Utilizing the Audiences feature requires several steps to create and send audiences to downstream systems, e.g. Facebook, Yahoo!, Google Analytics, Nielsen. This article describes those steps conceptually so that you have a good understanding of how and what data is available for defining attributes, how to utilize the attributes to create audiences, and how to select the audiences to send to the downstream systems.
Creating an audience workflow consists of the following steps:
- Creating and defining a Data Layer
- Creating Attribute Builder apps
- Creating Audience Builder apps
- Creating Audience Sync apps
Creating and defining a Data Layer
Creating a Data Layer
A data layer is a foundation where users define the building blocks that can be used to create attributes. At its simplest, the creation of a data layer consists of selecting the data sets that are needed to design attributes.
Typically an organization will only need a single data layer, but additional data layers can be created for each brand/customer-facing identity that has separate data set inputs and/or needs the resulting attributes and audiences to be separated. Syntasa staff will work with you to design and create the data layer(s).
It is important to note that a single attribute result table and a single audience result table are created per data layer. When there are multiple attribute apps on top of the same data layer all the apps will write their results to the shared attribute result table for the data layer; the same is true for multiple audience apps created within the same data layer.
Creating Attribute Builder apps
Creating an Attribute Builder app
Building a set of attributes is creating the ingredients that will then be used to later form the audiences. These ingredients are designed, based on user-provided rules, within one or more attribute builder apps. An attribute builder app uses a specialized app template that lets users select one or more data sets that were defined in the data layer.
When creating any app throughout the application there is a concept of development and production sections within the app. The development section of an app is where users will design, test, and tweak their app before activating into production. The production section is where the app will be scheduled to process data on a regular basis.
To create a set of attributes, an attribute builder app is created, rules defined, and the app is tested within the development section of the app. The attribute results created here are only available and affecting the development version of the attribute results table.
Activating the Attribute Builder app
Once an attribute builder app has been created and tested, the app needs to be activated. Activating an app will create or update the app from its current state in development into the production section of the app.
Once in production, the app will be scheduled to run on a regular basis and produce attribute results in the production version of the attributes results table.
Further updates or additions to the app and attribute rules/conditions must be done within the development section of the app and then activated as an update to the production version of the app.
Creating Audience Builder apps
Creating an Audience Builder app
Now that we have attributes in production, we are ready to build audiences. Creating an audience builder app is similar to building an attribute builder app, but we are now utilizing the production attributes created in the previous step as the input into the rules of an audience.
To create a set of audiences, an audience builder app is created, rules defined, and the app is tested within the development section of the app. The audience results created here are only available and affecting the development version of the audience results table.
Activating the Audience Builder app
Once an audience builder app has been created and tested, the app needs to be activated. Activating an app will create or update the app from its current state in development into the production section of the app.
Once in production, the app will be scheduled to run on a regular basis and produce audience results in the production version of the audience results table.
Further updates or additions to the app and audience rules/conditions must be done within the development section of the app and then activated as an update to the production version of the app.
Creating Audience Sync apps
Creating an Audience Sync app
Now that we have audiences in production, we are ready to select the audiences to be sent to downstream systems. Creating an audience sync app is similar to building the other apps, but we are now utilizing the production audiences created in the previous step as the input into the audience sync app.
To select the list of audiences that will be sent to the downstream systems, an audience sync app is created, production audiences selected, and the app is tested within the development section of the app. The audiences selected here are only available and affecting the development version of the selected audience results table.
Activating the Audience Sync app
Once an audience sync app has been created and tested, the app needs to be activated. Activating an app will create or update the app from its current state in development into the production section of the app.
Once in production, the app will be scheduled to run on a regular basis and produce a list of the user-selected audiences from the production version of the audience results table.
Further updates or additions to the app and audience selections must be done within the development section of the app and then activated as an update to the production version of the app.
Integrating audiences downstream
The downstream system integration piece of the workflow is configured by Syntasa staff. This is implemented via a process within the audience sync app that users will see but unnecessary for users to configure.
At this time it is necessary to create one audience sync app per downstream system integration. Each audience sync app will have its own list of selected audiences that will be sent to the particular downstream system the app is configured to send to.
Audience Sync with multiple Data Layers
If multiple data layers have been created because your organization has several brand/customer-facing identities, you may still want to send the selected audiences to the downstream systems only, for example, once a day, across all data layers.
For this reason, unlike attribute and audience builder apps that are tied to a single data layer, the audience sync app can be built from multiple data layers. So you may set up an audience workflow like below with, for example, two data layers, each with their own attributes and audiences, and a single audience sync app per downstream system, each integrating with its selected downstream system, but drawing audiences from both data layers.
