Send audiences to Braze¶
Note
This topic contains information about configuring a destination that sends query results to Braze using orchestrations. To configure a destination that sends audiences to Braze using campaigns see this topic .
Braze is a marketing automation platform that uses customer profile attributes and segments to build custom experiences, and then map those experiences to campaigns. Use the Braze API to send customer profile attributes from Amperity to Braze.
Amperity can send customer profile and custom attributes to Braze, attaching the data that is sent from Amperity to customer profiles that already exist in Braze.
About custom attributes¶
Attributes in Braze describe your customers.
Profile attributes describe who your customers are. For example: names, birthdates, email addresses, and phone numbers.
Custom attributes describe how your customers have interacted with your brand. For example: purchase histories, loyalty status, and value tiers.
When user profile fields and custom attributes are available in Braze they can be used to build out audience segments and to apply personalization to your campaigns.
Customer profiles¶
Customer profiles in Braze are represented by a set of user profile fields . To update these fields in Braze you must follow a strict naming convention when sending data from Amperity. These fields are also case sensitive (and are in lowercase).
What about email and phone subscription status?
Braze uses two fields to track email and phone subscription status: email_subscribe and push_subscribe. The values for these fields are not modified by Amperity even when the fields are sent from Amperity with the correct values. Braze is your source of truth for customer consent and for tracking email and phone subscription status.
An orchestration can send customer profile updates to Braze as the results of a query. For example:
SELECT
amperity_id AS external_id
,given_name AS first_name
,surname AS last_name
,email
,phone
,city AS home_city
,country
,birthdate AS dob
,gender
FROM Customer_360
The following table describes the default user profile fields that are most commonly updated from Amperity:
Braze default field |
Amperity field name |
Description |
|---|---|---|
external_id |
varies |
Required. The external_id is a unique identifer for user profiles in Braze. The external_id is a unique identifier that exists in another system, such as the Amperity ID, a loyalty ID, or some other unique customer identifier. |
first_name |
given_name |
Optional. |
last_name |
surname |
Optional. |
Optional. |
||
phone |
phone |
Optional. |
home_city |
city |
Optional. |
country |
country |
Optional. Must be in ISO 3166-1 alpha-2 format. |
dob |
birthdate |
Optional. Must be in “YYYY-MM-DD” format. |
gender |
gender |
Optional. Accepted values: “M”, “F”, “O” (other), “N” (not applicable), “P” (prefer not to say), or NULL. |
Note
Default user profile fields also exist for alias_name, alias_label, current_location, date_of_first_session, date_of_last_session, email_open_tracking_disabled, email_click_tracking_disabled, facebook, language, marked_email_as_spam_at, push_tokens, subscription_groups, time_zone, and twitter.
These fields are not commonly sent to Braze from Amperity, but if your brand chooses to update these user profile fields from Amperity, be sure to use the exact name of the default field name, send the correct value (or values), and to use lowercase.
Custom attributes¶
Custom attributes in Braze are represented by a set of custom-named fields. The names of these fields are determined by your brand. They may already exist in Braze, in which case you will want to shape the output that is sent from Amperity to align to the names you already have.
The names of custom attributes that can be managed by Amperity are defined by your brand. The names are strings, may contain hyphens, spaces, or underscores, may include numbers, and may contain a mix of lowercase and uppercase letters. For example, custom attribute can have names that:
Already exist within your organization.
Are exactly the same as Amperity standard output, such as “One and Done” or “L12M Monetary” (the “monetary” component of an RFM score), or “Early Repeat Purchaser”.
Align to marketing goals and/or terminology that exists within your brand’s segmentation strategy.
Verify the names of custom attributes that will be sent to Braze from Amperity. Amperity will add a custom attribute whenever there isn’t a matching name.
Tip
Avoid sending custom attributes as duplicates of default user profile fields. For example, birthdates should be sent to Braze as a user profile field named “dob”. If they are sent as “birthday”, “Birthdate”, or any other string, a custom attribute will be created and the values in the “dob” field will not be updated.
