I’ve been in and around technology for nearly 20 years. Everything from IT administration/end-user support, software development and technology marketing/sales. In each one of these lines of work, there has been a consistent theme. Testing.

Why Testing?

If we’re honest, all end user support starts with a lot of questions. What was happening when that issue happened? Were you doing another task when that happened? What led up to the error? What showed up on screen when it happened? These questions are all designed to provide answers that lead to preventing that issue in the future.

Every operating system, mobile application or other software that we may use, operates in an environment that is unique to it. Trying to determine the source of these issues, often means understanding the environment as well as every unique element related to it. Once a possible source is discovered, we test to determine if our hypothesis is correct.

In a similar fashion, whether you are designing digital learning tools, or a robust marketing automation solution, each newly designed feature or added capability requires testing to ensure that it operates in a manner befitting its goal. And likewise with marketing messages, there are companies that primarily work on focus group testing messages with a variety of audiences to ensure that their message is resonating with it’s potential customers.

If we can find testing in so many environments, then it makes logical sense that we equip our own organizations with systems that provide us with the opportunity to test out new software that will impact our business. That’s why we are excited to share that we will be re-launching a beta-release program with the announcement of Mautic 2.9.0!

Beta-Release

For those who don’t adhere to a release management process, in its simplest form there is a test server and a production server. Each of these have their own purpose. The test server provides organizations with the ability to load and test pre-releases of software in an environment that doesn’t interrupt your day-to-day marketing automation (or other business) activities. The production server typically contains the most stable version of the software that enables you to continue gathering data on your audience as well as provide them with value at every interaction.

Mautic makes it simple to access and test beta-releases. To set up a test server, follow a similar process for a production server, with the most significant change occurring in the setup of Mautic. Follow the link below for more configuration details.

IMPORTANT NOTE: Please do not use beta releases in your production environment. There may be bugs still present in a beta release. Remember to always take a backup of your files and database prior to applying any updates, beta or otherwise.

Mautic 2.9.0 Beta-Release

For more detailed information on how you can access the Mautic 2.9.0 beta-release click here.

Now you are ready to test! Be sure to access Mautic’s Github Pre-release page to determine what features are being released and what issues are being resolved.

…a systematic and repeatable organizational capability to achieve and maintain profitable and significant growth.

With each bug we squash and new feature we develop, we seek to tackle each challenge your business may face. Ultimately building Mautic into an “organizational capability” that will help you fast track your growth.

Your journey is our journey. We are poised and ready to support your growth as you create meaningful experiences with your customers. Release 2.1 carries with it a number of features that we believe will help your business, and ultimately your customers, grow faster and smarter. This release includes the following;

Campaign Management

• Custom Themes: Users now have the ability to upload and use their own custom themes! Create an email or landing page theme/template that represents your brand and use it over and over again. Administrators can upload, download, view or delete themes by accessing the theme menu item in the settings area. All users on the account can access the custom themes from the theme selection area while building new emails and landing pages.
• Multi Lingual Dynamic Content on Emails and Landing Pages: Many businesses work with customers around the globe. Now a preferred language can automatically be associated with a contact based on the language settings in their browser! Users can translate a page or email into various languages and also link different versions together. The page or email is then dynamically displayed into the contacts language! (if a translation exists). The default language can also be set manually.
• New Campaign Builder Experience: Building campaigns should be incredibly fast and intuitive. Well the campaign builder has has gotten a powerful usability increase! A list of available actions are displayed by clicking on the ‘+’ for each campaign item making it more efficient to use the campaign builder. Talk about a time saver.

Contact Management

• Progressive Profiling: Forms now have dynamic fields! When serving up a form, information that the system already knows about the contact can be hidden, and alternate fields can be displayed in their place. This ensures that the contact is only asked to complete limited information every time they fill out a form. This reduces the risk of abandoning a form when they are part way through. Yes!
• Touch Management: There are specific times when you should send information through specific channels. Administrators can now set limits on the maximum number of times a contact can receive a message through a particular channel. Limits can be set per channel, system wide for all contacts and can also be overwritten at the individual contact level. Don’t fall into the trap of over communicating with your contacts.
• New Interface for Timeline Activities: Viewing timeline activities in the contact record can be a struggle. Well, now you can view record detail in a tab-based format, making it much easier to consume and filter activities. Here’s to making information easier to read!

Reporting and Tracking

• Reporting on SMS and Web: You want more detail, we’ve got more detail. Information such as creator, date and category are now tracked for the SMS and Web notification channels. This enables better understanding and visibility of the content sent through these channels.
• Device Granularity: Now you can see which devices contacts are using to view their emails and landing pages! Two new dashboard widgets have been created to show device usage by segment and by channel. Now you can view a breakdown of usage based on devices such as a tablet, mobile or desktop. Device information is also available for each email/landing page, on the contact timeline and in reports. This feature will help you understand what devices your contacts are using to consume your content.

Integrations

• Expanded Salesforce Integration: The integration to Salesforce has been expanded! Now, information from contacts in Salesforce can be mapped back to contacts in Mautic! Timeline activity from the contact in Mautic can be also be written back to the Lead or Contact record in Salesforce. This enables sales users in Salesforce to see what marketing activities the record has interacted with. Win. Win.
• Video Integration: Deeper video integration is here! Users can insert videos from Vimeo or YouTube or any other mp4 platforms onto landing pages with a gate. This means the user can require a contact to fill out a form after the video has played for a predefined period of time. Video consumption metrics including time viewed and percent of the video watched are also available on the contact’s timeline.

We’ve assembled a playlist of videos to help you understand these new features. We’ll be adding to this playlist throughout the day so be sure to hover over the playlist button and scroll down to access them all.

The powerful features we’ve packed into release 2.1 are just that. Powerful. They are designed to help your business move beyond being inspired to grow, and actually create measurable results.

Mautic 2.1 Upgrade Details:

For more detailed information about the release for self-hosted users, please follow this link to the Mautic 2.1 Release Notes. If you experience any challenges accessing or using these incredible new features, please be sure to connect with us on Slack and the Community Forum.

Thank you for being an important part of the Mautic community!