This article provides the technical specifications and operational procedures for implementing Exit Rules within your journeys. Exit Rules serve as a global filter, automatically removing subscribers from an active journey the moment they no longer meet your criteria, ensuring your automated messaging remains relevant.
What is it?
Exit Rules are journey-level configurations that evaluate a subscriber's eligibility at every message step. Unlike manual branches, which require individual placement, Exit Rules function as a persistent "gatekeeper" for the entire journey.
Technical Specifications:
- Evaluation Protocol: The system performs a logic check immediately before any SMS/RCS, email, or push message is dispatched.
- Capacity: You may configure a maximum of 10 rules per journey.
- Logical Complexity: Each individual rule supports up to 10 conditions, utilizing AND/OR logic to define exit triggers.
- System Exclusions: To maintain carrier compliance, Exit Rules are suppressed for the initial "Legal and Welcome" messages in a Welcome Journey.
How do I use it?
Follow these procedural steps to configure and monitor Exit Rules within the Journey Builder interface.
Configuration Steps:
Access Journey Settings: Open your journey and navigate to the Exit Rules section within the settings menu (upper right corner).
Define Criteria: Click + Condition group to select your data source. You can build rules based on:
- Product: Changes in inventory levels or specific product availability. This only applies to journeys where you can branch on product data.
- Subscriber Activity: Real-time e-commerce events such as "Purchase Completed" or "Checkout Started."
- Segment Membership: Automatic removal when a subscriber joins or leaves a specific segment.
Apply Logic: Use the + button to add multiple conditions. Define the requirement as Any (subscriber exits if one condition is met) or All (subscriber only exits if every condition is met).
Finalize: Save your changes and launch or update the journey to initialize the rules.
Manage journey revisions: Check out this article for information editing journeys, including what happens with en route subscribers.
Viewing Exit Rules in Live Journeys
You can view the current exit rules for a live journey by clicking Exit rules in the journeys settings menu (upper right corner of your journey)
Optimization & Monitoring:
- Redundancy Detection: The system will flag existing manual branches that mirror your new Exit Rules. You have the option to "prune" these redundant branches to reduce logic bloat and simplify your journey map. Be sure to review the journey to ensure everything is working as expected!
- Data Retrieval: To review performance, click on any message step in a live journey. The reporting interface will display the total number of subscribers removed at that specific step and identify which rule triggered the exit.
Why should I use it?
Exit Rules are designed to optimize both your subscriber experience and your backend journey management.
- Precision Filtering: By removing subscribers immediately after a conversion event (like a purchase), you eliminate the risk of sending redundant or annoying messages that could lead to opt-outs.
- Architectural Efficiency: Global rules significantly reduce the number of steps required on your journey canvas. This "cleaner" map is easier to troubleshoot, audit, and scale than those relying on dozens of manual exit branches.
- Real-Time Adaptability: Because rules are checked at the millisecond before a message sends, your journey reacts to the most current subscriber data available, including recent inventory shifts or segment changes.