Email Campaigns

Broadcast vs Journey Campaigns

Modality supports two campaign types, each designed for different use cases:

• Broadcast campaigns are one-time sends. You build the email, choose your audience, and send it immediately or schedule it for a specific date and time. Once sent, the campaign is complete and you can review analytics.
• Journey campaigns are automated, recurring sends. They can be triggered by automations (form submission, tag added, ticket purchased) or run on a schedule (daily, weekly, monthly, or custom cron expression). Journey campaigns stay active and continue sending to new people who match the trigger criteria.

You can convert between types at any time from the More menu on the campaign detail page. Converting a broadcast to a journey preserves all content and settings; you just need to configure a trigger.

Creating a Broadcast Campaign

Follow these steps to create and send a broadcast campaign:

1. 1

   Navigate to Campaigns

   Click "Campaigns" in the sidebar navigation. You will see all existing campaigns with their status, type, and provider.

2. 2

   Click "New Campaign"

   The new campaign dialog appears. Enter a name for your campaign (e.g., "Spring Event Announcement"). Select "Broadcast" as the campaign type. Choose your sending provider: Modality (native) or a connected ESP (Brevo, Mailchimp, Klaviyo).

3. 3

   Choose your starting point

   The setup wizard appears with four options: start from scratch, generate with AI, pick a template, or paste HTML. See the next section for details on each option.

4. 4

   Complete the checklist

   The campaign detail page opens with a checklist guiding you through Sender, Recipients, Subject, and Design. Complete each section to unlock the Send button.

The Setup Wizard

After creating a campaign, the setup wizard gives you four ways to start building your email:

Start from Scratch

Opens the visual email editor with a blank canvas. You build your email block by block using the drag-and-drop editor. Best for custom designs that do not match any existing template.

Generate with AI Campaign Studio

Opens the AI Campaign Studio modal. Describe your campaign goal, select a tone, choose sections (hero, body, CTA, footer), and optionally link events from your workspace. AI generates a complete email using your brand kit assets. See the AI Campaign Studio section for a full walkthrough.

Choose from Template Library

Browse 9 built-in starter templates organized by category: welcome, newsletter, event announcement, promotional, transactional, and minimal. Each template shows a live preview before you apply it. Click "Use Template" to load it into the editor, where you can customize every element.

Paste Existing HTML

Paste raw HTML from another email tool or export. Modality parses the HTML and attempts to convert it into editable blocks. A live preview renders alongside the code editor so you can verify the result. If parsing fails, the HTML is wrapped in a single code block that renders as-is.

The Campaign Checklist

The campaign detail page uses a step-by-step checklist layout. A progress bar at the top shows how many sections are complete. Each section expands to reveal its configuration:

Sender

Configure the "From" name and email address. If you have a verified custom sending domain, it appears as an option. Otherwise, emails send from your workspace name via the shared modalitystudio.com domain. You can also set a Reply-To address if it differs from the sender.

Recipients

Choose who receives the campaign. Options include:

• A specific list — select from existing lists or create a new one inline
• All contacts — sends to every active, subscribed person in your workspace
• Tag-based — target people with specific tags

The recipient count updates in real time as you change selections. People with "Unsubscribed" or "Bounced" status are automatically excluded.

Subject Line

Enter your subject line and optional preview text. Merge tags are supported (e.g.,{{firstName}}). The preview panel on the right updates to show how the subject and preview text appear in an inbox.

Design

Shows the current email design status. Click "Edit Design" to open the visual editor, or "Change Design" to return to the setup wizard and choose a different starting point. A thumbnail preview of the current design appears in the checklist.

The Visual Email Editor

The email editor is a full-page, drag-and-drop builder. It consists of three panels:

• Left panel (Block palette) — drag blocks onto the canvas: heading, paragraph, image, button, divider, spacer, social links, logo, and columns
• Center (Canvas) — the live email preview where you arrange and edit blocks
• Right panel (Settings) — block-specific settings appear when you select a block (colors, padding, alignment, link URL, etc.)

Working with Blocks

1. Drag a block from the left palette onto the canvas. A blue insertion indicator shows where it will land.
2. Click any block to select it. The right panel shows its settings.
3. Drag the handle on the left edge of a selected block to reorder it.
4. Click the trash icon on a selected block to delete it.
5. For text blocks (heading, paragraph), click directly on the text to edit inline. A floating toolbar appears with bold, italic, underline, link, and alignment options.

Brand Colors in the Editor

Every color picker in the editor includes your brand kit colors as preset swatches. This ensures consistent branding without remembering hex codes. Colors are pulled from your Brand Kit settings (primary, secondary, accent, and navbar colors).

