarify your objectives:

What’s the goal? (e.g., drive conversions, increase engagement, notify customers)
Who’s the audience? (e.g., build or select from Adobe Experience Platform)
Which campaign type fits? (See campaign types above)
What channels will you use? (email, push, SMS, in-app, web, etc.) → See supported channels by campaign type
When should it execute? (immediate, scheduled, or API-triggered)

2. Configure campaign properties

Set up the foundation of your campaign:

Name and describe your campaign for easy identification
Select campaign type (Action, API-triggered, or Orchestrated)
Choose your audience
Set priority if using conflict management
Configure schedule (for Action campaigns) or API details (for API-triggered)

Type-specific guides: Action campaign properties | API-triggered campaign properties | Orchestrated campaign setup

3. Design your content

Create compelling messages for your audience: