Advanced Merge Fields

Default email merge fields are great at pulling supporter information into your messages. But what if you need to change the message based on the information you pull in — to include a tax-deductible disclaimer on receipts for donations made in your currency but hide the disclaimer on receipts for foreign contributions, for example. Or what if you want to tell donors the impact of their donation by multiplying the donation amount by the number of meals each dollar will provide. Are all of these possible?

Absolutely! All email and SMS templates in Raisely have access to conditional logic and template helpers, and you can use these to evaluate and manipulate data using certain conditions.

Some recent updates have been made as part of Raisely's commitment to protecting donor privacy so some PURLs and Advanced Merge Fields that you may have been familiar with previously would need to be adjusted. You can read more about the our security commitment here.

Conditional Logic

Conditional logic lets you show or hide content based on supporter or donation information. If a condition is met, the content will appear. If a condition isn't met, the content will stay hidden.

Add Conditions to Your Messages

Conditions are kind of like a sandwich: they're made by squishing your juicy content between two or three merge fields. Every condition starts with {{#yourCondition}} and ends with {{/yourCondition}} , like this example below:

{{#lt profile.totalPercent 90}}You're almost there - ask your friends to donate today!{{/lt}}

You can also use  {{else}}  between the opening and closing merge fields to add backup content in case the condition isn't met. If you wanted to be extra thankful to donors who give generously, for example, you could add the following to your donation receipt:

{{#gte donation.amount 500}}Thank you SO much for your generous donation!{{else}}Thanks for your support!{{/gte}}

If the donor gives $500 or more to your campaign, they will see "Thank you SO much for your generous donation!" in their receipt. If the donor gives less than $500, they will simply see "Thanks for your support!".

Add Conditions to Your Pages

You can add conditions to your pages so that content changes dynamically based on the donor's session or specific parameters in your PURLs (Personalized URLs).

Following our security updates, personal data (like names) is now handled via secure sessions, while non-personal data (like campaign sources) continues to use URL queries.

1. Conditional Content based on Personal Data (User Session)

To greet a donor by name, you no longer pull data directly from the URL. Instead, you use the user object. This works when a donor arrives via a link containing an access_token (automatically generated in the Raisely email editor).

Example Scenario: You want to show a personalized greeting if the donor is recognized, or a general message if they are a new visitor.

Example PURL: https://campaignsite.com/?access_token={{user.accessToken}}

Use this conditional statement on your page to display their name if available:

{{#if user.firstName}}Hey {{user.firstName}}, thanks for being a great supporter of the campaign!{{else}}Thanks for being a great supporter of our mission!{{/if}}

2. Conditional Content based on Query Parameters (PURLs)

For data that isn't personally identifiable—such as a specific donor segment, tracking code, or campaign type—you can still use standard query parameters in your URL.

Example PURL: https://campaignsite.com/?donorType=regular

Use this conditional statement to change the message based on that "donorType" value:

{{#eq query.donorType 'regular'}} As a regular supporter, you help to ensure consistent funding for important programs. {{else eq query.donorType 'major'}} As a generous supporter, you help us shift the needle with making a real impact on these issues. {{else eq query.donorType 'xyz'}}   As a xyz supporter, you help us ensure.....{{else}} Help us ensure that.... {{/eq}}

This allows you to create highly tailored landing page experiences while keeping your donors' personal information secure and compliant.

Available Conditions

These are all the conditions you can use in messages. X is the data field you want to evaluate, and Y is the field (or value) you want to evaluate against:

X ✅
		

X = Y
		

X > Y
		

X >= Y
		

X < Y
		

X <= Y
		

Template Helpers

Template helpers let you format and manipulate information in your messages, and they're most commonly used with donation amounts, profile totals, and dates.

Add Template Helpers to Your Messages 

While conditional logic needs two merge fields to work, template helpers only use one merge field: the helper itself. Add any of the merge fields listed below to your message, and the merge field will automatically be replaced with the correctly-formatted or -calculated data when the supporter reads their message.

Available Template Helpers

These are all the helpers you can use in messages.  X is the first data field you want to evaluate, and Y is the second field (or value) you want to evaluate:

Formatting Date and Time in messages

Messages in Raisely will default to sending dates in universal time (that's Greenwich Mean Time). If your campaign isn't in the UK, you probably want to customise the timezone your emails use so the dates appear correct to the people who are receiving them. 👍

Your emails currently show dates like:  <br>{{prettyDate donation.createdAt}}. This formats them to be human-readable, but won't convert the timezone.

To set a timezone, you need to replace this merge field with:
{{localDate donation.createdAt "Australia/Sydney" "dd/MM/YYYY"}} .

The first section in double-quotes is your timezone, pick one closest to where your donors are. You can find the full list at the bottom of the article in the dropdown menu.

The second section is the format you'd like to display the date in. Common formats are:

• dd/MM/YYYY – displays as 02/11/2021 (British/Australian format)
• MM/dd/YYYY - displays as 11/02/2021 (US format)

You can see here for a full list of formatting options.

Timezones

You can use any of the timezone options available below:

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