Managing the Unsubscribe: Part 3

Managing the Unsubscribe

25 Days of Sitecore EXM continues with Day 19 and Part 3 of the mini-series Managing the Unsubscribe. Today we’re going to take a closer look at a new feature available in Sitecore 9.1, The Email Preference Center, which was a significant feature added to the out of the box capabilities of Sitecore.

The Unsubscribe In Action

Yesterday, in our Part 2 on Day 18, we ended with showing how Test User 5 was on the Common Global Opt-Out list after clicking the Unsubscribe from all link in the Sample Email.

We continue our look into the Unsubscribe in Action with a look into how the Preference Center looks after Test User 5 unsubscribed. Because our user is now in the Opt-Out list for the entire Manager Root, as shown below, the Preference Center disables itself, and the checkbox is checked indicating that the user is opted out.

Continuing the example, Test User 5 has come back to the site through the Preference Center and is going to uncheck the box to begin receiving emails from Sitecore EXM.

The Contact is removed from the Common Global Opt-Out List as shown in List Manager which now shows 0 in the opt-out list, and the Preference Center actives again, allow our Contact to modify their Marketing Preferences.

Marketing Preferences

Expanding our dive on the Preference Center, the Marketing Preferences is a new part of Sitecore that allows users to self-select marketing segments. This is an important concept because, at least as of now, the selection of Marketing Preferences, out of the box, has no bearing or effect on the subscription to EXM. In fact, all Marketing Preferences really do is add additional metadata to the Contact’s Facets.

In the above Example, our Test User has Product Updates selected. Under the covers this equates to the following Facet data on the Contact.

The Marketing Category ID represents the Category item ID in Sitecore that represents these Marketing Preferences.

Using Marketing Preferences

The proper way to use Marketing Preferences is by using the Rules Engine. Sitecore has added a number of rules for EXM in Sitecore 9.1, with one of them being about the Marketing Preferences selected.

You can use these new rules in List Manager as well as Marketing Automation. They are not available for Experience Editor personalization. We will cover how to personalize your website with a contact, based on Email interaction on Day 23 when we connect the experiences.

Creating a Segmented List

Using the rule above, we can create a Segmented Contact List that will automatically curate a list based on which contacts have a specific marketing preference selected. Keep in mind, it’s important to note that Marketing Preferences are based on a specific Manager Root in EXM. So, if there are multiple manager roots in play, you’ll need to have specific contact lists managing those.

Using Marketing Automation

These rules are also available in Marketing Automation for the various places where rules can be used. For example, if your use case is that you want to add the specific contact to a Contact List (not a Segmented List), you can do so by using Marketing Automation to enroll the contact based on the rule (which is shown above) and perform an action, such as adding to a contact list.

Summary

While Marketing Preferences do not tie directly to Email Experience Manager, except in relation to a Manager Root, they can be used in collaboration with the other functions of Sitecore to affect Contact Lists, which can be added to EXM Messages for sending to contacts. Add to that the enhanced functionality of being able to use Marketing Automation in relation to these rules, the possibilities are numerous.

Part 4 Tomorrow

We continue Managing the Unsubscribe series tomorrow with Part 4 where we’ll look specifically at the new feature in Sitecore 9.1: Sending Limits.

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Tagged as: 25days, EXM

Categorised in: EXM, Sitecore