Survey Prompts Syntax

To provide a more personalized survey experience and gather the most effective feedback, you can customize survey prompts with dynamic variables and conditional branching. Interaction variables allow you to dynamically populate data such as the agent name or any custom attribute. You can use conditional expressions to present prompts differently based on the context of the interaction. You can also add images and links directly into survey prompts. All of this can be done with the Mindful Feedback survey prompt syntax described in this guide.

Overview

This article covers the following topics:

• Interaction Variables
• Logical operators
• Conditional expressions
• Images, links, and special characters

Interaction Variables

Text and text-to-speech prompts in Mindful Feedback can change based on interaction variables. To insert the value of an interaction variable into a text prompt, use the format %variable%. For example, to insert the name of the agent associated with a survey, you could reference the agent_name attrbute as follows:

We would like to ask about your recent call with %agent_name%.

In this example, if the agent associated with the interaction is named Joe, the customer would see "We would like to ask about your recent call with Joe." 

Default Interaction Variables

The interaction variables listed below are available by default.

Custom Interaction Variables

Custom interaction data can also be accessed the same way. For example, if you have set up a survey that assigns the customer's name to a custom interaction variable named customer_name, you could modify the earlier example to reference the custom attribute:

Hello %customer_name%. We would like to ask about your recent call with %agent_name%.

In this case, a customer named Susan would see "Hello Susan. We would like to ask about your recent call with Joe."

Variable Mutators

Mutators can be used to change the value of existing variables. For example, you could change the agent ID to uppercase using the %agent_id.toUpper% mutator. 

Expand the content below for a list of all available mutators.

Click to view variable mutators

Logical Operators

Survey syntax supports basic logical operators such equals (==) and greater than (>), in addition to more advanced operators such as contained in (=~). You can also use the pipe operator ( | ) to build complex if/then/else logic in conditional statements. The following section details the available operators.

Comparison Operators

The following comparison operators can be used:

The Pipe Operator ( | ) -  Set Default / Else / Else if / Or

The pipe operator can be used for several purposes in survey syntax:

• to define a default value when a referenced interaction variable does not contain a value
• for ELSE and ELSE IF statements in conditional expressions
• to achieve the same purpose as an OR statement in conditional expressions

Defining a Default Value

When you are not sure if your custom variables will have a value for all interactions, you can use the pipe operator to define a default value for the variable. In the example below, the value valued customer would be provided if the custom respondent_name variable is empty:

Hello [%respondent_name%|valued customer].

In this example, the square braces ([ ]) contain an expression. The pipe operator returns the value on the left side of an expression if possible and the value on the right side if not. In this case, if the respondent_name variable is empty, the customer will see "Hello valued customer."

Pipes can also be chained together as in the following example:

We would like to ask you about your call with [%agent_name%|%agent_id%|our customer service representative].

In this example, the agent will be referred to by name if they have a Mindful Feedback account, otherwise they will be referred to by their agent ID only. If the agent ID is also not defined for an interaction, it will generically refer to them as "our customer service representative."

Conditional Expressions

If/Then Expressions

For a more customized survey experience, you may wish to prompt or ask different things based on the value of an interaction variable. You can do this via conditional expressions using the if/then operator (??).

The following example uses the if/then operator (??) and the equals comparison operator (==) to show different messages depending on the value of the %call_type% variable:

We would like to ask you about your recent [%call_type%==SERVICE?? customer service experience][%call_type%==SUPPORT?? technical support request].

The expression can be understood as "if call_type is SERVICE, display customer service experience. If call_type is SUPPORT, display technical support request."

Assuming that the value of call_type is SERVICE, the customer would see "We would like to ask you about your recent customer service experience."

If/Then/Else Expressions

You can use the if/then operator in conjunction with the pipe operator to create if/then/else expressions. When placed within an if/then expression, the pipe operator acts as an else:

[%custom_var%==value??A|B]

This expression will show A if the variable custom_var is set to "value" and B in all other situations.

If/Or Conditions

There is no or operator to build complex conditions. However, you can perform the same logical operation by using several if/then/else statements together, as in the following example:

[%Department%==Support??Department is Support|%Department%==Helpdesk??Department is Support]

This statement would evaluate to TRUE if either "Support" or "Helpdesk" are found in the Department variable, and would assign the same output if either value is found. This achieves the same purpose as using an or statement to combine both conditions into one.

Images, Links, and Special Characters

The remainder of this article discusses additional dynamic elements you can add via survey syntax.

Images

You can include images in email and web survey prompts using the syntax . For example:

![Mindful Feedback Logo](https://demo.surveydynamix.com/img/logos/sd_logo_large.png)

HTML Links

You can include clickable links in email and web survey prompts using the syntax [Link text](URL). For example:

[Mindful Feedback](https://demo.surveydynamix.com)

Escaping Special Characters

Special Characters can be escaped by preceding them with a single backslash. For example, if you want to print the opening bracket character ( [ ) instead of using it as a prompt expression, you could escape the opening bracket with \[.