Set up and manage the approval process approval-marketing-campaigns
Methods and people involved in creating and approving marketing campaigns are specific to each organization. The campaign approval process involves coordinating multiple stakeholders: digital marketers, delivery managers, content managers, and external owners such as partners or suppliers.
With ÃÛ¶¹ÊÓƵ Campaign, you can set up an approval flow for your campaigns and notify operators when an action is required. You can define approvals for each steps of a delivery: targeting, content, budget, extraction, and proof sending. As your campaign deliveries move through the various validation steps, ÃÛ¶¹ÊÓƵ Campaigns compiles an history of modifications and sign-offs, including feedback, comments, change requests, and comments.
Notification messages are sent to the ÃÛ¶¹ÊÓƵ Campaign operators who are designated as reviewers to inform them of an approval request.
Operators can approve in several ways:
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From the notification message. The link in the email gets the operator to Campaign through a web browser. After connecting, the reviewer can choose to approve the content or not.
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From the campaign dashboard.
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From the delivery dashboard.
Operators can access the campaign and the delivery from the approval window. They can also enter a comment.
Once an operator validates, the information is displayed in the campaign and delivery dashboards, and in the logs.
The information is also available in the approval logs of the delivery, and in the approval journal of the campaign. These logs are accessed via the Edit > Audit > Approvals tabs.
Enable approvals enable-approvals
Approval notifications are sent to the operators affected to each process for which approval was enabled.
They can be enabled for the campaign template, for each campaign individually, or for a delivery.
All jobs requiring approval are selected in the campaign template, through the Properties > Advanced campaign parameters… > Approvals tab. Reviewers or groups of reviewers are selected from this tab. They receive notifications, unless this option is not enabled. Learn more.
These settings can be overridden for each campaign created using this template, and individually for each delivery. Browse the Properties button of the delivery, then the Approvals tab.
In the following example, the delivery content will not require approvals:
The approval process for deliveries is detailed in this section.
Select reviewers select-reviewers
For each type of approval, the operators or operator groups in charge of approval are selected from the drop-down list in the delivery. More operators can be added using the ·¡»å¾±³Ù… link. This window also lets you edit the approval deadline. By default, reviewers have three days starting from the submission date to approve a process. To add an automatic reminder, use the Add a reminder link.
If no reviewer is specified, the campaign owner is responsible for approvals and receives the notifications. The campaign owner is specified in the Edit > Properties tab of the campaign:
All other ÃÛ¶¹ÊÓƵ Campaign operators with Administrator rights can also approve jobs, but they do not receive notifications.
If a list of reviewers is defined, a job is approved when one reviewer has approved it. The approval link is then no longer available in the campaign and delivery dashboards. When the sending of notifications is enabled, if another reviewer clicks the approval link in the notification message, they are notified that another operator has already approved the job.
Review and approve deliveries review-and-approve-deliveries
For each campaign you can approve the delivery target, delivery content and costs. ÃÛ¶¹ÊÓƵ Campaign operators in charge of approval can be notified by email and can accept or reject approval from the client console or via a web browser. Learn more.
For direct mail deliveries, ÃÛ¶¹ÊÓƵ Campaign operators can view the extraction file before it is sent to the router, and if necessary they can change the format and re-launch extraction. Learn more.
When these validation phases are complete, the delivery can be launched. Learn more.
Steps to approve a delivery approving-processes
The steps requiring approval appear on the campaign dashboard (via the client console or a web browser). They also appear in the delivery tracking table and on the delivery dashboard.
For each delivery in the campaign, you can approve the following processes:
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Targeting, content and budget
When the Enable target approval, Enable content approval or Enable budget approval options are selected in the approval settings window, the related links are shown in the campaign and delivery dashboards.
note note NOTE Budget approval is only available if target approval is enabled in the approval settings window. The link for budget approval is only displayed once the target has been analyzed. If the Assign content editing or External content approval options are selected in the approval settings window, the dashboard will show the Available content and External content approval links.
Content approval lets you access the proofs sent.
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Extraction approval (direct mail delivery)
When Enable extraction approval is selected in the approval settings window, the extracted file must be approved before the router can be notified.
The Approve file option is available on the campaign and delivery dashboards.
You can preview the output file before validation. The extraction file preview shows a data sample only. The entire file is not loaded.
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Approving associated deliveries
The Enable individual approval of each associated delivery option is used for one primary delivery associated with secondary deliveries. By default, this option is not selected so that an overall approval of the main delivery can be performed. If this option is selected, each delivery must be approved individually.
Approve a content approve-content
It is possible to configure a content approval cycle. To do this, select the Enable content approval option in the approval settings window. The main steps of the content approval cycle are:
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After creating a new delivery, the campaign manager clicks the Submit content link on the campaign dashboard to start the content approval cycle.
note note NOTE If the Enable the sending of proofs option (for email deliveries) or Enable the sending and approval of proofs (for direct mail deliveries) options were selected in the approval settings window, proofs will be sent automatically. -
A notification email is sent to the person responsible for content, who can choose whether to approve it or not:
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via the notification email: the notification email contains a link to the proofs already sent, and possibly to a rendering of the message for the various webmails if the Deliverability add-on is enabled for this instance.
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via the client console or a web browser, delivery tracking, the delivery dashboard or the campaign dashboard. This campaign dashboard lets you view the list of proofs that have been sent, by clicking the Inbox rendering… link. To view their content, click the Detail icon to the right of the list.
