Defining custom attributes as 'date' types enhances your ability to deliver precise and timely messages. Dates are crucial in campaigns, serving as key triggers for personalized outreach.

Use custom date attributes to create targeted audience segments, allowing you to tailor your communications more effectively for anniversaries, pre-boarding, onboarding and more! 

Please refer to Generate and Create Audiences with Audience Attributes for more details on creating audiences using attributes.

How Have Custom Date Attributes Changed?

Previously, custom date attributes configured via file sync or User API, were stored as strings, limiting their functionality to string operators in the audience builder. Even if a date value was provided, it was treated as a string, making it ineffective for building audiences based on date criteria. Now, custom date attributes are stored in date format, allowing you to utilize the same date-specific operators available for system date attributes like 'Anniversary.'

System Date Attributes

System date attributes use the following date operators, and the 'value' field then provides a calendar for convenient date selection:

on
between
since
last
next
relative

Custom Date Attributes

Previous Behavior

As shown below, custom date attributes were previously stored as strings, limiting their use to string operators only:

is
is not
contains

New Behavior

Custom date attributes are now treated the same as system date attributes, with the same available date operators, as well as a calendar for convenient date selection:

on
between
since
last
next
relative