How to set up a campaign Targeting

The Targeting step will allow you to define the conditions in which your campaign will be displayed. 

In this how-top article, you will learn how to define:

• Who: The SEGMENT who should or shouldn’t see the campaign
• Where: On which PAGES of your website the campaign should be visible
• How: The browsing and contextual conditions that need to be met to TRIGGER the campaign
• When: The FREQUENCY at which the campaign will be displayed to the targeted segment
• Specific options: Replicate targeting and Add to targeting

The Targeting step

Targeting is a step inside the campaign creation flow. You have several options to access it. 

• When you create a campaign from scratch, this is the 2nd step for Personalizations and the 4th step for Tests. 
• From the Campaign dashboard, when clicking the pen icon for each campaign, and choosing “targeting” from the list 

Step 1: WHO - the Segment

A segment is a cluster of users/ visitors who share specific persistent traits though sessions. 

The segment enables the campaign to be displayed to the configured visitor segment only when the conditions are met.

Segments are mostly based on current and former sessions conditions and behaviors.

You want to choose between displaying the campaign:

• to all your visitors
• to a specific segment you've already created in the past and which is available in the list
• to a new segment you can create by clicking on Create new segment (see the article How to create a segment)

The segment applies differently regarding the type of campaign:

• Tests: it applies to your whole AB Test, meaning the original variation (V0) and all the variations (V1, V2, and V3 for an A/B/C/D test, for example)
• Personalizations: it applies to the selected scenario for the personalization campaigns. Use the dropdown to navigate between scenarios and choose the right segment for each of them
• Patches: the option is not available, "all visitors" is selected by default

To learn more about the way the tag detects the segment and triggers the campaign, please refer to the specific articles about criteria.

Single-page Experiences vs. Multipage Experiences

• For A/B Tests, Simple Personalizations, and Patches, you’ll have to define your "Who section" once for your campaign, because these types of campaigns have only one “experience” (one type of new content generated with AB Tasty to display).
• For Multipage Tests, Multivariate Tests, and Multipage Personalizations, you’ll have to define your "Who section" several times for your campaign, for each page. But we encourage to use exactly the same segment to ensure the continuity and visibility of all experiences during the visitors’ navigation.
• For Multi-experience Personalizations, you’ll have to define your "Who section" several times for your campaign, for each experience. You'll have to choose different segments for each experience, because this is the objective of this kind of campaign.

❗️In any case: Don’t forget to use the dropdown menu on the Targeting page to switch between experiences and set up your segment for every experience

We also offer a “Replicate” option, which allows you to replicate the full targeting setup or one part of the targeting setup of one experience in another experience, or in all experiences.

For more information refer to this section and this specific article. 

Managing your saved segments

If you want to edit, duplicate or delete an existing segment, you can do so directly from the dropdown menu: 

Click on the pen icon and you will open the Segment Builder. You can then modify the name of your segment and/or its configuration. Click Save to record your changes.

📎  Note: If your segment is already used in a live campaign or is live in QA, you won’t be able to save your modifications. In this specific case, you’ll get a yellow disclaimer with the details of the campaign(s) that is (are) using the segment and that is (are) currently live or live in QA.

In this case, you can: 

• • Pause the ongoing campaign(s) to edit the segment: you can edit and save it 
    
  • Duplicate the segment to have a new one with the same configuration
    

❗️Important: You can’t delete a segment that is already used in a live campaign or is live in a QA campaign. You need to pause the campaign(s) that use(s) the segment to be able to delete the segment from your account.

Step 2: WHERE - the Pages

How it works

Configuring the targeted pages of your website means specifying the page(s) for which the changes made via the visual editor/ code editor will be seen by your visitors. This configuration is made inside the targeting interface, on the same page as the segment configuration, in the “where” section. 

