Automated Promotion not associated for users already in target segment

jongdae.won

Hello brainCloud team,

We are investigating the behavior of Automated Promotions for users who already satisfy the target segment conditions.

During testing, we found the following behavior:

A user is already in the target segment before an Automated Promotion is created or attached to that segment.
In User Monitoring > Pricing, the user appears under User's Current Segments.
However, the segment does not show the promotion under Associated Automated Promotions.
Calling RefreshMySegments from Cloud Code, calling RefreshPromotions, and logging in again do not cause the promotion to become associated or returned by GetEligiblePromotions.
If we use Reset Segments for that user, or run Re-evaluate All Segments, the promotion is then associated and returned.

Questions:

Is this expected behavior for Automated Promotions?
Should RefreshMySegments or RefreshPromotions attach newly created Automated Promotions to users who are already in the target segment?
Is there a client-callable or Cloud Code API equivalent to Reset Segments or Re-evaluate All Segments for the current user?
Is there any API to manually trigger or re-trigger an Automated Promotion for the current user?

Our concern is that if Automated Promotions only trigger on a new segment entry, then attaching a new promotion to an existing shared segment will not work reliably for existing users unless we manually reset or re-evaluate segments.

Thank you for your guidance.

JasonL

Yes, the behavior you’re describing is expected with the current implementation. RefreshMySegments, RefreshPromotions, and login will not attach the promotion to users who are already in the segment, because the system is designed to only grant automated promotions when the user enters the segment (i.e., when it shows up in enteredIds). The fact that Reset Segments or Re‑evaluate All Segments fixes it is also expected, because those actions force the user back through the segment‑entry logic.

We’re working on a fix to make this smoother. The practical effect going forward will be that, when a new automated promotion is created or attached to an existing segment, the next segment refresh will automatically apply it to all currently‑eligible users in the background, without you needing to reset or re‑evaluate segments manually. This should make the behavior more predictable, especially when you have a large number of existing users already in that segment.

jongdae.won

Hello brainCloud team,

Thank you for the clarification. That explanation helps us understand the current behavior.

We would like to add more detail about our current situation, because the issue we are seeing is not limited to users who were already in the segment before the Automated Promotion was created.

We created a new Automated Promotion and attached it to a target segment. After that, we had a user who was not previously in that segment become eligible by updating the relevant user statistic. After calling RefreshMySegments, the user appears in the target segment under User Monitoring > Pricing.

However, the promotion still does not appear under Associated Automated Promotions for that user, and GetEligiblePromotions / RefreshPromotions do not return it.

The promotion only starts being associated and returned after we manually use Reset Segments / re-evaluate segments for that specific user from the portal.

So the issue appears to be:

The user is newly entering the segment after the Automated Promotion has already been created and attached.
RefreshMySegments updates the user’s current segment membership correctly.
But the Automated Promotion is not associated with the user.
A manual per-user Reset Segments / re-evaluation from the portal makes it work.

Could you advise if there is any supported workaround for this before the planned fix is released?

Specifically:

Is there any Cloud Code, client, or S2S API equivalent to the portal Reset Segments / per-user re-evaluation action?
Does RefreshMySegments trigger the same enteredIds logic that Automated Promotions use, or does it only update the user’s current segment membership?
If RefreshMySegments does not trigger Automated Promotion association, what is the recommended way to launch a new Automated Promotion and have it apply to users who become eligible after launch?
Is there any safe operational workaround that does not require manually resetting segments for each user?
Do you have an estimated timeline or release version for the planned fix?

Our current blocker is that even newly eligible users for a newly created Automated Promotion are not receiving the promotion unless we manually reset/re-evaluate segments per user, and we need a scalable way to handle this.

Thank you again for your help.

Paul Winterhalder

Hi @jongdae-won,

We have a patch being deployed today that will allow you to create promotions that will allow you to target both existing and new members of a segment. We plan to have that deployed by the end of the day.

We hope that this will address the primary issue.

Your latest message seems to indicate that even new users to a segment are not getting the promotion offer... that does seem odd. I will point out that segments only get refreshed nightly and upon login - so if a new stat meant that they should be added to a new segment - the new segment and/or promotion wouldn't be refreshed until they logged back in again...

Unless... your app is making this call before it brings up the store:
https://docs.braincloudservers.com/api/capi/appstore/refreshpromotions

Could that be [that specific] issue?

In any event - we are hopeful that the patch should address your primary concern. We'll post here once it has been deployed.

Paul.