Merge Tags

Insert personalization tokens into any text block. Click the merge tag button in the text toolbar or type {{ to open the merge tag dropdown. Available tags include:

• {{firstName}} — recipient's first name
• {{lastName}} — recipient's last name
• {{email}} — recipient's email address
• {{unsubscribeUrl}} — one-click unsubscribe link (required for compliance)
• Any custom field defined in your workspace

Merge tags render as colored pills in the editor. Switch to the Preview tab to see them replaced with sample data.

AI Campaign Studio

The AI Campaign Studio generates complete, brand-consistent email campaigns from a text description. Here is how to use it step by step:

1. 1

   Select campaign type

   Choose from: event announcement, newsletter, promotional offer, follow-up, thank you, or custom. This guides the AI's content structure and tone.

2. 2

   Describe your goal

   Write a brief description of what the email should accomplish. For example: "Announce our upcoming summer festival with early bird pricing and lineup reveal."

3. 3

   Choose tone and sections

   Select a tone (professional, casual, urgent, playful, etc.) and pick which sections to include: hero image, intro paragraph, event details, CTA button, social links, footer.

4. 4

   Link events (optional)

   Select events from your workspace to pull in real data: event name, date, venue, ticket types, and pricing. This data is woven into the generated content.

5. 5

   Generate and review

   Click Generate. The AI produces the email using your brand kit (logo, colors, fonts) and returns a live preview. Brand assets are automatically applied. You can regenerate with adjusted settings or load the result into the visual editor for manual refinement.

Template Library

Modality includes 9 built-in starter templates to jumpstart your email design:

• Welcome — clean onboarding email with logo, greeting, and CTA
• Newsletter — multi-section layout with featured article, secondary stories, and footer
• Event Announcement — hero image, event details, ticket CTA, and lineup section
• Promotional — bold headline, offer details, and urgency CTA
• Transactional — minimal layout for order confirmations and receipts
• Minimal — plain text style with logo and single CTA
• Follow-up — short thank-you with next steps
• Invitation — elegant event invite with RSVP button
• Recap — post-event summary with photos and highlights

To save your own template, open any campaign's email editor, click the More menu, and select "Save as Template." Custom templates appear alongside built-in ones in the template picker.

Pre-Send Review and Content Screening

Before a campaign is sent, Modality runs a comprehensive preflight check. The pre-send review dialog shows the results organized into categories:

Content Screening

• Spam trigger words — flags words like "free," "act now," "limited time" that may trigger spam filters
• Missing unsubscribe link — checks for the presence of {{unsubscribeUrl}} or a manual unsubscribe link
• ALL CAPS subject — warns if the subject line is entirely uppercase
• Excessive exclamation marks — flags subjects or body text with more than 3 consecutive exclamation marks
• Image-to-text ratio — warns if the email is predominantly images with little text, which hurts deliverability
• Unknown merge tags — catches merge tags that do not match any field in your schema

Deliverability Health

The dialog displays your sender reputation based on a 30-day rolling window:

• Green — bounce rate below 3%, spam complaint rate below 0.05%
• Amber — bounce rate 3-5% or spam rate 0.05-0.1%
• Red — bounce rate above 5% or spam rate above 0.1% (sending may be blocked)

Audience & Limits

The review shows the total recipient count after excluding unsubscribed and bounced contacts, and checks against your plan's monthly send limit (Free: 500, Pro: 10K, Business: 50K). If the send would exceed your limit, the Send button is disabled with an upgrade prompt.

Sending and Scheduling

Once all checklist items are complete and the pre-send review passes, you have two options:

Send Immediately

Click "Send Now" to begin delivery immediately. Emails are sent in batches with rate limiting to protect deliverability. For native sending via Modality, batches of 100 are sent with a brief delay between batches. You can monitor send progress in real time on the campaign detail page.

Schedule for Later

Click the dropdown arrow next to Send and select "Schedule." Pick a date and time in your workspace timezone. Scheduled campaigns show a "Scheduled" badge with the send time. You can edit or cancel a scheduled campaign at any time before the send window.

Campaign Analytics

After a campaign is sent, the detail page transforms into an analytics dashboard. Metrics are updated in near real-time via webhooks from the sending provider.

Performance Metrics

• Delivered — number and percentage of emails successfully delivered
• Opened — unique opens with open rate percentage
• Clicked — unique clicks with click-through rate
• Unsubscribed — people who unsubscribed via this campaign
• Bounced — hard and soft bounces
• Spam complaints — recipients who marked the email as spam

Activity Timeline

Below the metrics cards, a chronological activity feed shows individual events: deliveries, opens, clicks (with the clicked URL), bounces, and unsubscribes. Each entry links to the person's record in the CRM.