Audience Builder

Problem

You need to send bespoke emails, SMS or push messages to a filtered list of members, such as booked customers for a cancelled session or members whose membership ends soon, which the standard Go emails do not cover.

Resolution

Build the audience

1. Build and save the audience
   • In Operator, go to Automation Portal > Audiences and create an audience: name, type (operational or marketing), optional sites, filters, then Submit to check the sample and Save.
   • Every step, filter rule and caveat is in Using Audience Builder.

Create the template

1. Create a Custom audience template (email)
   • Go to Email templates, add new with type Custom audience, then pick the audience (newest are at the bottom of the list).
   • In the drag-and-drop editor, add text, images (by URL), buttons and social tiles.
   • Marketing emails must include the unsubscribe block (anywhere in the email).
   • Check the email settings: the subject defaults to "New template", and the description is only an internal reference.

Create the communication job

1. Set up the job

   • General set-up is in Gladstone Go and 360 Email Templates and Business Rules and Communication Jobs in the Gladstone Go Automation Portal.
   • Give the job a unique name and choose job type Custom audience (the same mechanism runs DD rejection, alert list and booking confirmation emails), then pick the audience.
   • One-off jobs send once at a date and time, and can be deleted but not edited. Repeating jobs re-check the audience on every run and send only to members who match at that moment. For an open-ended job, pick the last available end date.

2. Choose channels and enter content

   • Choose channels: email, push (Go Mobile app only) and SMS. SMS has no templates, just plain text. Placeholders available depend on the audience's filters; member fields such as name are always available.
   • If several languages are enabled (for example, English and Welsh), enter content for each. Each member receives only their chosen language, defaulting to English.
   • Test SMS goes straight to the number you enter, with placeholders unfilled. The credit estimate is shown (roughly 250 characters per credit).

3. Schedule the job

   • Choose days of the week, then once daily (for example, a nightly reminder about tomorrow's booking) or multiple times a day (for example, every 5 minutes, for an email just after a membership purchase).

4. Test, then go live

   • With job status Test, the job sends to the email addresses you enter (more than one allowed) at the scheduled time, instead of to members.
   • Send first result sends you just one email rather than one per member. Untick it and a 100-member audience sends you 100 emails.
   • When you are happy, edit the job and set its status to Live.

Notes

• Audience Builder builds filtered lists of members (audiences) for bespoke messages, sent by a communication job. It is a separate, paid product from the standard Go emails (see Gladstone Go and 360 Email Templates).
• Sending bespoke communications has three parts: the audience (who), the template (what: an email template, or plain SMS or push text) and the communication job (when). If something is not working, work out which part is failing; many reported "Audience Builder" problems are actually in the communication job.
• Typical uses: bespoke emails the standard set does not cover (for example, a booking-cancellation notice), telling booked customers about a cancelled session (deleting a session in Plus2 does not notify anyone; see Plus2 Activities, Reservations, Booking Sheets and Closures), renewal reminders and follow-ups after a purchase.
• Confirm SMS is live for your site before promising it.
• A sent email cannot be recalled.
• Credits: SMS sends stop when SMS credits run out (for example, 10 credits for 100 members sends 10). Email sends continue and the email credit balance goes negative, because Gladstone controls email credits but not SMS credits.
• Checking what was sent: there is currently no customer-facing report of how many members a job reached. Email analytics are being built: every email sent and every action (delivered, undelivered, opened, clicked) will be stored per job run, with success and failure counts, and shown in the interface. SMS and push analytics will be more basic. Emails sent to a member also appear in their correspondence in 360 (see Finding and Viewing Member Records in Gladstone 360).
• The audience prerequisites (paid feature, advanced comms module), marketing consent, duplicates and the audience list are covered in Using Audience Builder.
• When the communication job runs, each member is sent the message only once, even if they appear more than once in an export.
• Related: Audience Builder FAQ; Audience Builder Best Practice Examples; Audience Builder: Available Filters Reference; Gladstone Go and 360 Email Templates; Gladstone Go Operator Configuration Overview; Plus2 Activities, Reservations, Booking Sheets and Closures.

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