The targeted pages set-up applies differently regarding the type of campaign:

• AB Tests: it applies to your whole AB Test, meaning the original variation (V0) and all the variations (V1, V2, and V3 for an A/B/C/D test, for example) for a test
• Multipages tests and Multipages patches: it applies to the selected sub-test. Use the dropdown to navigate between sub-tests and choose the right pages for each of them
• Personalizations: it applies to the selected scenario for the personalization campaigns. Use the dropdown to navigate between scenarios and choose the right pages for each of them
• Patches: only one scenario and a 100% allocation traffic, no specific rule
• AA Tests: only one scenario and a 100% allocation traffic, no specific rule

Single-page Experiences vs. Multipage Experiences

• For A/B Tests, Simple Personalizations, and Patches, you’ll have to define one single targeted page rule for your campaign because these types of campaigns have only one “experience” (one type of new content generated with AB Tasty to display).
• For Multipage Tests, Multivariate Tests, Multipage Personalizations, and Multi-experience Personalizations, you’ll have to define a targeted pages rule for each “experience” or "sub-test". This rule can be the same or different depending on your needs. 

Best practices

• Use different targeted pages for Multipage Tests and Multipage Personalizations. This is the objective of these kinds of campaigns: displaying several different messages (the experiences, to create a relevant and complete user journey) on several different targeted pages.
  
• Use the same targeted pages for Multivariate tests if you’re testing a combination of several changes on the same page and try to discover the better combination (color of the CTA, small style banner, new product carousel on a product page)
  
• Use the same targeted pages for Multiexperience Personalizations: this kind of campaign has been designed to help you to launch several messages to different segments in the same campaign and to assure no overlap between messages. To learn more about them, please refer to this article

❗️In any case: Don’t forget to use the dropdown menu on the Targeting page to switch between experiences to set up your targeted pages in every experience.

We also offer a “Replicate” option, which allows you to replicate the full targeting setup or one part of the targeting setup of one experience in another experience, or in all experiences.

For more information refer to this section and this specific article. 

Configuration of the targeted pages

When you land on the page, you’ll find the following set-up: 

• The operator "is" selected by default
  
• The URL you’ve used in Step 1 Main Information page to load the Visual Editor which is pre-pasted in the URL field
• Additional options:
  • Add condition 
  • CSS selector option
  • Code option
  • target by event option checkbox

❗️Be careful: the URL field is case sensitive (i.e. a targeting 'contains' 'CHECKOUT' will not affect visitors on a URL like 'https://abtasty.com/checkout/' to the campaign).

Using operators to target the right URL(s)

The dropdown will present you with several options, in this order:

• Inclusive operators: is, is exactly, contains, is regular expression, and is saved page
  
• Exclusive operators: is not, is not exactly, does not contain, is not regular expression, and is not saved page
  
• Target All URLs: it will target your campaign on all your website pages where the AB Tasty generic tag has been installed.

Caution: If you have several sub-domains for all of the languages or countries you’re addressing, your campaign will be displayed on all of them. Use this option with caution, if you are sure that your campaign should be targeted on 100% of the pages of your domain. For more information about the way you've set-up your account regarding domains, please refer to this article.

Details about inclusive and exclusive operators

This is the matrix about the way the operators work: 

To learn how to manipulate operators to build the correct pages targeting, please refer to this complete article. 

Using saved pages

From the dropdown, you can access the list of the saved pages you’ve previously set up in the page builder. For that, you just have to select the following operator: 

• Is saved Page 
  
• Is not saved Page 
  

You can access the page builder by clicking on “Manage Saved Pages”.

Please refer to this article for more information. 

Useful tip: You can see the content of the setup of your saved pages by hovering over them: 

You can directly click on the saved page you want to include/exclude by using the dedicated “is saved page” option in the previous dropdown. 

You can mix the inclusion of saved pages with the exclusion of saved pages by clicking on “Add Condition”. 

You can also mix saved pages with custom URLs. 

In any case, the functional rules between inclusions and exclusions are the same for the setup by URLs: 

• Inclusion(s) only: If you include one or several specific URL(s) and saved pages, all the other URLs will automatically be excluded from the targeting. At least one of them has to match.
• Exclusion(s) only: If you exclude one or several specific URL(s) and saved pages, all the other URLs will automatically be included in your targeting configuration.
• Combination of inclusions and exclusions: You can combine inclusive rules with exclusive rules. In this case, to be accepted in the targeting, a website’s URL has to match:
  • All the exclusion rules
  • At least one of the inclusion rules

Using the CSS selector option

Use the CSS selector option if you want to display changes on the pages of your website containing an element linked to a specific ID or class, whose presence cannot be determined by a URL. It is useful for targeting a set of pages that don't share a specific URL structure. 

