How to handle Target and Suppress user list in campaigns

[Paul Joy Parayannilam]

Hi, Im currently working on developing a solution using Adwords API. Im planning to use AdwordsUserListService and CampaignCriterion to upload email id's under specific campaigns (Campaigns are created in the Adwords website).

I have a requirement where I want to perform a Suppress and Target operation using the API. Let me take an example

1. Week 1 -- Upload 100 email ID's to a campaign as Target Users.

2. Week 2 -- I want to suppress 25 of these email ID's (because they are no longer valid) and append another 50 (this is the Target Users).

3. By week 2, I should only have a valid set of 75 + 50 --> 125 email id's under the campaigns.

How can I achieve this? Is it possible using the above listed 2 services? Is there a parameter/attribute that I can use to tell Adwords to suppress few and Target/add rest during my second upload?

Or should I write separate API calls for suppression? If so, please help with the right API call

Thanks

Paul

[Sreelakshmi Sasidharan (AdWords API Team)]

Hi Paul,

You will need to create the user list using AdWordsUserListService and then add the audiences using the AdWordsUserListService.mutateMembers(). The AddCrmBasedUserList Java example shows how to add a user list and upload members to the list. Once you have the user lists created, you will need to use the CampaignCriterionService to set the user list as a targeting criteria to the campaign. You can check the AddCampaignTargetingCriteria sample in Java for adding a targeting criteria to a campaign. Code samples in other languages are also available here. 

1. Week 1 -- Upload 100 email ID's to a campaign as Target Users.
   

1. You will need to use AdWordsUserListService.mutateMembers() as specified above and add these new members to the list.

1. Week 2 -- I want to suppress 25 of these email ID's (because they are no longer valid) and append another 50 (this is the Target Users).
   

1. To remove the users, you can perform AdWordsUserListService.mutateMembers() and then do a REMOVE with the memberList populated with the 25 emails that you need to remove. To add the users, you can perform AdWordsUserListService.mutateMembers() and then do a ADD with the memberList populated with the 50 emails that you need to add

1. By week 2, I should only have a valid set of 75 + 50 --> 125 email id's under the campaigns.
   

1. Once the operations in step 2 is completed, your list will only have 125 email users.
   

Please note that it might take a few hours for the list to be populated with the members and be available for targeting. Let me know if you have any additional questions.

Thanks,
Sreelakshmi, AdWords API Team

[Paul Joy Parayannilam]

Thank You.

I have a followup question. So when we use AdWordsUserListService, we get a user list ID(or a specific file ID) and we upload emails to this specific file. While removal, do I need to mention this ID or can i delete directly from the campaign? My question is whether I need to store this User list ID on my side (in a table or so) so that i can use the same next week for suppression along with campaign id?

Im trying to avoid using another service to achieve this

Thanks

Paul

[Sreelakshmi Sasidharan (AdWords API Team)]

Hi Paul, 

Yes, you will have to specify the userListId and membersList that needs to be added/removed in the user list. That said, you could store the user list Id or you can perform a CampaignCriterionService.get() and specify the UserListId in the selector to get the Id of the user list. The highlighted lines of code in the AddCrmBasedUserList example shows the mutate members operation. It is not possible to delete the members of the targeted user list criterion using the CampaignCriterionService. 

[Paul Joy Parayannilam]

Thank You Sreelakshmi again for timely response. I want to ask the question different based on the actual subject of this forum.

1. Other than performing a deletion/removal of email ID's, does Adwords provide a feature to Suppress certain email ID's from the campaign.

For eg:

Out of 1 Million email id's uploaded against a campaign, i want to mention that 100k email ID's should be suppressed - meaning, they shouldn't get the targetted campaign. Only 900k email ids should be targeted.The 100k email id's will still be part of campaign in a Suppress mode.

Other than using the AdwordsUserList & CampaignCriterionService, what other service options provide me a feature to achieve this functionality?

Also, please let me know if there is a phone number for me to recah out to Adwords helpdesk in case if i am not clear?

Thanks

Paul

[Sreelakshmi Sasidharan (AdWords API Team)]

Hi Paul, 

It is not possible to partially exclude members of a targeted user list criterion. User lists can only be modified using the AdWordsUserListService via the API. Similarly, to modify or set a campaign criterion you will need to use CampaignCriterionService. 

For questions specific to AdWords API, you could use this forum. Unfortunately, we don't offer support via phone. If your questions are specific to AdWords product in general, you can either post that on the Advertisers community forum or use the Help button within the AdWords UI to call or email AdWords support.