We strongly encourage you send yourself a test during the design process of your campaign to check that you are happy with the look and feel of final event message(s).
Testing allows you to simulate the entire guest experience, identify potential issues, and ensure a smooth interaction with your event's invitations and forms. This diligence is key to maintaining professionalism and ensuring a polished guest journey.
Sending a Test Email Message
You can find the 'Send Test Email' function at the top of your email builder:
A new pop-window will open, which will allow you to send a test email to up to 5 email addresses at a time entering the recipients email addresses into the 'Send Test To' field:
You additionally have the possibility to receive the test email as if it were sent to a specific guest. All dynamic guest field tags contained in the email will then consequently be replaced by the actual values from the selected guest, and any form links will allow to display the form as the actual guest sees it.
Please note: if you select a real guest as a 'Sample Guest' and submit the form, your real guest's status will change to 'Confirmed' or 'Declined' and a Confirmation Email will be triggered to that guest. Please refrain from testing the form submission when using a real guest as a Sample Guest from the test email.
We still recommend sending a real test email to an internal test guest list before mass sending the final invitation to your event guests in order to check exactly how the entire process from receiving the email message to filling out and submitting the form would look and feel for guests.
You can always archive any sent test emails you no longer need to avoid unnecessary confusion - check out this article if you are unclear on how to do this!
Best Practices During Testing
Use a dedicated test profile (i.e. a guest you have created for that purpose) to avoid interfering with your live guest list.
Check the formatting of your form and email on different devices.
Test multiple scenarios, such as incomplete form submissions or incorrect responses.
Review all details, including branding, text, and links, to ensure they align with your event requirements.
Sending a Test SMS/ WhatsApp Message
Similarly to the option on the custom email builder, you are able to send a test SMS or WhatsApp via the 'Send Test SMS' option above the message composer:
This will open a new pop-up window in the same way as the Test Email function, from where you can add a phone number you'd like the test message to be sent to, select a sample guest to see the SMS or WhatsApp as if it was sent to them and select which format (SMS or WhatsApp) your test message should be in:
Please note: Sending test SMS or WhatsApp messages will deduct credits from your zkipster account in the same way as the real campaign sendout. If you need to top up your credits, please see the 'How to Purchase Credits for SMS/WhatsApp Messages' article for further guidance.
Duplicating Campaigns for Testing
Duplicating your campaign is an effective way to simulate the entire invitation and confirmation email workflow without affecting the original campaign:
Duplicate the campaign you want to test.
Use the 'Review and Send' feature in the duplicated campaign.
Send the test campaign to yourself or a trusted internal team.
This method allows for a comprehensive review of all aspects of the campaign, including guest interactions from start to finish.