Mailing Lists | Custom Fields

This settings page is only available to domain administrators and system administrators with the proper permissions.

Mailing lists are a great way to communicate with a number of different individuals via a single email address. Custom Fields make those communications personal: they let you store extra information about each subscriber — a first name, a company, an account number — and then use that information as variables in the messages the list sends. For example, if you'd like your postings to greet each subscriber by name ("Hello John,"), you'd first create a "First Name" custom field, then fill in a value for each subscriber.

To create or manage Custom Fields, log into SmarterMail as a domain or system administrator, open a mailing list's configuration options, and click on the Custom Fields tab.

Note: The Custom Fields tab is only visible to domain and system administrators — List Moderators don't see it. In addition, custom fields are shared across ALL mailing lists on the domain: a field created for one list is available on every list, so name your fields generically. (Moderators CAN edit each subscriber's field values from the Subscribers tab.)

Adding a New Custom Field

Use the New button to add a new custom field. A modal window will display the following options:

Name - The name of the field.

Note: The text entered here is used as the variable when using custom fields in mailing list messages. For example, if you enter "First Name" in this field, you will need to enter #First Name# as the variable in the mailing list message.

Default Value - Enter the text that should be automatically entered for current and new subscribers. Once the field is created, subscribers can be individually modified to change the value: open a subscriber from the Subscribers tab and enter their values on the Details tab. Values can also be filled in bulk by importing a CSV file whose column names match your custom field names.

Note: If a default value is not included, and the subscriber does not have their field configured, the variable will be removed from the message, leaving a blank space in its location. So a default like "there" makes "Hello #First Name#," degrade gracefully to "Hello there," for subscribers with no name on file.

Using Custom Fields in Messages

A Custom Field can be used in mailing list messages as a type of custom variable. To enter Custom Fields as variables, the name of the field must be enclosed with a # on each side. For example, if a Custom Field was created for "Customer Name", you would enter #Customer Name# in your message, and each subscriber would see their own stored value in its place.