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A notification email is sent to the person responsible for the campaign informing them of whether the content has been approved or not. The person responsible for the campaign can re-start the content approval cycle at any time. To do this, click the link on the Content status line of the campaign dashboard (at delivery level), then click Reset content approval to submit it again.
Assign content editing assign-content-editing
This option lets you define someone in charge of content editing, such as a webmaster. If the Assign content editing option is selected in the approval settings window, several approval steps are added between delivery creation and delivery of the notification email to the person in charge of content:
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After creating a new delivery, the person responsible for the campaign clicks the Submit content editing link in the campaign dashboard to start the content editing cycle.
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The person responsible for content editing will receive an email telling them that the content is available.
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They can then log on to the client console, open the delivery and edit it using a simplified wizard to change the subject, HTML and text content, and send proofs.
note note NOTE If the Enable the sending of proofs option (for email deliveries) or Enable the sending and approval of proofs (for direct mail deliveries) options were selected in the approval settings window, proofs will be sent automatically. -
Once the person in charge of content editing has finished making any changes to the delivery content, they can make the content available.
To do this, they can use:
- the Available content link in the ÃÛ¶¹ÊÓƵ Campaign client console.
- the link in the notification message.
The operator can add a comment before submitting the content to the person in charge of the campaign.
The notification message lets the reviewer approve or reject the content.
External content approval external-content-approval
This option lets you define an external operator in charge of approving delivery rendering, such as brand communication consistency, rates, etc. When the External content approval option is selected in the approval settings window, several approval steps are added between content approval and the delivery of the notification to the person in charge of the campaign:
- The external content manager receives a notification email telling them that the content has been approved and requesting external approval.
- The notification email contains links to the proofs sent, which lets you view delivery rendering, and a button for approving or rejecting the delivery content.
These links are only available if one or more proofs have been sent. Otherwise, delivery rendering is only available via the client console or a web browser.
Approve an extraction file approve-an-extraction-file
For offline deliveries, ÃÛ¶¹ÊÓƵ Campaign generates an extraction file which, depending on how it is set up, is sent to the router. Its content depends on the export template used.
When the content, targeting and budget have been approved, the delivery changes to Extraction pending until the extraction workflow for the campaigns is launched.
On the extraction request date, the extraction file is created and the delivery status changes to File to approve.
You can view the content of the extracted file (by clicking its name), approve it or, if necessary, change the format and re-launch the extraction using the links on the dashboard.
Once the file has been approved, you can send the notification email to the router. Learn more.
Approval modes approval-modes
Jobs can be approved in the campaign dashboard, in delivery tracking tab, the delivery dashboard, or in the email notification sent to the reviewers.
Approve in the dashboard approval-via-the-dashboard
To approve a job via the client console or using a web browser, click the appropriate link on the campaign dashboard.
For example, once delivery analysis has been executed:
- Select Approve targeting.
- In the popup window, check the information to be approved.
- Select Accept or Reject and enter a comment if necessary. This comment will be displayed in the validation logs.
- Confirm your choice with the Target approval button.
If a process has already been approved by another operator, the approval link is not available.
If a process has been rejected, the information is displayed in the delivery dashboard as follows:
Approve from the notification messages approval-via-notification-messages
To approve a job from the notification message:
- Click the link in the notification.
- Log on to ÃÛ¶¹ÊÓƵ Campaign.
- Check the information to be approved
- Select Accept or Reject and enter a comment if necessary.
- Validate. Your choice and comment are displayed in the validation logs.
Track the approval approval-tracking
Approval logs are available in the user interface:
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In the campaign approval log, Approvals sub-tab of the Edit > Audit tab:
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In the campaign delivery log, Deliveries sub-tab of the Edit > Audit tab:
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The approval status for each delivery can be viewed by clicking the Hide/display logs option of the Summary tab.
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This information can also be accessed via the Audit > Approvals tab of each delivery:
Automatic/Manual approvals automatic-and-manual-approval
When creating a targeting workflow, if approval is automatic (default mode), ÃÛ¶¹ÊÓƵ Campaign displays the approval link or sends a notification as soon as an approval is required.
To choose the approval mode (manual or automatic), click the Edit > Properties tab of the campaign or campaign template, then click Advanced campaign parameters… and finally the Approvals tab.
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When a targeting workflow is being built, manual approval lets you avoid creating approval links or sending notifications automatically. The campaign dashboard then offers a Submit targeting for approval link to launch the approval process manually.
A confirmation message lets you authorize approvals on the jobs selected for this delivery.
The approval buttons are then displayed on the campaign dashboard (for this delivery), on the delivery dashboard and in delivery tracking. If notifications are enabled, they will be sent in parallel.
This method of enabling approvals lets you work on targeting without sending spurious notifications to reviewers.
Notifications notifications
Notifications are specific email messages sent to reviewers to inform them that a process is pending approval. When the operator clicks the link in the message, an authentication page appears and, after logging in, the operator can view the information and approve or reject the job. A comment can also be entered in the approval window.
The content of notification emails can be personalized. See Notification content.
Enable/Disable Notification enabling-disabling-notification
By default, notification messages are sent if the approval of the related job is enabled in the campaign template, the campaign, or the delivery. Notifications can, however, be disabled in order to authorize approvals from the client console only.
To do this, edit the approval window of the campaign or campaign template ( Edit > Properties > Advanced campaign parameters… > Approvals tab) and select Do not enable notification sending.
Notification content notification-content
Notification content is defined in a specific template: Notification of validations for the marketing campaign. This template is saved in the Administration > Campaign management > Technical delivery templates folder of the ÃÛ¶¹ÊÓƵ Campaign tree.