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Comparison of Marketing-Oriented Flow Types
With Marketing Cloud Next, you can create several types of flows that help you implement your marketing use cases. When you add flows to your campaigns, it’s important to understand the abilities and usage considerations for each flow type.
Required Editions
| Available in: Salesforce Enterprise and Unlimited Editions with Marketing Cloud Next Growth Edition or Advanced Edition |
| Available in: Marketing Cloud Engagement Pro+, Corporate+, and Enterprise+ Editions |
Activation-Triggered Flow
An activation-triggered flow runs when an activation is published. For example, if a customer receives an email but doesn’t open it, an activation-triggered flow can send their information to Google Ads via an activation so that they receive a targeted ad.
Records are added to an activation-triggered flow based on the segment publishing schedule. Depending on how the segment is configured, a refresh can happen as often as every 10 minutes for an incremental refresh to every 24 hours for a standard refresh. You can also trigger a refresh manually.
Automation Event-Triggered Flow
An automation event-triggered flow runs when an event occurs. For example, use an automation event-triggered flow to add a customer to a welcome flow after they submit a registration form. Alternatively, use engagement signals to define custom events.
For built-in automation events and custom events, the flow is executed within about 15 minutes after the triggering event occurs.
Broadcast Flow
A broadcast flow uses dynamic segments to determine eligibility. Segment membership is determined after the broadcast flow starts.
For example, use a broadcast flow to send a daily promotional email to a dynamic segment of all customers in a region by specifying a postal code in an API call to update the segment.
Execute a broadcast flow programmatically by issuing an API request or Apex call. Broadcast flows can also be executed by another flow.
On-Demand Flow
An on-demand flow is triggered as-needed for high-priority use cases.
For example, use an on-demand flow to send an order confirmation email after a customer makes a purchase. An API request that triggers an on-demand flow can include information about the event, such as the order ID or purchase amount.
Execute an on-demand flow programmatically by issuing an API request or Apex call.
Audience Flow
An audience flow targets a specific group of people: segment members, list members, campaign members, or a subgroup based on record criteria.Audience flows run on a schedule or can be executed immediately.
For example, use a segment- flow to send a monthly preferred customer email to all customers who have made over $1,000 in purchases over the past 12 months.
A scheduled audience flow can run once or on a recurring basis. A recurring audience flow can run as often as every hour.
For scheduled segment flows, you can configure the start step to publish the target segment immediately before running the flow. This option helps ensure that segment membership is as up to date as possible.If you don't republish before running the flow, the segment defaults to its defined publishing schedule.