You can choose between the ID of your element, the CSS class, or any other parameters (custom choice in the dropdown). If the element you want to declare exists on the page you’ve loaded in the editor, it will appear while beginning to fill in the field by auto-completion.

❗️Caution: Don’t forget to add a ‘.’ for a class or a “#’ for an ID. 

This option is compatible with other options in the section, except for the Target All URLs option.

The option "My element appears after page load" is useful if you element is loaded after the page load (dynamic element such as a popin for exanple).

Important ⚡️: When you use this option with targeted URLs, the operator between both options will be AND.  Meaning that the targeted pages will have to respect both rules in the targeted URLs section and the class option section. 

For more information on this option, refer to ID/Class/Element option.

Using code option

The code-based option enables you to insert JavaScript code to trigger a campaign depending on the presence of a specific JS instruction.
This option is compatible with other options in the section, except for the Target All URLs option.

When using this option, you must comply with the following rules:

• Do not use a function (){ at the beginning of your code.
• The function/condition you code must return a true or false value.
• If you plan to use jQuery, you must enable the use of jQuery in Settings. In this case, go to Account Management → Framework and select Load AB Tasty’s jQuery.

For more information on this option, refer to Using the code-based option.

Triggering your whole campaign by event

In some instances, you might want to launch a test after a user completes a certain action on your site, for example, after they have clicked a certain button, or after they have spent a certain length of time on a given page.
You can condition a test in this way using the JavaScript function ABTastyStartTest. This function takes a single, unique parameter: the ID of the test you would like to launch. It must be called after the AB Tasty tag.
The function takes the following form:

ABTastyStartTest(testID); // 

Where testID is the ID of the campaign to be launched.

This function must be called as soon as each visitor has completed the action on which the test is performed. Note: the tested page must be the page on which the action takes place (you cannot test modifications on another page).

To create a test conditioned on an event, you must:

• Create a standard campaign, applying your desired modifications
  
• Tick the checkbox “Target by Event” in the targeting options window, in the same box as the URL targeting options. Note that other targeting options will no longer be available
  

• Set up the rest of your campaign as usual
• Launch your campaign
  
• Call the function ABTastyStartTest directly from your application whenever the event occurs.
• For example, if you would like test 12345 (set up in advance) to be triggered by a click on a button, you can do this in the following way:

<button onclick='ABTastyStartTest(12345)'>Launch a test from this button</button>

You can use any other method which links this function to an event. For example, you could use jQuery, or a callback function might be used if your site uses AJAX.

ATTENTION! When you use this function the tag does not check the targeting, including the QA parameters. Take extra care when pushing a campaign that is using an event-based targeting into production.

Step 3: HOW - the Trigger

A trigger is a temporary user condition that enables you to display the campaign in a specific context.

The trigger enables the campaign to be displayed to the configured visitor segment only when the conditions are met.

Triggers are mostly based on current session conditions and behaviors.

You can choose between displaying the campaign:

• Anytime: no trigger is defined and the campaign will display in all cases, without any specific conditions
• Following the rules of an existing saved trigger you have already created
  
• Following new rules of a new saved trigger you can create by clicking on Create new trigger (see the article How to create a trigger)

The trigger applies differently regarding the type of campaign:

• Tests: it applies to your whole AB Test, meaning the original variation (V0) and all the variations (V1, V2, and V3 for an A/B/C/D test, for example)
• Personalizations: it applies to the selected scenario for the personalization campaigns. Use the dropdown to navigate between scenarios and choose the right segment for each of them
• Patches: the option is not available, "all visitors" is selected by default

To learn more about the way the tag detects the trigger and triggers the campaign, please refer to the specific articles about criteria.