Important
Your brand’s list of custom attributes should be a list that is mostly static, remains stable over time, and is focused on your most valuable customers.
Only update custom attributes for customers to which your brand is currently engaged. Define an audience in Amperity that is some combination of “high value” (historical or predicted), “active” (has purchased recently), and are “contactable” (with an opt-in status of true for phone numbers and/or email addresses).
This will help ensure that you are only updating custom attributes for your most valuable customers. Custom attributes will be updated only for those customers have a matching “external_id” or “braze_id” within Braze.
About data points¶
Braze uses data points to determine when to update segment membership, to identify which types of messages should be sent, and how to apply message personalization.
You can send custom attributes to Braze from Amperity by attaching attributes from your customer profiles in Amperity, such as first and last names, email addresses, phone numbers, physical locations, SMS and email consent status, purchase histories, and so on.
Amperity tracks changes as they are sent to Braze and only sends list membership and attribute that have changed since the previous update.
Note
Data points are part of the billing and pricing structure in your Braze contract. Some data points are non-billable; many data points are billable.
Review the lists of non-billable and billable data points , and then review those lists against the attributes you will send to Braze from Amperity to understand which of those attributes are considered billable or non-billable data points.
Important
Connected Content does not write data to user profiles, which means you can use Connected Content to dynamically populate values into messages without consuming data points.
Audience profile updates¶
Profile attributes, such as email, birthdate, address, and phone, contain stable values. Most customers remain at the same address and have the same phone number for years. An individual customer’s birthdate never changes. When customer profile attributes do change your brand will always want to update any downstream audience profiles.
Behavioral attributes, both historical and predicted, are more likely to contain values that change frequently. Behavioral attributes should be carefully evaluated before including them within audience profiles. This will help ensure that updates related to behavioral attributes are adding value to your brand’s downstream business use case(s).
What types of attributes have values that change frequently?
The following types of attributes contain values that change frequently:
Relative date values |
Attributes with relative date values typically contain a rolling value that is updated daily. For example, the Transaction Attributes Extended table contains an attribute named Days Since Latest Order. This is a useful attribute that counts the number of days that have elapsed since an individual customer last placed an order with your brand. Today that value might be “10” and tomorrow, if that customer has not purchased, will be “11”. Using Days Since Latest Order as an attribute within customer profiles ensures that every customer profile associated with a customer who did not purchase during the previous X days will get an updated profile. For relative date values, consider building a custom attribute that converts the ranges into a list of values. For example, you can assign a single value to represent a range of values. Less than 30 days is “green”, less than 90 days is “yellow”, and less than 365 days is “red”. Include the custom attribute to capture the range of days as an indicator instead of the specific relative value. |
High-precision values |
High-precision values are found in attributes that contain floating points, decimals, and percentages. These types of values—1.09413481, 345.47 or .34—often change slightly, but in a way that offers little value to the downstream business use case. For example, predictive attributes are refreshed daily. Predicted CLV during the next 365 days might be $345.37 on one day and $348.75 a few days later. Instead of using predicted CLV in an audience profile, consider using predicted lifecycle status (active, at risk, etc.) or predicted value tier (gold, bronze, etc.), both of which are less likely to change because they represent a range of predicted behaviors instead of a specific predicted value. |
Calculated attribute values |
Many attributes are calculated by Amperity, including all time period rollups. For example, the Transaction Attributes Extended table contains an attribute named L6M Order Revenue. This attribute returns the order revenue for each customer over a rolling 6-month timeframe. This attribute is refreshed on a daily basis and the value is updated each time a customer makes a purchase. Instead of using the time period rollup attributes directly you can build a custom attribute to define thresholds or to return a yes or no. For example, instead of using the specific revenue amount for L6M Order Revenue you could build a custom attribute that returns true when the value for L6M Order Revenue is greater than $500. |
Customer attributes table¶
Build a table that contains all of the attributes in Braze that your brand wants to manage from Amperity. The columns in this table must be correctly mapped to requirements for user profile fields and should contain the list of custom attributes that will be maintained.
