Custom fields

Custom Fields

Zoho Campaigns allows you to create your custom fields for your contacts where you can store the extra information. With Custom fields, you can feed any type of information, set character limit, create custom merge tags, and use them to save data which are specific to your business needs.

Only users with Admin roles can create and modify custom fields.

How to add custom fields?

To add custom fields, follow the steps below:

Click Settings icon on the top-right corner of the screen.
Select Custom Fields under Customization.
Click the Add New button.
Select the custom field type: Contact field or Account field.
Provide the Display Label, Field Length and Mail Default value. Click Add.

Note:

For accounts custom fields, a merge tag will be automatically created as soon as you create and map the account custom fields. It will be available in the merge tags section.

Field length

We have different field types to create diverse custom fields ranging from text area field to radio buttons.

Field Type	Other Details	Maximum field length
Text	To enter a simple text input	300
Integer	To enter and validate numeric input	9
Email	To enter a valid email address	100
Phone	To enter a valid phone number	20
Date	Format- MM/DD/ YYYY	18
Date and Time	Format- MM/DD/ YYYY HH:MM	18
Pick List	Specify the pick list values	100
Multiselect Pick list	To choose multiple values	100
Percentage	To enter Percentage values.	5
Decimal	To enter numerical decimals	16
Radio Buttons	To choose any one of the predefined set of options.	100
Checkbox	To select an option	NA
Long Integer	To enter numerals with maximum characters	18
URL	To enter a web address	200
Text Area	To enter a text input with maximum characters, e.g. Description field.	2000
Multiselect Checkbox	To display multiple checkbox options.	100
Anniversary Field	To enter a date value. The date can be anything from the contacts' birthday to a wedding anniversary. The selected values will be stored in the format "DDMM, MMDD".	NA

Maximum number of fields

You can have a maximum of 150 custom fields in your Campaigns account.

A maximum of 75 text fields can be created.

Data type	No of allowed fields
Text, Phone, Email, Picklist, Multiselect, Radio option,URL,Text area, Multiselect Checkbox, Rich text, Append field, Birthday	75
Integer	16
Date, Date Time, Long Integer	33
Checkbox	11
Decimal,Percent	15

Use case

1. When I try to add a new custom field with the Checkbox type, I receive an error message saying I have reached the maximum limit. How can I add the custom field?

You need to delete one of the Checkbox custom fields to add a new field of the same type. You can create a total of 150 custom fields and 10 custom Checkbox fields. To delete a custom field,

Click Settings icon on the top-right corner of the screen.
Select Custom Fields under Customization.
Click Delete icon beside the required field.
Click Delete in the popup that follows.

Note: You cannot edit or delete a custom field as it is used in components like sync, merge tags, segments and so on. Please remove the field from its associated components before deleting it.

How to encrypt a custom field?

Click Settings icon on the top-right corner of the screen.
Select Custom Fields under Customization.
Click the Add New button and select which custom field you wish to add.
Click the checkbox Encrypt Field if you want to turn on encryption for the custom field.
By clicking it, you have turned on encryption for the custom field.

Applications of Custom Fields

Personalize your email campaigns and autoresponders

Every custom field you create can be converted into a merge tag to personalize your email content and autoresponder messages.

For example, you can remind a contact to pay their monthly balance using the merge tag related to the custom field where the due amount is stored. Or, you can use a custom date field in autoresponders to send reminder emails for events planned.

Segmentation of Contacts

Use custom fields as criteria to create segments and filter out contacts for an email campaign. For example, you can focus on contacts in a specific city or region if this data is stored in custom fields.

Encryption of Custom Fields

Only custom field data can be encrypted. Say, for instance, you need to store confidential information like credit card details or backup phone numbers. You can include those fields in the user layout as a custom field. Data encryption is done when a custom field is created or edited. Learn more about the encryption process at Zoho Campaigns.

Specifications:

If a custom field associated with a segment or a score based view is encrypted, then they will cease functioning normally. You can resume the functioning of the segment or the score based view by turning off encryption for the associated custom field.

If a custom field associated with a workflow, autoresponder, or field-based scoring is encrypted, they will stop working. The only way to reactivate the workflow or the autoresponder is by cloning and initiating them. You cannot clone field based scoring, so you need to create a new field based scoring with your desired criteria.