Single-page Experiences vs. Multipage Experiences

• For A/B Tests, Simple Personalizations, and Patches, you’ll have to define your "How section" once for your campaign, because these types of campaigns have only one “experience” (one type of new content generated with AB Tasty to display).
• For Multipage Tests, Multivariate Tests, and Multipage Personalizations, you’ll have to define your "How section" several times for your campaign, for each page. You can use different triggers to build a unique and consistent experience during the visitors’ navigation.
• For Multi-experience Personalizations, you’ll have to define your "How section" several times for your campaign, for each experience. But we recommend to choose exactly the same trigger conditions for each experience, the only objective of this kind of campaign is to display different messages to different segments and avoir messages overlap.

❗️In any case: Don’t forget to use the dropdown menu on the Targeting page to switch between experiences and set up your segment for every experience

⭐️ Best practices : 

• Use the same trigger on all experiences when this trigger is linked to your visitor’s current situation (e.g. geolocation criteria, device criteria, etc.)
• Use a different trigger on all experiences when the trigger is linked to a contextual behavior.
  e.g. Experience 1 is a pop-in that will be triggered after 5 viewed pages to promote sales (trigger = minimum viewed pages), Experience 2 is a banner in the basket (no specific trigger)

We also offer a “Replicate” option, which allows you to replicate the full targeting setup or one part of the targeting setup of one experience in another experience, or in all experiences.

For more information refer to this section and this specific article. 

Managing your saved triggers

If you want to edit, duplicate or delete an existing trigger, you can do it directly from the dropdown menu: 

Click on the pen icon and you will open the Trigger Builder. You can then modify the name of your trigger and/or its configuration. Click on Save to record your changes.

📎  Note: If your trigger is already used in a live campaign or is live in QA, you won’t be able to save your modifications. In this specific case, you’ll get a yellow disclaimer with the details of the campaign(s) that is (are) using the trigger and that is (are) currently live or live in QA. 

In this case, you can: 

• • Modify the configuration and use the new trigger in this campaign only (CTA Use Without Saving). The new trigger will be used for this campaign only, and you’ll find it at the top of the list in the dropdown. If you edit it again, you’ll be able to give it a new name and save it as a new saved trigger
  • Go back to the previous dropdown and duplicate it before editing 
  • Pause your campaigns first before editing and saving it
  • By clicking on the trash icon, a prevention pop-in will ask you if you’re sure you want to delete the selected trigger.

Click Delete to delete, or click Cancel to return to the previous screen. 

By clicking on Duplicate, the selected trigger will be duplicated and will appear just after the selected one in your dropdown list

❗️Important: You can’t delete a trigger that is already used in a live campaign or is live in a QA campaign. You need to pause the campaign(s) that use(s) the trigger to be able to delete the trigger from your account.

Step 4: WHEN - the Frequency

In this section, you will learn how the AB Tasty tag interacts with your website to apply the Display Frequency defined for a campaign.

When a page loads, the AB Tasty Tag verifies the targeting conditions that you configured inside this targeting step. The 'When' section adds new timing conditions on top of what you previously configured (URL of the page, specific page elements, triggers, and segments).
The Frequency condition is set on the unique visitor level (cookie). They will be affected to the campaign only if they meet ALL the targeting conditions.

By default, the visitor will be affected  "anytime" if they meet the other conditions (segments/pages/triggers aka who/where/how).

To determine at which Frequency the visitor will be targeted, follow the steps below:

1. Open the When will the campaign be displayed section and select one of the following Frequency options:
   - Anytime (default option): for the visitor to be targeted each time they land on the page and respect other targeting conditions. 
   - Once: for the visitor to be targeted only once if they land on the page and respect the other targeting conditions.
   - Once per session: for the visitor to be targeted only once per session if they land on the page and respect the other targeting conditions.
   - At regular intervals: for the visitor to be targeted at specific regular interval. Intervals should then be configured (see below)
2. Click Save step. 

Be careful! The Targeting Frequency option is a targeting condition allowing you to add a temporal condition of targeting upon unique visitors. The frequency is based on the ABTasty cookie value. Learn more about it in our developer documentation.
In this sense :
- It differs from the widgets recurrence setup as it is not a display condition but a targeting acceptance condition affecting individually unique visitors.
- It also differs from the Scheduler as the Frequency options are only a targeting condition not affecting the campaign status (live/pause), the latter impacting all visitors without discrimination.

