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Conditional Content allows you to show, hide or alter sections of an email based on data stored against each contact on your list.
The beauty of this feature is that it allows you to do all of this within a single email message. So instead of creating a separate message and separate sends for each set of criteria, you can do it all in one message and only send the message once.
This results in an email campaign that is far more dynamic and is going to resonate with your audience, which means increased clicks and engagement. Of course, for those contacts who do not meet your selected criteria, you can always choose a fall-back option for the default (or 'other') state.
For conditional content to work correctly and efficiently, you must have the relevant contact data in your contact list prior to sending your message.
Some conditional content examples include:
- Display a different image based on the location of a contact - eg. map of stores in their state or country.
- Display a piece of content if a contact's renewal date for something is within 60 days of the current date, but hide it for contacts that aren't due for any renewals soon.
- Running an event? You could show parking directions & venue details for those attending in-person, but show online webinar links and resources for those attending online.
- Display a different discount / coupon code based on the VIP tier / status of a contact.
- Change the imagery in an email for contacts that meet certain criteria - eg. if the contact likes donuts, then all banners could switch to images featuring donuts. For contacts that like pancakes, theirs would also change accordingly. If the contact has not specified a favourite food, then a default set of images are used.
How-to Guide
This article will step through some important information on inserting conditional content and its limitations. Here is what we will be covering (click to skip ahead):
- Using conditional content on entire components
- Using conditional content on specific content within a component
- Conditional content limits
Using Conditional Content on Entire Components
- Open your desired email message for editing.
- Select the component that you would like to apply your conditions to. In our example, we're going to select a paragraph component so that we can make the various bits & pieces (image, text & button) dynamic, based on the dietary information set on the contact's record.
- From the Settings panel on the right, expand the Conditions panel.
- Click .
- In our example, we're going to change the image, text and button parameters for recipients who have the value 'gluten free' stored in their 'dietary' field. So in our case, the criteria for the first condition would be: Dietary - Includes any - Gluten free - but depending on the field type, you can use operators such as 'contains', 'does not contain', 'is empty' and so on.
- Click .
- Once the condition is added, our system copies whatever was in your component originally - but you can now go in and change it. In our case, we'll replace the text with something that's going to resonate with a gluten free reader. We'll also double-click on the image and replace it with our gluten free donut photo. We can also alter the CTA button properties and change the destination link, the colour, width, text and more. Remember, we are only applying these changes to the 'Dietary = Gluten free' condition - not the original. Here's how it looks now:
- Now let's add another condition - this time for our vegan customers. With your component selected, click again.
- The criteria for our second condition would be: Dietary - Includes any - Vegan.
- Click .
- Once the condition is added, you can now change / populate the component with whatever content you wish to show to contacts that meet this specific criteria. As you can see below, we've switched the photo to a vegan donut and have altered the text and button as well.
- Repeat this process for any additional conditions you may have - you can have up to five, plus a default (other / else) option.
- Once complete, make sure that your default condition (ie. the one that displays when none of the other conditions are met) shows the correct text, image and button. To do so, click on the Default condition in the Conditions panel over on the side to select it & make any adjustments as needed.
- Save your message.
- Once your message is saved, click from the top right corner of the editor.
- Test your conditions are set correctly by choosing the list and scrolling through the contacts. The images, text, etc should swap as you scroll through - based on the dietary preferences of each contact in the database.
To make a component 'disappear' (not display anything) for a certain condition (or for the 'default' option), simply select the condition from the panel on the right, then turn off the image, the button and delete all text in the text component.
If your text component has padding - like the example below, you may wish to lower this down to a smaller number (like 5), in order to remove the extra spacing that would other appear when your 'blank' condition is met.
Using Conditional Content on Specific Content Within a Component
You can also apply conditions to specific content (such as single words or lines of text) within your paragraphs by highlighting the content and then clicking the conditional content icon from the floating toolbar.
When doing so, the section of text with a condition applied to it will have a special shading applied to it, as you'll see in one of the screenshots below.
It won't immediately be clear what condition is applied to which block of text, but you will be able to view this by going into HTML mode for the text component you're working in.
- Type all the content required into your component and apply any links, font styling, etc first.
- Highlight the first bit of content that you want to apply a conditional rule to.
- Click the conditional content icon from the floating toolbar (as shown).
- Set up the criteria for your condition. In this example, we want to show a particular link to our Gluten Free users which links them directly to the relevant page on our online store. So the criteria we use is: Dietary - Includes any - Gluten free (as shown).
- Repeat the steps above for your other conditions - highlight & apply conditional rules.
- Save your message.
- Once your message is saved, click from the top right corner of the editor.
- Test your conditions are set correctly by choosing the list and scrolling through the contacts. The images should swap as you scroll through - based on the dietary preferences of each contact in the database.
Conditional Content Limitations
Conditional content can be a very useful tool when wanting to customise the content of your emails to specific recipients. However, users should be aware of the limitations of this feature, to avoid problems when sending their emails.
When using conditional content, in any type of email, there is a cap of 75 conditional content checks which cannot be exceeded.
When using the drag and drop editor in the system, individual components have a limit of 5 conditional content checks ie. on a paragraph or header component for example, as well as a default / 'other' condition, which displays when none of the conditions are met.
If these limits are exceeded, you will receive a warning and the email containing the conditional content will not be able to be sent.
These limits are in place to optimise the system's performance and make sure everything runs smoothly and quickly. If a subscriber meets multiple criteria for a condition, the last condition is displayed.
Furthermore, note that the Click Map Report will only show the default condition, however the actual reporting data & totals will still be calculated for all links within your email, including those inside conditions.
Further Reading
We also support advanced conditional wildcards through HTML code - either within certain components in our drag & drop email editor, or via a HTML email.
Advanced Conditional Wildcards