How do Communication Limits Handle Duplicates?

[Anonymous]

What happens if two records exist in the system with the same email address? How does the Communication Limit handle that? Which option?

• Option 1 (ideal): Does it work like the Durable Unsub where anyone with that email address is blocked?
• Option 2: Will skip the first record and send to the second email?

Example

Communication limit set to 1 email per week.

Dups

• John Smith (jsmith@abccompany.com)
• Jonathan Smith (jsmith@abccompany.com)

Emails

• Both John Smith (jsmith@abccompany.com) and Jonathan Smith (jsmith@abccompany.com)  qualify for an email on 11/1. Marketo picks one of those records and sends the email.
• Both John Smith (jsmith@abccompany.com) and Jonathan Smith (jsmith@abccompany.com)  qualify for an email on 11/2. Which option happens?
  • Option 1. Marketo recognizes jsmith@abccompany.com as being sent an email on 11/1. No emails are sent because of the Communication limit (Ideal)
  • Option 2. Marketo recognizes John Smith record as being sent an email. That record is not sent an email but the Jonathan Smith record is sent the email.

[Grégoire_Miche2 · Accepted solution]

Hi Jeff Coveney ,

Very good question

I just ran a test. Option 1 applies.

3 leads in the smart campaign (Grégoire, Greg1 and Greg2), Communication limit set to 1 per day. Ran the same smart campaign 3 times, received the email only once. Only the lead with the lowest ID (first name = Grégoire) appears in the campaign results tab:

-Greg

[Anonymous]

As always, thanks Greg. Makes sense.

[Grégoire_Miche2]

HI Jeff,

Pls mark it as answered.

-Greg

[Josh_Hill13]

So did this work across Programs?

I suspect it may not always do that.

[Robb_Barrett]

Marketo claims that a smart list will never send an email to the same address twice at the same batch unless you have custom dupe rules.

[Grégoire_Miche2]

Hi Josh,

I just tried to rerun the first campaign, which gave this:

You will see the email was sent only once in 3 tries, because of the weekly limit set to 3 (I had 2 send yesterday).

Then, I cloned the program, and ran the cloned smart campaign. Result is here;

So yes, it also enforces the Option 1 across programs.

-Greg

[Todd_Baker]

We have an instance where there are known duplicates in the system. We are working to eliminate them where possible. But, when we try and send an A/B test, the duplicates are sent to.

We do have Communication limits in place. But even still are hand-cuffed in the ability to send an A/B test without a highly regulated smart list.