A Logic Lesson for Marketers

A marketing automation rockstar must understand basic logic.

I believe we’re all database marketers at this point. Perhaps that isn’t your title, but it is your every day reality. Even designers must consider the database with spaces for text blocks, mail merges, and other dynamic content.

Dynamic content is about segmenting your audience into increasingly smaller blocks to send the right message to the right group of people as efficiently as possible. Segmentation of the database is all about logic, especially Boolean logic.

So let’s talk about logic. I believe a marketing rockstar embraces logic to target audiences effectively. You probably have heard of Boolean logic and I won’t go into the details but there are the three key operators that you should be familiar with.

And, Or, and, Not.

Let’s try some examples based on this diagram.

• First, Joe is a subscriber to the Blog. Blog = TRUE.
• Second, Joe is a subscriber to Marketo’s Blog. Marketo Blog = TRUE.
• Third, Joe is not a subscriber to HubSpot’s Blog. HubSpot Blog = FALSE.

Which campaigns does Joe qualify for?

If I use “OR” or “Any”, then either or both criteria can be true and I will qualify for the campaign, even if I am only a subscriber to the blog.

I can also qualify if I’m a subscriber to both blogs.

Not is anyone without that criteria so everybody who is not a subscriber to HubSpot’s blog will be in the blue area and if I am a subscriber I am in the white area so I will be excluded from this campaign if I use a “Not” filter.

The good news is if you understand this type of logic, you don’t necessarily have to know things like SQL queries, which can become more complex.

Common Operators in Filters

These are Marketo specific, however, you will see very similar ones in HubSpot, Pardot, and Eloqua.

Operator	Description
IN	The lead is IN, or a member of a List
NOT IN	The lead is NOT IN, or not a member of a List
CONTAINS	The field has the value somewhere
NOT CONTAINS	The field does not have this value anywhere
STARTS WITH	The first few characters contain this phrase, word, or number
NOT STARTS WITH	The first few charactes do not contain this phrase, word, or number
IS	Exact match for the value – not more or less
IS EMPTY	The field is empty, or NULL. There is nothing here.
IS NOT EMPTY	The field has a value of some type
Less than	The number or score is less than X
Greater than	The number or score is greater than X
At Least	The number or score is X or above
In Past	The date is within or prior to X days, months, or years
Between	The value is between these two dates
On or Before	The value is on this date or prior to the date
Before	The value is before this date
On or After	The value is on or ahead of this date
After	The value is after this date
Is	The date is X
Any	Or is between the filters
All	And is between the filters
Advanced	Allows you to use parentheses with OR and AND: (1 or 2) and 3

For more details on Marketo filters and triggers, see my Marketo Filter Reference Document.

Stay tuned for more on Not filters next week.