Group Types
Static Groups
Traditional groups in the emfluence Marketing Platform are known as Static Groups. These groups allow a user to manually update contacts within each group. By default, Static Groups are private, but can be made public if you wish.
Private Groups
By default, when you create a Static Group in the system it is private, meaning the group will not show up on a list of public groups on your unsubscribe page.
Public Groups
If you choose, you can make Static Groups public. This allows a client to choose from a list of public groups to add/remove themselves from on your unsubscribe page. Public Groups can also be used in the Add-to-Group feature on a form to let clients sign up for individual groups. If you do choose to make a group public, we suggest you edit the Friendly Name for the group. This allows you to keep your internal naming for groups (Newsletter - Store 15689) but allows the front-facing Friendly Name to be something else (Company's Monthly Newsletter).
Test Groups
During the preview step of creating your email you have the ability not only to send proofs to individual users but also send a proof to everyone within a Test Group. Test Groups must contain contacts already in the system and must be private.
Dynamic Groups
Unlike Static Groups in the emfluence Marketing Platform, Dynamic Groups are designed to search for specific set of criteria at a specific time and add those contacts temporarily to the Dynamic Group. Pulling their data from a Source Group, Dynamic Groups search for the criteria of the query which drives them (for example: find contacts whose birthday is today). Using Query Builder you can set-up your own Dynamic Groups within the emfluence Marketing Platform. Since contacts may be in Dynamic Groups for less than a single day, to control preferences to a Dynamic Group (allowing recipients to unsubscribe) we use the Source Group (the static group you chose to search when creating your Dynamic Group) to handle those unsubscribes. If you want recipients to have the ability to unsubscribe from only that group, please remember to make the Source Group public and give it a friendly name allowing it to show up as an option on the Unsubscribe page.
NOTE: Because Dynamic Groups are empty except when the queries are run they aren't going to offer reporting data at the group level reporting in the same manner that Static Groups do. They will still provide domain, device, and individual level reporing. If you need to send to the same email to mutliple Dynamic Groups and want to compare group level statistics we suggest making a copy of your email and sending each separately. You may also choose to add these emails to a campaign.