Now that you have a list, there are a few technical aspects you should consider before adding contacts. No need to memorize them all right now, but a simple overview of the basics can help you successfully manage your list.
- Every new SmartSender Contact List starts out pretty empty, but our Contact List Import Wizard can help you quickly upload and organize your audience.
- If your SmartSender Contact List already has subscribed contacts, that’s great too. Our auto-update import feature can help you add new people to your Contact List and update the information of current subscribers at the same time.
- You can add contacts manually or import from file.
Before You Start
Here are some things to know before you start:
- These instructions are for adding subscribed contacts to your list. Make sure you have the names and email addresses of people who have opted in to receive your email marketing.
- Make sure you’ve set up your SmartSender Email List.
- The only field SmartSender requires is email address. Other fields are optional, but may be necessary for personalization, segmentation or other features.
- Date type of list fields requires a specific format to import and work correctly.
- IMPORTANT: You’ll need a blank sheet in a spreadsheet software, such as Microsoft Excel or Google Sheets, saved or exported as a Comma Separated Value (CSV) File.
- Need some help saving your spreadsheet file in CSV format before you import? Check out these CSV tips from Excel and Sheets. Or, download our sample CSV import file and replace the sample emails with your own data.
Definitions
| Term | Description |
|---|---|
| Contact List | Your Contact List should be your total collection of contacts, so you should only need one overall Contact List. If you still choose to create multiple Contact Lists, be aware that Contact Lists are independent of each other. They don’t share data or contact information. For example, if freddie@address.com is in two of your Contact Lists, we count that as two people. It’s almost always better to have a single Contact List, and use our Contact List organization tools to separate and manage contacts. |
| Segments | A segment is a filter, or query, that you can apply in your account to sort your contacts based on the data we have about them. You can filter your contacts based on things like location, tag data, group membership, signup source, campaign activity, behavior and more. |
| Variables | Also known as list fields, variables keep your contacts’ basic information. Variables are a lot like cells in a spreadsheet. They store emails, names, birthdays, group preferences, addresses, or other information. You can use Variables to pull the list field information into email campaigns, like placing a first name in a greeting. |
Add contact manually
This form lets you create or update the given contact.
- If the email address/phone number/user ID, which you provide in this form matches someone that already exists in your Contact List, his/her attributes will be updated to reflect those ones provided in this form.
- In case there is no user with those attributes, a new profile will be created.
Step-by-step instructions:
- Select Contact List domain from the drop down menu (in the upper right corner) if there are several domains in the account.
- Navigate to Contact List Management page (Menu -> Contacts -> Lists).
- Select a Contact List
- Click on the “Add Contacts” icon
- Select the “Add contact manually” tab
- Fill in all input fields with valid data
- Click the “Add contact” button.
Prepare import file
| Import file header | Description and format requirements. |
|---|---|
| name | The optional display name to use for the recipient |
| The new email address of the recipient. You must include an email address column in your import file, and only one email for each contact. Review this column for anything that might cause syntax errors, like missing information, unsupported characters, and extra spaces before or after an address. | |
| phoneNumber | Addressee phone number. Should be valid E.164 phone number. |
| userId | The user ID from customer’s platform to be able to manipulate lists based on it. Used as an alliance for the email address. |
| emailSubscribe | Used to specify if user is subscribed or unsubscribed to the Email Channel. Use value “1” to subscribe a user and value “0” to unsubscribe it. |
| smsSubscribe | Used to specify whether the user is subscribed or unsubscribed to the SMS Channel. Use value “1” to subscribe auser and value “0” to unsubscribe it. |
| desktopWebPushSubscribe | Used to specify whether the user is subscribed or unsubscribed to the desktop Web Push Channel. Use value “1” to subscribe a user and value “0” to unsubscribe it. |
| mobileWebPushSubscribe | Used to specify whether the user is subscribed or unsubscribed to the mobile Web Push Channel. Use value “1” to subscribe a user and value “0” to unsubscribe it. |
| active | Used to specify whether the user is subscribed or unsubscribed from the list. If the user is unsubscribed from the list, no communication will be sent to his/her contact regardless of the status of separate channels. Use value “1” to subscribe a user and value “0” to unsubscribe it. |
| customStringVariable | For a Variable, use only Latin in lowerCamelCase format, no numbers or other symbols are allowed. For a value no specific format is required. |
| customDateVariable | For Variable, use only Latin in lowerCamelCase format, no numbers or other symbols are allowed. For a value, the ISO Standard year-month-date format (YYYY-MM-DD) is required. |
Step-by-step instructions:
- Select the Email List domain from the drop down menu (in the upper right corner) if there are several domains in the account.
- Navigate to Contact List Management page (Menu -> Contacts -> Lists).
- Select a Contact List
- Click the “Add Contacts” icon
- Browse your import file to upload.
- IMPORTANT: If you tick the “Subscribe contacts to scenarios” checkbox, all your imported contacts will be subscribed to the active scenarios.
- Click the “Import” button
- Use selector to map format of your custom Variables when adding first time (select if Variable string or date format)
- IMPORTANT: If you remove checkbox “Ignore empty cells during the import“, we will remove data from variables with empty cells.
- Click “Save” button
- For large files it will take some time to get imported and the Contact List updated, You can watch the loading process on your screen. Please wait till the end of the file validation and then you may leave the page. We will take care of your contacts from that point.