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The Global Contact Rule

Jomar
  • Updated

Introduction

The Global Contact Rule is one of the foundational elements of AskNicely, designed to prevent over-surveying your contacts. With automation in play, it’s easy to unintentionally survey the same contact too frequently—which can lead to unsubscribes and lost feedback opportunities.

This rule protects the relationship between you and your customers by ensuring a thoughtful, respectful survey cadence. Once a contact unsubscribes, they are permanently marked as “Do Not Contact”, which means no future surveys or feedback from them, ever.

Step-by-Step Instructions

✅ How the Global Contact Rule Works

You can view or edit your Global Contact Rule on the Send page
➤ (paper airplane icon in the left-hand navigation)

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The rule works in two parts:

  1. Resend Delay

    “Wait at least [xx] days before surveying a contact again.”
    Example: If set to 120 days, once a contact receives a survey, they cannot be surveyed again until 120 days later.

  2. Delay for New Contacts

    “For newly added contacts, wait [yy] days before sending any survey.”
    This setting prevents brand-new contacts from being surveyed immediately (useful if you want to delay feedback collection to allow time for product delivery, onboarding, etc.)

🧠 Note: AskNicely identifies contacts by email address (for email surveys) or SMS number (for SMS surveys).

❌ What the Global Contact Rule Does Not Do

The Global Contact Rule does not schedule surveys. It simply controls eligibility.

  • Correct: "After 120 days, this contact is eligible to receive a survey."

  • Incorrect: "This contact will be surveyed exactly in 120 days."

Survey delivery still depends on your Send Scheduler settings. If you’re sending to everyone eligible daily, surveys will go out right when someone becomes eligible. But if you’re limiting sends to 25–50 per day (a recommended “drip campaign” approach), surveys will be randomized among eligible contacts.

🚫 Why This Rule Matters

  • Over-surveying leads to unsubscribe fatigue

  • Unsubscribed contacts = permanent Do Not Contact status

  • Maintaining a buffer ensures you receive ongoing, reliable feedback

Overriding the Global Contact Rule

There are several ways to bypass the Global Contact Rule when needed:

1. Using the CSV Importer

After importing a list:

  • On the “Success!” confirmation screen, check “Send a blast to the contacts in this CSV”

  • You’ll then have the option to override the Global Contact Rule for this send

2. Custom Contact Rules in Send Schedulers

  • At the bottom of the Send Scheduler, change the dropdown:

    From: Use your global contact rules
    To: Use custom contact rules

Screen_Shot_2021-09-01_at_5.56.09_PM.png

 

This lets you define unique send behavior for a specific scheduler.

3. Integration-Based Overrides

  • Certain integrations like Salesforce support sending contact-specific rules per batch

  • Useful if your CRM handles advanced segmentation or real-time workflows

4. API Integration

  • Use the triggeremails=true parameter in your API request

  • This will force the survey to send immediately, regardless of contact eligibility

FAQs & Common Issues

  • Q: If I override the Global Contact Rule once, does it reset the delay?
    A: Yes. Sending a survey restarts the eligibility clock from that date.

  • Q: Can I customize the rule by contact type or tag?
    A: Use custom contact rules in Send Schedulers for this level of control.

  • Q: Why would I delay surveys for new contacts?
    A: To allow time for product use, delivery, or onboarding before asking for feedback.

  • Q: What happens when someone unsubscribes?
    A: They are permanently blocked from receiving AskNicely surveys.

Next Steps & Related Articles

Video Tutorial

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