To add a Braze customer attributes table
|
Open your customer 360 database and add a table named “Braze Customer Attributes”. Use SQL to define the default user profile fields that are required by Braze: SELECT
mc.amperity_id
,mc.amperity_id AS external_id
,mc.given_name AS first_name
,mc.surname AS last_name
,mc.email
,mc.phone
,mc.city AS home_city
,mc.country
,mc.birthdate AS dob
,mc.gender
FROM Merged_Customers mc
You may include custom attributes that map to other fields in your customer 360. For example, to use transaction attributes as custom attributes in Braze you can extend the table to include fields from the Transaction Attributes Extended table: SELECT
mc.amperity_id
,mc.amperity_id AS external_id
,mc.given_name AS first_name
,mc.surname AS last_name
,mc.email
,mc.phone
,mc.city AS home_city
,mc.country
,mc.birthdate AS dob
,mc.gender
,ta.L30D_purchase_channels
,ta.L30D_order_revenue
,ta.L30D_order_frequency
,ta.L3M_purchase_channels
,ta.L3M_order_revenue
,ta.L3M_order_frequency
,ta.L12M_rfm_score
,ta.L12M_recency
,ta.L12M_frequency
,ta.L12M_monetary
,ta.lifetime_order_revenue
,ta.one_and_done
,ta.multi_purchase_channel
,ta.first_to_second_order_days
,ta.days_since_latest_order
,ta.latest_order_datetime
,ta.early_repeat_purchaser
FROM Merged_Customers mc
LEFT JOIN Transaction_Attributes_Extended ta
ON mc.amperity_id = ta.amperity_id
LEFT JOIN Customer_Attributes ca
ON mc.amperity_id = ca.amperity_id
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Validate the table, and then click Next. Name the table “Braze Customer Attributes”, and then save the table. Verify that the table is accessible to the Segment Editor and to the Edit Attributes editor within campaigns. |
Get details¶
Review the following details before configuring credentials for Braze and before configuring Amperity to send email lists to Braze.
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Credential settings API key
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Required configuration settings Instance
User identifier
Profile updates?
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A list of user profile fields and/or custom attributes that may be sent to Braze from Amperity. |
Configure credentials¶
Configure credentials for Braze before adding a destination.
An individual with access to Braze should use SnapPass to securely share “API key” details with the individual who will configure Amperity.
To configure credentials for Braze
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From the Settings page, select the Credentials tab, and then click the Add credential button. |
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In the Credentials settings dialog box, do the following: From the Plugin dropdown, select Braze. Assign the credential a name and description that ensures other users of Amperity can recognize when to use this destination. |
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The settings that are available for a credential are determined by the credential type. For the “braze” credential type, configure settings, and then click Save. API key
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Add destination¶
Use a sandbox to configure a destination for Braze. Before promoting your changes, send a test audience, and then verify the the results in Braze. After the end-to-end workflow has been verified, push the destination from the sandbox to production.
To add a destination for Braze
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Open the Destinations page, and then click the Add destination button. 
To configure a destination for Braze, do one of the following:
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Select the credential for Braze from the Credential drop-down, and then click Continue. Tip Click the “Test connection” link on the “Configure destination” page to verify that Amperity can connect to Braze. |
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In the “Destination settings” dialog box, assign the destination a name and description that ensures other users of Amperity can recognize when to use this destination. Configure business user access By default a destination is available to all users who have permission to view personally identifiable information (PII). Enable the Admin only checkbox to restrict access to only users assigned to the Datagrid Operator and Datagrid Administrator policies. Enable the PII setting checkbox to allow users with limited access to PII access to this destination. Restricted PII access is enabled when the Restrict PII access policy option that prevents users who are assigned to that option from viewing data that is marked as PII anywhere in Amperity and from sending that data to any downstream workflow. |
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Configure the following settings, and then click “Save”. Instance
User identifier
Profile updates?
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After this destination is configured, users may configure Amperity to:
to Braze. |