Go to ortto.com
Home Campaigns Journeys Journeys Journey entry criteria

Journey entry criteria

Overview

The Journey entry criteria setting lets users specify how contacts enter a journey.

Accessing entry criteria

To access the entry criteria of a journey, go to Marketing > Campaigns > Select journey.

Managing entry criteria

Set an entry criteria

In the People enter when section, choose criteria that determine when customers enter your journey. Depending on your selection, you may need to add more conditions to refine your selection.

You have various Entry criteria options available:

  • Contact status in other campaigns (in, entering, leaving).
  • Audiences.
  • Person or organization fields.
  • Connected data source fields or activities.
  • System activities.

Activity filters

For Activity filters, you can choose:

  • Occurs: Every time this activity happens.
    • When using occurs, if you want people to enter the journey each time it occurs, make sure to update the People can be in journey setting accordingly.
  • Has/has not occurred: Whether the activity has or hasn't happened.
  • First occurred: When the activity first occurred.
  • Last occurred: When the activity last occurred.
  • Frequency & time: How often over what period.

You can also add When and where clauses for further filtering.

Field filters

If you select a Field filter, you can specify:

  • Is, is not, starts with, ends with, contains, does not contain.
  • Less than, greater than, between.
  • Has no value or has any value.

Some field options also have Relative and absolute clause options:

Relative

  • More than, exactly, less than.
  • Occurs in less than, occurs in, occurs in more than.
  • Anniversary, age is exactly, age is more than, age is less than.

Absolute

  • After, on, before, between.
  • Has no value, has any value.

NOTE:

  • The entry condition can be singular, nested or grouped, and you can use AND/OR operators to modify your filter.

Set last entry date

You have the ability to set a last entry date for when you no longer want people to enter.

Example of setting up the last entry date.

NOTE:

  • Once the date has passed, people will stop entering the journey.
  • If you remove this setting at a later date the entry criteria will run again and people who match the filter will re-enter the journey.

Modifying entry criteria

Editing the Entry criteria of an active journey does not exit people already in the journey.

Neither does Switching a journey off and on again.

Filters with an ‘occurs’ condition

Editing the Entry criteria of an active journey won’t cause people to re-enter.

Neither will Switching a journey off and on again. People will only enter the journey when the specified event occurs.

NOTE: You can link entry and exit conditions using occurs conditions with matching activity attributes. This feature applies specifically to occurs conditions. The activities must have matching attributes of the same type.

EX: Matching the name attribute of the Opportunity created activity with the name attribute of the Opportunity won activity.

TIP: To match occurs activity attributes:

  1. Under People enter when, choose an occurs condition (such as Salesforce’s Lead created).
  2. Under People exit when, choose a related occurs condition (such as Salesforce’s Lead updated), then Match with entry condition.
  3. Select the activity attribute you wish to match (such as Lead ID), then click Done and save your changes.

NOTE: The occurs activity is stored for the entire duration that the contact is in the journey, extending beyond the default 90-day limit, even if data retention for the activity is not enabled.

Learn more about using occurs conditions.

Filters without an ‘occurs’ condition

Editing the Entry criteria of an active journey will not re-enter people who still meet the old criteria. Only those who no longer meet the old criteria but meet the new criteria will enter the journey, provided the journey allows multiple entries.

Switching a Journey off and on again will allow people who meet the new entry criteria to re-enter if:

  • The journey allows people to be in the journey more than once, and enter multiple times.
  • Or the journey allows people to be in the journey only once and enter multiple times and they have exited the journey.

Learn more about when not using occurs conditions.

Entry criteria with a recurring time condition

For journey campaigns, entry criteria using a recurring time condition with timezone optimization (sending in the customer's timezone) schedules entries up to 24 hours in advance to ensure that people enter in a timely manner.

As such, changes to the filter made within 24 hours of the scheduled send time may not be applied, and people who matched the old entry criteria may still enter the journey during this period.

Example "Recurring day" filter option with local timezone optimization enabled.

How to re-enter people into a journey

Sometimes, you might need to re enter someone back into a journey campaign after they have already completed it. This could be because you've added new messages for them to receive, automated actions to update their records, or sent notifications related to the journey.