Integration of Unica Campaign with Unica Link

With numerous marketing software out there, how are you supposed to choose the right marketing software to meet all your marketing needs? An integrated martech stack is an answer to the changing industry trends. From HCL Unica V12.1, Unica Suite launched a new product named Unica Link, which has the capability to connect to delivery channels for sending the communication. Unica Link provides both design-time and runtime services. It is invoked at design-time when an administrator configures a Link connection or when you configure a process box in the Unica Campaign application or a touchpoint in the Unica Journey application. Unica Link has the capabilities to create connectors, which include the configuration and provisioning to connect to any delivery channel.

Unica Link supports the following connectors:

• Mailchimp connector: The Mailchimp connector uploads contact information to an audience in Mailchimp, populating the merge field defined for the Audience. Then runs (or optionally schedule) Mailchimp campaigns for delivering communications as eMail. This connector also has the capability to report back whether emails were delivered, bounced, opened, or links clicked within the emails.
• Mandrill connector: The Mandrill connector sends email using a defined template on a Mandrill account. This connector then polls Mandrill to report whether emails were bounced, opened, or links clicked within the email.
• Salesforce connector: Salesforce (CRM) saves and updates details about users. It supports two operations, i.e., ‘Create’ and ‘Update,’ on two objects, ‘Lead’ and ‘Contact.’
• Twilio connector: The Twilio connector sends SMS to a destination device and fetches the sent SMS status.

Campaign Link Integration Overview

• Unica Link can create Connectors. Connectors consist of configuration and provisioning to connect to any delivery channel. The out-of-the-box connectors in the Unica link are as follows:
  • Mailchimp
  • Mandrill
  • Twilio
  • Salesforce
• A new process box named LINK has been introduced in Unica v12.1.
• Link process box allows the users to create actions (like send eMail, send SMS, or update CRM). There is a unique action associated with each process box.
• An action is associated with connections.
• When executing a Link process box, an action is executed in Unica Link, and an underlying execution starts in connectors.
• Campaign internally triggers event tracking for selective action (MailChimp) based on connection and action properties specified (Activity fetch frequency, Activity fetch units, Fetch results end date).

Integration Configurations

• To integrate Unica Campaign with Unica Link, the below parameters need to be set at Settings – Configurations – Campaign – partitions – partition(n) – Link.
• LinkConnectionURL – Specify Link connection URL. The campaign uses this URL to fetch connection and action details
• LinkProjectName – Project Name for Campaign, which is configured in Link. With the default installation of Link, Project Name for Campaign is ‘_app_campaign.’
• Application – Application name used in Unica Link for Campaign integration. With the default installation of Link, the Application Name for Campaign is ‘campaign.’
• AsmUserForLinkCredentials – Unica Platform user who holds Link credentials data source.
• DataSourceWithLinkCredentials – DataSource name which holds login credentials for Link server to authenticate.
• LinkSharedLocation – Mounted location where Campaign Listener output the files. By default, Campaign output the files at <CAMPAIGN_HOME>/partitions/partition(n)/HIPData. This location has to be mounted on the Link server. This configuration property holds the mounting location on Link Server.
• LinkRuntimeServerURL – Link runtime HIP REST server URL.

NOTE: LinkConnectionURL and LinkRuntimeServerURL must end with ‘/.’ Otherwise, you might encounter errors in the LINK Process Box.

Using LINK Process Box in Campaign Flowchart

Pre-requisites:

Before start using the LINK Process Box, the Campaign Administrator needs to configure Link Connector configuration details by navigating to Settings – Campaign setting – Manage Link Connections. This is where the administrator needs to define a connection to all their delivery channel that marketers can use to deliver marketing communication.

Process

1. Create a flowchart in Campaign and select your audience data (whom to you to send to Journey) in SELECT Process Box.

2. You can implement separation logic if you have any.

3. Then add LINK Process Box and start configuring it as below:

• On the first screen, all the connectors defined as a part of the pre-requisite configurations would be available. Select the connector which you wanted to use for communication with the customer. 
• Based on the selection of your connector, different information would be asked. Below is an example for Twilio (SMS connector):

  NOTE: Here <FirstName>is the personalized field, which you can map with Journey fields in the next step. You can add up to five personalization fields in one SMS.

• Clicking on ‘Next’ would take the ‘Field Mapping’ screen where the marketer needs to map the fields required for the delivery channel and the personalized fields used in your marketing communication.

4. Once the LINK process box is configured, you can run the flowchart.

5. Upon successful run of the flowchart, LINK Process Box would create a .csv file with naming convention as <CampaignCode>_<CampaignID>_<FlowchartID>_<ProcessBoxID>_<RunID>.csv

Following is the sample content of the file generated for Twilio connector:

6. Unica link processes this audience information and performs the execution part like – sending an email, SMS or CRM actions, etc.

7. Delivery status (success, failure, etc.) are sent back to Campaign, and process box execution results are updated. This action creates a result file at the shared location with the content like below:

Below is an example of an email connector execution result:

In this result file, marketers would get clear information on who has done what activities.

Advantages of using Campaign – Link integration

• No extra efforts are required to send the communication once the LINK process box is executed.
• No extra efforts are required to fetch the execution results back in the Unica environment.
• Just one-time configuration.
• Easy to use

This integration enables Campaign to send data to customers’ in-house developed delivery system, which sends email or SMS based on each custom configuration as per the client requirements. It reduces the dependency on IT infrastructure to achieve these results. It also has the capability to integrate with the CRM system, which enables to keep marketing and CRM systems in sync. To learn more about Unica Campaign and Unica Link Integration you can go through the guide here.

You can reach out to us for any more queries, and we will be happy to help.