Using Trial Messages

You can use trial messages to help you fine tune the content of your main message so that it is as successful as possible. To do this, you'll send trial messages to a small group of randomly selected customers in a segment or segmentation model (or audience model if you've not associated a segmentation model for the campaign). You'll then use the information you gain from these trials to create the main message that you'll send to the remaining target customers in your selected customer group.

Trial messages are available for all one-time campaigns, but are not available for recurring or externally triggered campaigns.

On the Trial Message Details page, you can define the size of the group that the system randomly selects for a trial message. You can arrange for it to select either a percentage of the segment, segmentation model, or audience model associated with the message or a specific number of customers.

Additional facts about trial messages:

If a customer receives a trial message from a campaign, that customer will automatically be excluded from receiving any additional trial messages or main messages for the duration of the campaign.
You can create multiple trial messages for one main message, but the customer set for any single trial message cannot exceed 100% of the target customers in an audience or segment.
After you have rolled out a main message for a particular segment, you will not be able to send new trial messages for that segment.
If you have rolled out a main message for all segments (in other words, the entire campaign audience), you cannot create another trial message for any customers in those segments.

You can send trial messages all at once or one after the other to determine the most effective message content. To do this, go through the process of defining a new trial message and associate it with the same segment or a different one. If you use the same segment for multiple trial messages, keep in mind that once a trial message is sent to a customer, that customer will not receive another message from the campaign you're working with. You'll want to keep your customer set for each trial message small so you don't end up sending trial messages to the majority of customers in the segment.

You can edit and delete existing trial messages up until they are launched. For more information see Editing and Deleting Existing Messages.