Custom properties let you attach your own key/value information to a journey step or an audience in Data Activation. That information is included in the API response, so systems that read your journey and audience data get business context alongside the structural data.
For example, you can add a priority level, an agent script, or a next action to a step. A downstream system, such as a call center application, reads these values directly from the API. You don't need to maintain a separate table that maps step or audience IDs to your business context.
Note
Custom properties are available on request. To turn them on for your account, contact our support team.
What custom properties are
A custom property is a static key/value pair you define on a journey step or an audience. Each property has a key (a short label) and a value (the information you want to store).
Custom properties don't change how a journey or audience runs. They add context that travels with your data into the API response. In the response, custom properties appear in a field named metadata.
Keys, values, and limits
You can add up to 5 custom properties per step or audience.
A key can contain letters, numbers, and underscores. It can't start with a number and can be up to 64 characters long, for example
priority_1.A value can be any text, up to 1,000 characters.
Both the key and the value are required.
Each key must be unique within the same step.
How custom properties appear in the API
When a step or audience has custom properties, they're returned in the API response as a metadata object. The object is a flat set of string keys and string values.
{
"journeyId": "a1b2c3d4-e5f6-7890-abcd-ef1234567890",
"journeyName": "Win-back campaign",
"stepId": "f9e8d7c6-b5a4-3210-fedc-ba0987654321",
"stepName": "Send reminder",
"metadata": {
"priority": "critical",
"agent_script": "Ask about the recent service issue.",
"next_action": "Offer a discount if the customer is eligible."
}
}Keep two things in mind:
When a step or audience has no custom properties, the response leaves out the
metadatafield. It isn't returned as an empty object.Values are returned exactly as you entered them, with no changes.
Before you begin
Custom properties are available on request. To turn them on for your account, contact our support team.
You need edit permissions for journeys or audiences. Without edit permissions, you can view existing custom properties, but you can't add or change them.
Instructions
Add custom properties to a journey step
On the Data Activation platform, go to Orchestration.
Open the journey you want to edit.
Click the step you want to add properties to. The step configuration drawer opens.
Open the Custom properties tab.
Click Add property.
Enter a Key and a Value.
You can add up to 5 properties per step.
Click Save.
Add custom properties to an audience
An audience works like a journey with a single step, so you add custom properties the same way.
On the Data Activation platform, select Audiences in the left-side navigation bar.
Open the audience you want to edit.
Open the step configuration for the audience.
Open the Custom properties tab.
Add your key/value pairs and click Save.
Validation and publishing
Data Activation checks your custom properties when you save and again when you publish. Publishing is blocked if any step has an empty key, an empty value, invalid characters, or duplicate keys.
If a property is invalid, it appears in the publish validation list alongside any other configuration errors. Fix the listed issues, then publish again.
What happens when you clone or run experiments
When you clone a journey or audience, we copy its custom properties to the clone. The copies are independent, so editing one doesn't affect the other.
In experiments, custom properties are set per variant. Each variant keeps its own set, the same way connectors and event listeners do.