Capturing customer data in Profile Properties
At the core of BlueConic are the profile properties that store customer or visitor data in BlueConic customer profiles. Profile properties receive data from various parts of BlueConic, for example from listeners that collect data, from customer input to dialogue forms, from connections that integrate with other systems, and so on.
To view or manage profile properties, you select Properties or Profile properties from the BlueConic navigation bar.
Organizing and managing profile properties
All existing profile properties are shown in a navigation list on the Profile properties tab. You can manage the listed profile properties by searching and filtering. You can even modify the columns displayed. See "Object Navigation" for an in-depth discussion of the navigation list and its options.
Creating a profile property
Profile properties can be created manually in BlueConic. To create a new profile property, click the [Add profile property] button on the Profile properties tab. Or, you can create profile properties as you are building connections, dialogues, or listeners.
Define the following settings for a profile property:
| Setting | Description |
|---|---|
| Name and Metadata | |
| Name | This is the human readable text that appears for the profile property wherever it appears in the BlueConic user interface. See Best practices for names and labels for tips on naming your profile properties. |
| Labels | Assign any number of text labels to the profile property for grouping or easy retrieval. |
| Description | A short description of the profile property. |
| Settings | |
| ID | The internal identifier for the profile property. The identifier must be unique for each profile property. A valid ID may consist of letters, numbers, hyphens (-), and underscores (_) and must be at least one character long. Once saved, the ID can not be modified. |
| Type | Specifies the data type of the profile property. The options are:
Note: If you set these data types, BlueConic will enforce them. Once there is at least one profile with a value for the profile property, you can no longer change the data type (except for "Text" profile properties, which can be changed to the type "Email address" at all times). Learn more about validating and enforcing data types in profile properties. |
| Segmentation | Specify whether the profile property will show up in the Segments tab for segmentation or not. If you do not show the profile property in the Segments tab, you cannot use it in a segment definition. |
| Default values | Enter default values for the profile property. These values will be available for building segments — even when no values have been added by listeners to visitor profiles yet. |
- Click [Save] to permanently save the profile property.
Selecting unit types for numerical profile properties
When you set a profile property's type to number, you can specify a unit for the numbers. The unit serves as a visual aid to help BlueConic users to understand the context for this profile property value. It does not affect the numerical values stored in the profile property. The default value is 'No unit'.
For example, if the profile property value represents page views, you can specify the unit when you create the profile property.
Expert Settings
Use the profile property expert settings to control the privacy level of the property, its data sensitivity (PII vs non-PII), and what happens to the value of a profile property during profile merging. You can also assign a unique identifier to a profile property that aids in the retrieving of property values using the BlueConic API.
If you aren't sure about how to configure these settings, it's best to leave them at the default value or ask your BlueConic customer success manager.
| Setting | Description |
|---|---|
| Unique identifier | A unique identifier that can be used to retrieve profiles with a specific value for a property, for example, an email address. The unique identifier is also used for profile properties that can be used to create a "When to Merge" rule. See Profile merging for complete information. Select "Create new profile when identifier changes" for improved privacy and security (to prevent profile hijacking). If checked, the visitor will switch to a new profile when a new value for this property is set. See Unique identifiers in BlueConic. |
| Data sensitivity | Select whether this profile property will contain personally identifiable information (PII) or non-PII. PII settings can be changed to non-PII only if no profiles contain values for this property. Properties with PII are visible only to BlueConic users whose user role includes data visibility for PII. See data sensitivity and visibility settings for more information. |
| Permission level | Specifies what visitor permission level is minimally needed to use the profile property. There are two options:
|
| Merge strategy | Specifies what to do with the value of the profile property if the visitor's profile is merged with another profile. See Profile merging for complete information on profile merging. You have the following options:
|
| Visitor access |
Determines what access the visitor or browser has from the browser client to read or write to this profile property (including BlueConic client connections, dialogues, and listeners). Enable the "Read" option to allow the visitor's browser to retrieve the value for this profile property. Enable "Write" to allow the visitor's browser client to write a new value into this property. When you create new profile properties via the Profile properties tab, Visitor access is turned off by default, to improve security of these values, so the values are not open to changes from the browser. You can choose to enable Read or Write access if you require that the visitor's browser be able to read or write the profile property value. Visitor access determines a profile property's read and write access from a website (as well as BlueConic client connections, dialogues and listeners). It does not apply to batch and server-side, real-time connections, server-side listeners, or the BlueConic REST API. The BlueConic connections to Mailchimp, via Webhooks, and for Facebook Custom Audiences are all examples of batch or server-side real-time connections, so these do not need readable or writable profile properties. Contact your BlueConic Customer Success Manager for more information. |
| Hide from UI | Enable the "Don’t show on Segments tab" option if you do not want this profile property to show up on the user interface of the Segments tab. This is useful if you only want to be able to hand off the profile property in a connection. |
Validating and enforcing data types
When you set a data type for a profile property, BlueConic enforces data validation for the number, currency, date time, decimal, and currency data types.
You can see the data type and validation status when you view profile properties in a navigation list.
See validating and enforcing data types to learn more.
Modifying a profile property
You can change any setting for a profile property except the ID of the profile property. When you change any of the settings of a profile property, the [Save] button is enabled. By clicking the [Save] button, the profile property settings are permanently modified. Note: Profile properties that are defined in plugins by a developer are read only and cannot be modified. This is indicated in the user interface by the grayed-out settings and the disabled [Save] button.
Deleting a profile property
To delete a profile property, select the [Save] button and choose [delete] from the dropdown menu. Note: Profile properties that are defined in plugins by a developer are read-only and cannot be deleted. This is indicated in the user interface by the grayed-out settings and the disabled [Delete] option.
Copying a profile property
To copy a profile property, select the [Save] button and choose [Save as...] from the dropdown menu.
A new profile property is created with the same settings as the original profile property, but with an adapted ID. You can set a new ID or change any other setting. By selecting the [Save] button, you finalize the creation of the copied profile property.
Statistics
In the right-hand sidebar, the "statistics" widget shows the number of profiles in your profile database that contain a value for the profile property that you are managing.
It also shows that last date and time a value was set in any of the profiles for this particular profile property.
Related items
In the right-hand sidebar, the "related items" widget shows the other objects in BlueConic that are directly related to the profile property that you are managing.
Profile properties can have the following types of related items:
- Dashboards that display statistics for this profile property.
- Segments that use this profile property as a filter.
- Listeners that are configured to set a value for this profile property.
- Dialogues that are configured to set a value for this profile property or interactions that use this profile property as a filter on the "Who" tab.
- Connections that map data to or from this profile property.
