Marketing Cloud Engagement | Creating and Using Custom Contact Attributes in MobilePush

In MobilePush, you can expand your marketing capabilities by adding original attributes (custom attributes) tailored to your specific business needs, such as "Preferred Category" or "Membership Rank," in addition to standard contact attributes.

1. Adding Custom Attributes 

Attribute definition is performed within Contact Builder.

1. Hover over the Audience Builder icon and select Contact Builder.

2. Ensure the Data Designer tab is open and click MobilePush Data.

3. The MobilePush Demographics attribute group will appear. Click the Create Attribute button located at the bottom of the list.

4. Define the attribute name, default value, data type, etc., and click Create to save.

2. Reflecting Data from the Mobile App (SDK Implementation)

To reflect actual data in the attributes created in Contact Builder, you must set and update the attribute values via SDK implementation on the mobile app side.

Implementation Overview

Call the appropriate SDK methods to set attribute values when user profile information is saved or updated within the app.

• Implementation Example: Use methods such as sfmcSdk.identity.edit (Note: Syntax applies to v10; check documentation for specific versions).

For specific implementation code and methods, please refer to the developer documentation below:

Reference:

Set Contact Attributes and Tags

Note on Reserved Words

The system uses specific "Reserved Words" for attribute names. Do not create attributes with names listed in the "Reserved Words" section of the developer documentation linked above (e.g., contactId, systemToken).

Note on Multiple Device Usage (Device-Level Management)

MobilePush attributes in Marketing Cloud Engagement are managed on a "per-device" basis. If a single Contact Key is used to log in from multiple devices, each device maintains its own set of attribute values.

• Implication: Even if profile information is centrally managed by the application backend per Contact Key, it does not automatically synchronize across devices within Marketing Cloud Engagement.

• Best Practice: You must test your application behavior and implement explicit update logic if necessary to ensure attribute values remain consistent when a user logs in with the same key on a different device.

3. How to Use Added Attributes

Once populated, custom attribute data is primarily used for Segmentation and Message Personalization.

Usage in Segmentation

In the Mobile List creation screen within Contact Builder, you can specify attributes located under MobilePush Demographics as filter criteria. This allows you to create send lists that extract only users who meet specific conditions, such as "Users with Gold Membership Rank" or "Users who prefer a specific Category."

Usage in Messages

You can dynamically insert attribute values into push notification message bodies or AMPscript. The syntax is the same as using Data Extension fields in Email Studio.

• Syntax: If the attribute name is shopName, use %%shopName%% to function as a personalization string.

• Use Case: You can include a user's "Favorite Store" name in the message or use AMPscript to vary message content based on "Membership Rank," enabling highly optimized notifications for each individual.

For information on how to verify attribute values received from the app, please refer to the following article:

MobilePush | FAQ: Verifying and Extracting Contact Data Synced via the Mobile App (SDK)

4. Frequently Asked Questions (FAQ)

Q. Are attribute values reflected in Marketing Cloud Engagement in real-time?

A. No, they are not real-time. There is a time lag for contact information updates. Update requests are typically sent to Marketing Cloud Engagement upon app launch or when the app transitions to the background. Subsequent registration and update processing within the system can take several minutes or more. Therefore, this method may not be suitable for use cases requiring immediate real-time action (e.g., triggered sends immediately following an operation). If latency consistently exceeds tens of minutes, please contact support with details of the situation.

Q. I manually changed an attribute value in Marketing Cloud Engagement, but it is not reflected in the app. Why?

A. Changes made in MCE are not reflected in the app. Synchronization is one-way from the App to Marketing Cloud Engagement. Changes made on the Marketing Cloud Engagement side are not pushed back to the app. Due to this behavior, MobilePush databases cannot be used as a backend database for the mobile app. The application side should always be designed as the Source of Truth.