What is a conditional block?
A conditional block means a block for which it is possible to define several versions of its content. The display of each version is determined according to rules that you define using the variables in your recipient list. In concrete terms, conditional blocks allow you to display a different version of your campaign according to certain criteria that differentiate your contacts. Mailify allows you to create up to 20 different versions for each conditional block included in your email.
Example: if the recipient is a woman, display the version 1 of my conditional block. If the recipient is a man, display the version 2. If the title is not defined, display the default version.
By using this type of dynamic content, you can send your recipients different content based on their characteristics in one single campaign. You will save time, especially if you are used to duplicate your email campaigns and make only slight modifications to adapt it to your different customer categories.
How to insert and use a conditional block with Mailify?
Warning: the display conditions depend on the value of one or more fields in a recipient list. Therefore a list of contacts must absolutely be associated to your campaign to use conditional blocks.
Go to the "Edition" section of your campaign. Select the "Conditional Block" in the right menu. Drag and drop it into your campaign.
The conditional block properties window pops up automatically. Click on the "Add new version" button to create the first version of your block.
Then you can define the display conditions for this version of the block, add other versions and define a default version (which will be displayed when none of the display conditions are met).
Defining Display Conditions
The display conditions are related to the information available in your contact list. Thus all display conditions are related to one of the columns of your list.
You can give a name to each version. By default, the version corresponding to your first display condition will be named "Version 1". This field is customizable to better identify the segment to which a given version is addressed.
Let's take our example of civility: If my contact is a woman, display the version 1. If the recipient is a man, display the version 2. If the title is not defined, display the default version.
Each version must therefore match a specific value of the "Title" column in my contact list.
To create a display condition, you first have to select the column that contains the value you are interested in. In our example, this is the "Title" column.
You must then define the type of operator for your conditions. Here are the available options:
- contains
- is different from
- is equal to
- starts with
- ends with
- not filled in
In our example, it will be " is equal to ".
Then you have to define the value of the variable that defines the condition. For the first version of our example, the value of the field "Title" should be equal to "Madam".
You must then define the display condition for the second version.
The default version will be displayed when no condition is met. If you don't want to create a default version, you can delete it by clicking on the recycle bin symbol. However, we recommend you to have a default version to avoid displaying nothing if a field is empty or if a value is misspelled.
Once you have defined the display conditions for each of your versions, you must create the block assigned to each of them. To do this, quit the conditions pop-up window by pressing the cross in the upper right corner.
Create the content of a conditional block
Back in the EmailBuilder, you currently have an empty line for each version of your block.
By clicking on the name of the version of your block, you can fold/unfold the content of the block corresponding to this version.
Then drag and drop the relevant blocks and contents at your convenience. Insert the texts and/or images corresponding to the selected version.
When you have created all the versions you wanted to, you can test and finalize the sending of your campaign.
What happens if you save a campaign containing conditional blocks as a template?
If you save a campaign containing conditional blocks as a template, the EmailBuilder lines corresponding to the different versions of your conditional blocks will be deleted. Indeed, templates are not related to a contact list and therefore cannot display conditional blocks.
Basically, the conditional block allows you to personalize the content of your email campaigns thanks to predefined criteria related to your contact list.