Ⓘ Available to Corporate accounts

What is audience sharing?

Audience sharing gives you a flexible way to add, update, and distribute contact data across subaccounts, while maintaining control over your audience. It creates a dynamic connection that allows a single source subaccount to share contacts with multiple target subaccounts, based on rules that you configure. Any segments that you share through this tool are automatically kept up-to-date through a sync that runs multiple times a day.

Sharing contacts is typically a privacy concern and impermissible between brands, so you’ll need to be sure to adhere to our Permission & Privacy Policy before setting up the audience sharing tool. You can also review our permission-based list examples if you are unsure if your contact list is acceptable.

How to set up audience sharing

There are two steps for setting up audience sharing. The first step is to establish which subaccount will act as your source subaccount. The source subaccount contains the data that will be shared to the target subaccounts; that data needs to be stored in segments, so be sure to create the segments you want to share in your source subaccount before proceeding to step two. Once your segments are ready to go, step two is configuring your sharing rules within the source subaccount.

Establishing the source subaccount

1. Click on the gear icon in the upper right corner.
2. Select Account from the dropdown menu.
3. Click on the Audience sharing tab.
4. Click on the Subaccount audience sharing link.
   
5. Use the dropdown menu to select the subaccount that will be sharing its audience and click on the Enable audience sharing button.
   

Creating the sharing rules

1. Navigate to the source subaccount. If you have not created the segments that you plan to share, do so now.
2. Navigate to your Audience tab.
3. Click on the Sharing section in the panel on the left.
4. Click on the Create sharing rules button to open the setup wizard.
   
5. The sync will create a single group in the target subaccounts, in addition to the segments. Once you decide what you’d like to name that group, type it into the Group name field. Then click on the Next button.
   
6. On the next screen, select which subaccounts will receive the shared segments by checking the boxes next to their names. If you’d like to select all subaccounts, simply select the box at the top. The interface will only show ten subaccount names per page. If you have more than ten subaccounts, use the arrows at the bottom of the list to navigate to the other pages. Once you’ve made your selections, click on the Next button.
   
7. On the next screen, select which segments and contact fields that will be included in the sync. By default, the sharing rules will be the same for all subaccounts. If you’d like to use different rules for each subaccount, click on Set unique sharing rules for each subaccount. Once you’ve chosen your sharing rules, click on the Next button.
8. Review your settings and accept the terms of service. You can also decide if you want the sync to be able to trigger field change automations. By default, this will be turned off, but you can turn it on by simply checking the box next to Yes, trigger field change workflows from this import. Once you’ve reviewed your settings and accepted the terms of service, click on the Activate button. The terms of service box must be checked before activation can occur.

The first sync will not begin immediately, but will be queued to begin within several minutes. To run the sync immediately, click on the Sync now button.

How to manage your sharing

Audience sharing toolbar

The toolbar at the top of the audience sharing dashboard contains several options for managing your sync and sharing options.

• The dropdown menu on the left to controls which subaccounts are visible in the interface. You can choose to view all subaccounts, only subaccounts with sharing rules, or only subaccounts without sharing rules.
• The Sync audience toggle allows you to pause your sync at any time. Any further sharing of audience data will not resume until the toggle is flipped back and the green checkmark is showing.
• Click on the Delete button to remove all sharing rules and deactivate the sync permanently. Any contacts, groups, segments, and fields that were shared as part of the sync will be archived in the target subaccounts.
• Click on the Sync now button to immediately start the process of syncing contacts. This can take several minutes to complete.
• Click on the Edit sharing rules button to return to the setup wizard, where you can edit the target group name, sharing rules, subaccounts, fields, segments, and automation settings for the sync.
• The sync will automatically run approximately every 6 hours. Last sync and Next sync show the last time it occurred, and when the next one is scheduled.

In the table below the toolbar, there are four columns: Subaccount, Shared segments, Shared contact fields, and Actions.

Click on a number in the Shared segments or Shared contact fields column to open a pop-up window that lists the names of the segments or contact fields, respectively, that are shared with that target subaccount.

To edit the sharing rules for a specific subaccount, click on the Edit button at the bottom of the pop-up window or click on the dropdown arrow in the Actions column and choose Edit settings from the menu.

Source segments

Your shared segments are stored with the rest of your segments in the Audience tab. The process for editing shared segments is identical to editing segments that are not shared. Please keep in mind that shared segments are not locked in the source subaccount, so any user with access to the Audience tab will be able to edit them.

Target subaccounts

In the target subaccounts, the audience sharing tool creates a single group, which will contain every contact that is shared to that subaccount. It will also create as many segments as you configure in your sharing rules.

When your subaccount users log in, they will see that group and those segments in the Audience tab in the Groups and Segments sections, respectively. The group and segment names will have a lock icon next to them to indicate that they are part of the sync and cannot be edited.

If a subaccount user opens a shared group or segment, they will see a message indicating that the group or segment is part of a sync and cannot be altered. They will not be able to add or remove contacts, edit segment criteria, or archive the contacts, group, or segment.

On the Contact fields page, subaccount users will also see that a new contact field called Audience Sharing Reference IDs has been created, along with any other contact fields that were included in the sharing rules. All of these contact fields will be locked.

Frequently asked questions about audience sharing

When are shared audiences synced?

Shared segments are automatically synced across subaccounts approximately every 6 hours.

Will my sync run immediately after I set it up?

No, it will not. Instead, it will be queued to begin within the next several minutes. To run the sync immediately, click on the Sync now button. Please note that it may take a few minutes for the sync to complete, especially if you have a large number of contacts.

Can the subaccounts receiving shared contacts make changes to them?

Yes, target subaccounts can edit shared contacts. However, any changes made in a target subaccount will not be reflected in the source subaccount. If any shared field data is edited in the source subaccount, the information in those fields will be overwritten in the target subaccount during the next sync.

Will the sync overwrite contact fields in the target subaccount that are not included in the sharing rules?

No, it will not. If a contact field is not included in the sharing rules, it will remain unaffected by the sync.

Will all shared contacts be updated each time the sync runs?

No, they will not. Each sync will only include contacts that have been updated in the source subaccount. If there have been no changes to a contact in the source subaccount since the last sync, then they will not be included in the next one.

I’m a Parent or Manager user, how can I tell if my account has audience sharing activated?

1. Click on the gear icon in the upper right corner.
2. Select Account from the dropdown menu.
3. Click on the Audience sharing tab.
4. Click on the Subaccount audience sharing link.

If you see a screen that has a dropdown menu and an Enable audience sharing button, then you do not have an active audience sharing setup in your account. If you see a screen that has a Disable audience sharing button, then you do have an active audience sharing setup in your account. If you do not see the Audience sharing tab, then you currently do not have access to this feature.

What happens if I unshare a segment or delete my sharing rules?

When you delete your sharing rules, all shared contacts, fields, groups, and segments are archived in the target subaccounts. They will remain in the source subaccount. The only exception to this is if there are contacts who existed in the target subaccounts before the sharing rules were created. Those contacts will remain in the target subaccounts, even if they were part of the shared audience.