The question ‘How do I test a QuickMail?’ can be interpreted in two ways:

1) you want to test your formatted e-mail with the variable data, or
2) you want to test which content is more effective for your target group.

We will answer both questions here, as we consider them both to be important.

How do I test my formatted content?

It is very important to test e-mails. After all, you will be sending them to potentially large target groups, so one mistake will immediately be noticed by many customers. It is a good idea to test your e-mail with ‘real’ customer data, especially if you have variable content in your e-mail or if data will be saved when a certain link is clicked on. We can recommend two scenarios for this situation:

1. Create several records for yourself and your colleagues in Deployteq with different data in the records. When you display various blocks in your e-mail based on a data item in a customer field or customer option field, make sure that all versions appear at least once in the test group. Then add these test customers to a test group or select them by using a profile. When you test the e-mail, you can select this group again for your broadcast.
2. As a final test, it is also a good idea to send the e-mails to yourself using real customer data. However, you do not want it to be possible for the customers to be e-mailed directly. You can prevent this from happening by using an override. This overwrites the e-mail address with the address for yourself and your colleagues.

To do this, configure the QuickMail as usual but select ‘Test e-mail’ instead when you get to ‘E-mail target’. You then have the choice of receiving the e-mail as either HTML or text or both. For the first few tests, we recommend sending both so that you can see what the text version looks like. Enter the e-mail address or addresses (separated by commas) where you want to receive the various e-mails and select how many you wish to receive. A random selection is made from the chosen profile for sending these e-mails. Complete the settings to receive the e-mails.

How do I perform an A/B test?

You can easily configure an A/B test by choosing the option ‘Split Run’ or ‘Smart Run’ for ‘QuickMail type’. If you do not have the ‘Smart Run’ option, this can be activated in the Deployteq Store. Simply configure the rest of the QuickMail as you would normally do. When you get to the option ‘Choose an e-mail’ and select an e-mail, you will immediately see the option to choose another e-mail. Continue doing so until you have selected all the contents you wish to test.

If you have opted for a Split Run, the rest of the settings will be the same. If you have opted for a Smart Run, you can also configure the percentage of the target group that you want to send the test to, what factor determines which content wins, and the amount of time you want to wait to send the winner to the rest of your target group.