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What would happen if a variant filter is set to a value that does not yet exist?

  • 11 December 2018
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john_apple
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Hi friends,



I'm building a Program to automate part of our renewal cycle. I have a couple variants I'd like to use that will be sent to different customers based on a field on the opportunity in Salesforce. We are currently adding additional values to this field (picklist) but it may not be updated for some time. If I set a variant to only send to a customer if this field equals particular value and that value will only exist in the future (the field is always there), will this impact the future sends in this program once that new value is available and begins to be populated in the field?



To me, it seems like email sends will be fine since the filter on the variant is set to defined condition (i.e. Field = Value 1) so it will only send once that value exists.



However, in the query, I am filtering based off the field as well to exclude everything value except one value that currently exists. I'm assuming that once a new value is added to the picklist field the query will also exclude this new value and any other new values by default. Would I have to change the filter to not sort based on possible values and just use the variants to filter customers?


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Best answer by dan_ahrens 11 December 2018, 20:52

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diane_morneau
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When I set up programs and intend to have x number of translations, I put them in place right away. When there is no match today, that variant isn't used until I start having matching records.



I am not sure why query builder would act any differently if your filtering is done on the basis of excluding an existing value. I expect that once the new value exists, it will be retained given it is not equal to the value you exclude.


dan_ahrens
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Hi John,



It sounds like you are talking about the filtering criteria that you're using to determine who should be added to a program, which is different than the field that determines which variant email type a recipient that has already been added to a program should receive. If so, remember that there is no direct link between a field that's used in program participant filtering and fields that are used to assign email variants.



In your example, the participant filtering would determine who would even qualify to enter the program as the first step and only if they had that specified field type could they proceed to becoming an email recipient, which would then trigger the variant type they would receive.



Hope this helps.


VP of Customer Success at Forcepoint
john_apple
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Hey Dan - I follow.



I guess I was wondering if I set a filter on the query to be:



Field Excludes A,B,C (so only D would be part of the query)



then at a later date we add another option (E) to the field in SFDC. Will E will be excluded as well from the query? In which case, E would not be part of the program.



Maybe Diane said it more succinctly in her second paragraph.


dan_ahrens
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Thanks for that added detail.



If you have a filter that excludes A, B and C; then ANYTHING that is NOT A, B, or C will be permissible. So D would be allowed, E would be allowed and WD40 would be allowed. ;-)


VP of Customer Success at Forcepoint
angelahibdon
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I am having issues similar to this in my NPS Program where my participant list may not always have a value present for cc'd email fields used in the templates as steps in the program. My attempts to launch the program are failing when a value is not present. I have support tickets out and am being told to delete the fields from my mapping in the participant list, which negates the whole reason for having an automated program with variant email templates using these fields as tokens.


Angela Hibdon
john_apple
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I'm curious - what is the error it is presenting when you try to publish the program?



Are your email steps set to not Skip sending if the record value and default value are unavailable?






diane_morneau
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Hi Angela



Tokens in headers are more challenging as you can't control those through variants.



How about handling the mailing through split power lists or use Query builder as the source of different programs to handle appropriately?


angelahibdon
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Thank you for your comments, Diane and John. I do use query builder for all of my programs participant lists. I was receiving custom email mapping errors and had participants being dropped from the program test. I spent time with Alex in Support today reviewing my program. You are correct in that if I have null values in fields, they cannot be used in the cc of the email template steps. But they can still be custom mapped and used as tokens elsewhere in the templates. After the call I was able to run a successful test.



I appreciate your comments.


Angela Hibdon

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