Conditional First Name tag use with if/else

[webfriendly]

Hello!

Now, my %FIRSTNAME% is defaulting to “Hey” if the first name value is blank.
Any kind of default value creates limitations when it comes to creating personalized subject lines and message starts.
What I’m trying to do is super simple:

1. Create IF/ELSE conditional personalization in the subject line that will check if the First Name field is blank and then put in a blank value (not the default for the tag)
2. Create two conditional text blocks in the message, one of which is only used when the First Name value is blank and another when it is not.

So far, I’ve only managed to break the entire email by trying {blank} (Test sends “Your content could not be processed”, and the Spam filter processes forever).

The only topic that I have managed to find on this is:

How to check if a custom field value is blank

If I create a custom field as, say, a dropdown with values = {A, B, C, D, and Unknown}, then I set the default value as Unknown, it turns out that all new contacts get created with this field = BLANK rather than Unknown. I wish I understood why AC does this, but let’s assume there’s a good reason, for now. Why they do this is irrelevant to my question. Inside an automation, I want to check if this custom field = Unknown or BLANK. If YES, set the value to A. If NO (for cases where the va…

Am I missing something obvious? Is there a way to do this at all?

[bungalowsoftware]

I haven’t tested, but this is what I found on forum:

%IF $FIRSTNAME != ‘’%
Hi %FIRSTNAME%,
%ELSE%
Hi,
%/IF%

[pleon]

Hi @bungalowsoftware,

Let me know if my previous response to your other questions clears everything up. If not, we will work on getting a better solution for you.

Perry

[webfriendly]

@bungalowsoftware

I haven’t tested, but this is what I found on forum:

%IF $FIRSTNAME != ‘’%Hi %FIRSTNAME%,%ELSE%Hi,%/IF%

I tested this and it doesn’t produce the desired result. It just returns “Hi Hey” (“Hey” is my default)

Any other ideas?

[pleon]

Hi @webfriendly,

I have seen “Hi There, Hi Friend, Hey There, Hey You” and others used as default values. Hope that helps!

Perry

[bungalowsoftware]

Can you show your exact %expression% ?

[webfriendly]

Just exactly what you posted:

%IF $FIRSTNAME != ‘’%Hi %FIRSTNAME%,%ELSE%Hi,%/IF%

[pmctraining]

There is a simpler solution here: https://ideas.activecampaign.com/ideas/AC-I-10971

[fundingforgood]

The expression string above does not work. Can someone please check the syntax and send a corrected/working version or provide us with the AC syntax dictionary/resource so I can generate a working expression for my emails?

[agconsult20879]

We just tried this in one of our message variables and it worked for us:

%IF empty($FIRSTNAME)%
Hey,

%ELSE%

Hey %FIRSTNAME%,

%/IF%

[bloomcommunity]

Thanks for this! It worked.

[hishholds]

Did you try to add user name in your content? I have tried this on my email. You can see.

[adriennejohnson]

What’s wrong in the original string are the quotation marks.

Here’s the updated version:

%IF $FIRSTNAME !=’’%
Hi %FIRSTNAME%,
%ELSE%
Hi,
%/IF%

–those are two separate single quotation marks after the = , one for the opening and one for the closing.