5 things you should know about Real-time Journeys

1. Trigger based Journeys can be edited and re-started after Go live. Segment based Journeys can not

So, my advice is to use trigger based Journeys wherever possible to be able to do changes at a later time and not loosing the whole Journey progress.

2. Journeys with too many branches underneath each other may not be published

This is a learning from my daily work with the Journey designer. More than 4 to 5 branches in a row will often prevent the Journey from Go Live. As a workaround, you may split the Journey into two or more parts and connect them via a custom trigger.

3. There is no email expire date option like in Outbound Customer Journeys

Keep this in mind if you need to disable emails on or after a specific date. My personal workaround is using the new tile 'send a series of messages' where an exit based on a date can be defined.

4. Be careful with the email link clicked - branch

Branches will always be evaluated based on the FIRST link clicked. If you use this decision rule for critical emails like opt-in or confirmation ones, be sure to remove every other link except the central one your customers should click on. This includes all links on logos, footers, text, social media or images. Otherwise you may redirect customers who clicked on a logo first down the wrong path in your Journey even if they click on the intended link at a later time.

5. Adding CC recipients to your emails can distort your activity data

Each interaction a CC recipient does with the email copy is directly reflected for the Contact or Lead itself. This means, if the person in CC opens up the email copy, clicks on links or uses the Preference Center everything is counted towards the Contact's activity history. This can impact the Journey (wrong path!) and the reporting in a negative way.