Suppose you have an Excel file that contains member names, member emails, and dates of birth. You can use this information and [Recurring Campaign] to send birthday cards to members whose birthdays are on that day every day. The following will explain how to complete all settings step by step.
Before importing the Excel file, you must first set up contact fields. There are already 3 preset fields: [Name], [Email], and [Mobile]. They are the minimum requirements for sending email, SMS, or MMS campaigns. You can store the member names in the [Name] field and email addresses in the [Email] field. However, there is no preset field for storing the dates of birth. You’ll need to create one manually.
Go to the [Field] tab under the [Contacts] section, then click the [Add Field] button. Enter “Date of Birth” in the [Field Name], then click [Next]. In the drop-down list for choosing the [Type], select [Date], then press [Confirm].
After completing the field setting section, you can start importing member data.
First, go to the [Import] tab under the [Contacts] page, click the [Import Contacts] button on the top right, and upload your Excel file. The next step is to match the fields, match the member name to the [Name] field, the email address to the [Email] field, and the date of birth to the “Date of Birth” field, and then click [Next].
In the [Action] setting of [Create or Modify Group], select [Don’t Create or Modify Group]. Since we will manually create an [Auto-update Group] after the import, creating or modifying a group is unnecessary. Then, carefully check the settings you have completed on the page. After confirming they are correct, click [Confirm and Start Import].
After successfully importing the data, we will create an [Auto-update Group]. The goal is to let the system automatically search for members whose birthday is on that day every day.
First, go to the [Groups] section and click the [Create Group] button on the upper right. In the search condition of the first row, set “Date of Birth month is Current Month”. Then, click [Add Condition], and set the second row to “Date of Birth day is Current Day”.
Note: Assuming today is January 1, 2023, “Date of Birth month is Current Month” will find all members born in January, which includes January 1 to 31. “Date of Birth day is Current Day” will search for all members born on the 1st, including January 1, February 1, March 1... to December 1. Therefore, combining these two search conditions is required to search for members whose date of birth is January 1.
After confirming the 2 rows of search conditions are correct, click [Search]. The number of resulting contacts will vary depending on the date you search. It may be zero because no members were born on that day. But don’t worry, [Auto-update Group] will search for matching contacts whenever used. Now you need to enter the [Group Name] as “Members Whose Birthday is Today”, and then make sure that [Save Group As] below selects [Auto-update Group]. Finally, click [Save].
You have now successfully created an [Auto-update Group]. Next, we’ll start building a [Recurring Campaign] and sending it to this group.
First, go to the [Recurring Campaigns] tab under the [Emails] section. Then, click the [Create Recurring Email Campaign] button at the top right to start creating a [Base Campaign].
In the editing summary page, you need to complete three sections, namely [Recipients], [Sender Information], and [Email Content]. You can first enter the name of the campaign as “Send Birthday Cards Daily”.
Click [Edit], then [Select Group]. In the list of groups on the next page, click the [Include] icon to the left of the previously created group “Members Whose Birthday is Today”. Then, click [Save] below.
Back to the editing summary page, the number of [Estimated Recipients] may be zero. That’s okay because probably no members were born today. If the number is non-zero, that is the number of members whose birthday is today.
Click [Edit]. Select the sender identity from the drop-down menu. Then enter the email subject, like: “Happy Birthday!”. In addition, you can enter the [Preview] text optionally.
Click [Edit], then [Select Template]. Choose a birthday card template and enter your desired content.
Once you’ve completed the 3 main sections, click the [Set Recurring] button below. In the dialog for setting the recurring sending cycle, set sending at 9:00 AM every 1 day. Since it’s a birthday card, you can choose [Never] to stop sending it regularly. Finally, click [Confirm].
After completing all the steps above, the system will send the birthday card you designed to the [Auto-update Group] “Members Whose Birthday is Today” at 9:00 AM every day. Because the search conditions for the group are “Date of Birth month is Current Month” and “Date of Birth day is Current Day”, the daily search results will only be members whose birthday is on that day.