Syncing Convio Interests with Offline Database

Sean Downing

We have a dozen Convio E-mail "Interests" that we'd like to sync automatically with our offline database. Our first thought was using our Custom Data Sync, which would allow us to map each Interest to a Raisers Edge Emailing Information Attribute (12 fields, one for each Interest). However, every time we create a new Interest we'd have to adjust the Data Sync, which does not seem ideal. We then thought about using a Segmentation Upload, which allows Raisers Edge to upload Interest selections into Convio. Unfortunately that only does half of what we need; it omits the Convio-down-to-Raisers-Edge part.

Has anyone attempted to automatically sync Convio Interests with Emailing Information Attributes in an offline database?

Bennett Donovan

Hi Sean - It is possible to create an interest download that sends down information only about interests that you've entered on a cross-reference table.  That way, you can add or subtract interests to the download yourself just by adding or removing cross-reference entries; no changes to the operation's underlying code are necessary.  I will add that Convio only logs opt-in/opt-out actions for email interests, so any interest "sync" (sending you down opt-ins and opt-outs since the last operation) would be restricted to email interests.  Please contact your Account Manager if you are interested in having such a project scoped.

Bryce Katzman

Bennett Donovan:

Hi Sean - It is possible to create an interest download that sends down information only about interests that you've entered on a cross-reference table.  That way, you can add or subtract interests to the download yourself just by adding or removing cross-reference entries; no changes to the operation's underlying code are necessary.  I will add that Convio only logs opt-in/opt-out actions for email interests, so any interest "sync" (sending you down opt-ins and opt-outs since the last operation) would be restricted to email interests.  Please contact your Account Manager if you are interested in having such a project scoped.

Here is my manual/clunky solution. Luckily I haven't had to do this...

1) Export Opt-In out of Convio

2) Global change in RE to add attribute of Group Name + Yes (this attribute should only allow 1 in tables)

3) Export Opt-Out of Convio

4) Global change in RE to add some kind of attribute (something to query on)

5) Global change in RE to change Group Name from Yes to No

6) Global change in RE to remove the attribute from step 4

So as you can see it is definitely not a simple or sleek process. Anybody have a better idea??

Matt Burghdoff 2

We haven't tried to do that ourselves, but it seems to me that the best way to do this would involve group assignments and queries.  Do you have your email interests automatically building a group of opt-ins and opt-outs?  If so, try this:

1) In Convio, create a query.  Use the "Add Group Clause" to select and add anyone who is a member of the different groups you've created corresponding to the interest categories.

2) Use the query to create a mail merge file spitting out the constituent's group membership and RE ID - or Import ID, if your RE database people prefer to use that.

3) Adjust the mail merge file as you desire - probably changing the group names to fit your RE coding for the attribute(s) that you're using.

4) Use an RE Constituent Attribute Import to get the data into Raiser's Edge.

That should work for what you're looking to do, and it shouldn't matter how often you want to change the names, add categories, etc. - you'll just need to be sure to create the new mirror in Raiser's Edge as you normally would.  I know this isn't a completely hands-off import, but my understanding of Convio's data sync is that nothing is COMPLETELY hands off anyway - the info will still need to be imported by a person on your database team.

Processing opt-outs would be a little trickier, but might not need to be automatic.  If you only have a few opt-outs per month, even, you might be better off to simply delete or change that by hand - we have a house file in the 6 digits and maybe get 5-10 category opt-outs on a monthly basis.