Clarification on Date Handling for Event-Based Segmentation in AEP/RTCDP

[yesraptors12]

Hello Community,

I'm seeking clarification on how AEP/RTCDP processes date attributes from events for audience segmentation purposes.

Consider the following scenario:

We receive an event through Data Collection, specifically for a restaurant booking. The event payload is as follows:

{
"event": "Restaurant Booking",
"event_date": "2023-12-01",
"NumOfPerson": 2,
"booking_date": "2024-02-02",
"email": "abc@gmail.com"
}

Given today’s date is 2023-12-01, we have configured an audience segment within AEP titled "Booking Today" with the following criteria:

booking_date = TODAY

As expected, the user with the email `abc@gmail.com` does not qualify for this segment on 2023-12-01 since the `booking_date` is set to a future date (2024-02-02).

Here's the crux of my query:

When the actual date reaches 2024-02-02, does the AEP/RTCDP system retroactively reevaluate past events (specifically the one from 2023-12-01) to include the user `abc@gmail.com` in the "Booking Today" segment?

I believe the system won't retrospectively process the event, but I would like to confirm if this assumption is correct. Any insights or official documentation references would be greatly appreciated.

Thank you in advance for your assistance!

Cheers,

Rap

[brekrut]

When it comes to events within the Adobe RTCDP platform the minimum payload is required.

{ "_id": "unique identifier",

"timestamp": "ISO time stamp of when event occured"

"identityfield": "string"

} 

The timestamp value of the event can be a current, prior, or future timestamp.  As noted in your use case if you are loading events with a timestamp which is a future data from the current date and your segmentation rule contains the logic of timestamp = today.

When future facing events are loaded into the Adobe RTCDP platform the will remain on profile, but the event will not qualify profiles due to the segmentation condition.  Once per day the global segment job will run for all segments in the Adobe RTCDP.  When today equals the future timestamp then the future events will qualify.  

To answer your question the event will qualify the profile when the segment rule criteria is met.

[yesraptors12]

Thanks @brekrut! Good to know RTCDP run global segment job in daily basis.

I have a follow-up questions concerning segment membership persistence:

Given a segment with the rule timestamp = today, I understand that users will qualify for this segment when their event's timestamp matches the current date TODAY. For example, if the booking_date is "2023-02-01" and today is indeed 2023-02-01, the user will be included in the segment.

My question pertains to what happens after today:

1. Will the user remain a member of this segment indefinitely after qualifying, or is the segment membership re-evaluated daily? Specifically, will the user still be part of the "Booking Today" segment on 2023-02-02, the day after the booking date?
2. If the system does not automatically remove users from the segment the following day, would it be advisable to create a complementary "No Booking Today" segment for exclusion purposes?
3. Additionally, could this lead to a scenario where the same user qualifies for both the "Booking Today" and "No Booking Today" segments if they make another booking in the future?

Asking this because we want to ensure that our marketing automation system receives only the segment containing guests with bookings for the current day. It is crucial for our operations to maintain an up-to-date segment that exclusively includes today's guests.

Thanks,
Rap

[brekrut]

@yesraptors12 

With the scenario where the segment rule is timestamp = today and we have multiple profiles in the Adobe RTCDP environment.  Consider the following profiles in in the sample below where the timestamp named value pair will have different values per profile.

A profile will qualify for the segment during the daily evaluation.  This will result in a realized segmentation status.  When the segmentation job runs on day 2, profiles who no longer qualify will have the segmentation status updated from realized to exited.

The segment definition’s participation status as part of the current request. Must be equal to one of the following known values:
realized: Entity qualifies for the segment definition.
exited: Entity is exiting the segment definition.

	profile	Timestamp value
	A	today
	B	today + 1
	C	today-1
	Segmentation job
	Today	Today+1	Today +2
Profiles qualified	A	B

[yesraptors12]

Thanks @brekrut  for clearing my doubt, I was so worrying about this cannot be handle properly.

[yesraptors12]

@brekrut is this a special treatment only for data type related i.e. DateTime?

[brekrut]

All segments will be evaluated each day by the daily segment job. profiles which meet the criteria qualify for the audience/segment. Profiles which no longer qualify will exit from the audience/segment.