Scenario​

Send a birthday message to contacts on their birthdays.



Benefits​

  • Show customer appreciation.

  • Increase engagement with your brand.

  • Generate additional sales with special offers.

Further Inspiration​

Take this scenario to the next level with these suggestions.

  • Track whether the recipient clicks on the special offer. If he doesn't, send a follow-up email a week later.

  • Hotel or travel agency? Send an email 3 weeks before the birthday suggesting that the recipient plan a special getaway. To do so, change the birthday selection to the following: ​Date of Birth​, ​Equals,​ ​Relative Date​, ​Before Run​, ​21 days before ​(check the ​Ignore Year​ checkbox).

  • Do something fun and different: send half-birthday emails. Include a message like, "Isn't it more fun to celebrate twice a year?" To do so, change the birthday selection to the following: ​Date of Birth​, ​Equals,​ ​Relative Date​, ​Before Run​, ​6 months before​ (check the ​Ignore Year​ checkbox).

  • Want to add a coupon to the message? Mapp Engage offers the ​Coupon Manager​ feature for creating and sending coupons. See Coupon Manager​.

Prerequisites​

To send birthday messages, you need to know your contacts' birthdays. Birthdays are stored in the standard user attribute ​Date of Birth​. Contacts whose ​Date of Birth​ attribute is empty do not receive a birthday message. Don't have your contacts' birthdays stored? For new contacts, try adding a birthday field to your standard subscription form. For existing contacts, send an email inviting them to submit their birthday on a landing page with a web form.

Procedure​

This procedure has three steps.
A) Create the prepared message.

B) Create a selection that identifies contacts whose birthday matches the current date (ignoring the year).

C) Create a time-based automation for daily sendout.


A) Create the Message​

​BirthdayEmail​

Save the message as a prepared message.

For more information, see Save Draft as Prepared Message​.

You can update the content of the prepared message at any time. For example, you can easily add or change a coupon or update the graphics. There is no need to change or pause the automation. Sendout with the new content continues as scheduled.

B) Create the Selection​

  1. In the ​Main Navigation​ menu, click Recipients​ > ​Selection Builder​.
    ⇒ The ​Selections​ window opens.
  2. Click ​Create New​.
    ⇒ The ​Selection Builder​ opens.
  3. In the ​Header​ area, click the name to edit it. Create a name for the selection. The name must be unique in the system.
  4. In the ​Add New Rules​ panel, click ​Profile​.
    ⇒ The panel expands to display profile attributes in your system.
  5. Drag a new ​Date of Birth​ rule onto the selection builder.
  6. Click the  icon to edit the rule.
    ⇒ A configuration panel appears to the right.
  7. Enter the following settings.

    Field

    Settings

    ​Operator​

    Equals

    ​Date Type​

    Relative Date

    ​Relative to Run Date​

    On Run

    ​Ignore Year​

    Check the ​Ignore Year​ checkbox

  8. Click ​Apply​.
    ⇒ A birthday rule is added to the selection.
  9. Click the ​Save​ button to save and publish the selection.
    ⇒ Before publishing, Mapp Engage checks the selection for correctness. Mapp Engage only publishes the selection if the rules are logically combined, all dates in the selection are valid and all mandatory fields are filled. A published selection can be used for sendout, in automations, in the CMS and to transfer contacts between groups.

Add an additional group condition to the selection to limit birthday message sendouts to a specific group.

C) Automate Daily Sendout​

  1. In the ​Automation​ area, create a new whiteboard.
  2. Click the Load Template​ button.
    ⇒ The ​Load Template​ window opens.
  3. Load the ​Birthday Message​ template.
  4. Define the settings for the modules as follows:

    Time Module

    Field

    Entry

    Name

    This field displays the default name of the module. This field is editable.

    Date

    ​Recurring Date​

    Time

    Define the desired time of the daily sendout. The slider ​Hour​ works on a 24 hour clock.

    Period

    Day(s)

    Value

    1

    Time-based Job Module

    Field

    Entry

    Name

    This field displays the default name of the module. This field is editable.

    Job

    Send Prepared Message to Selection​

    Message

    ​BirthdayEmail​

    Selection

    Select your birthday selection.

  5. Click ​Next​.
    ⇒ The ​Whiteboard​ wizard opens to step two.
  6. Define the desired time frame and notifications.
  7. Click ​Activate​ to immediately activate the whiteboard.
    ⇒ The whiteboard is saved and activated. The automation has the status ​Running​ if the start date is immediate and ​Scheduled​ if the start date is in the future.


Gain insight into the performance of your messages in the ​Statistics​ area. All of the messages are evaluated together as a single message. This allows you to see at a glance how your birthday messages are performing. See Message Statistics (window)​.