Focus on the Regular Intervals configuration:

This option allows you to target your visitors on a specified timeframe. It's really useful to be able to promptly send specific messages to your visitors, and have confidence around the visibility of this message.

To configure the regular intervals of the campaign's targeting, follow the steps below: 

1. Open the When will the campaign be displayed block and select the At regular intervals option in the "The targeted segment will see the test" list. 
2. Determine the regular intervals of the campaign's targeting using the Day, Week, or Session option, combined with the numerical selector.   
3. Click Save step.

Please note that the At regular intervals option is to affect your visitors to the campaign not once but during the entire day or week or session!

Other example, if you want to display a message targeting all your URLs (or a wide ‘contains’) and having as frequency option ‘every 2 sessions’, the message will not only appear once on one page during the ongoing session as you may expect. Instead, the user will be affected on every targeted page ('Where' section) during the ongoing session.

The same goes for 'every x days' and 'every x weeks' conditions. If you want to display the modifications made only one time per session, please use the frequency options 'Once per session'. Meaning that if I choose each 3 days, I will see the campaign on the day 1 whatever the session or the number of time I see the campaign during the day, same on the day 4, then on the day 7 etc…

You can find more details on this targeting condition's QA here.

7. Specific options

Replicate targeting option

The Replicate Targeting option enables you to copy the targeting configuration of a sub-test (for a Multivariate Test), a page (for a Multipage Test or a Multipage Personalization), or an experience (for a Multi-experience Personalization) and to paste it into another sub-test(s) or scenario(s).

This option is available in the targeting step and can be useful for Personalizations with multiple scenarios, or Multipage Tests and Multivariate Tests with multiple sub-tests. 

It saves you from having to configure targeting independently for each scenario and each sub-test and saves you time.

To use the Replicate Targeting option, you must first configure targeting for at least one sub-test/page/experience. It can be any sub-test/page/experience.

For more information about how to use the replicate targeting option please refer to this article. 

Add to targeting

With the idea in mind to constantly improve the user experience, AB Tasty now offers an option that will help you set up your campaign more efficiently. You can now choose a specific element within the WYSIWYG/contextual editor, and directly use it in the targeting step of the campaign setup.

⚙️ Configuration

Using the WYSIWYG/Visual Editor

AB Tasty's WYSIWYG/Visual editor enables you to design and create your own user experiences using AB Tasty widgets, your custom widgets, or the WYSIWYG interface and its contextual menus.

As you are in the Editor step, you can use the contextual menu of the editor to directly set a page element as a “where” condition, avoiding back-and-forth between both campaign steps.

To do so, in the Editor step, select the page element to be set as the “where” condition and click the Add to targeting option to send your element’s URL and CSS selector to the Where section of the Targeting step. 

As soon as you click the Add to targeting option, the element configuration will automatically be sent and saved in the Targeting step as a CSS selector condition.

A window will appear, allowing you to do one of the following: 

• Continue editing your variation(s).
  You will then still be able to review your targeting configuration later on, in the Targeting step. 
• Go to the Targeting step page and start reviewing it.

Good to know 💡

Depending on the type of campaign you are setting up (test or personalization campaign), the Editor step will come before or after the Targeting step. 
When configuring a personalization campaign, you start with the Targeting step to define precisely the audience you would like to target. In this case, if you configure the "Where"section first and then use the Add to targeting option in the editor, you will erase your previous configuration and replace it with the newly created one. A window will appear asking you to do so. If you accept, you will need to go back to the Targeting step to review the new configuration.

⚙️To the Targeting Step

As you are in the Targeting step, you will be able to retrieve the information you have sent and saved from the editor through the Add to targeting option. The Where section is unfolded to let you review these two newly added configuration elements (URL and CSS selector).

Two elements are configured:

• The URL: you should retrieve the URL that was previously declared in the Main Information step (and that you worked with in the editor). If you want to change it, then you will need to enter another URL in the dedicated field and save the Targeting step by clicking Save step. 
• The CSS selector of the element that has been selected in the editor.