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Attentive Integration

Attentive is an SMS and email marketing platform. Once connected, you can use OuterSignal's Playbooks to send your persona and signal data into Attentive, so you can build segments and messaging around who your customers are.

Step 1: Setup (one-time)

  1. Log in to Attentive and go to the App Marketplace.
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  2. Select + Create App in the top-right corner.
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  3. Give the app a name (e.g., "OuterSignal") and grant it the permissions it needs to write Custom Attributes and Custom Events.
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  4. Once created, copy the generated API key immediately.
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  5. In OuterSignal, go to Settings → Integrations → Attentive and select Connect.
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  6. A window opens asking for your Attentive API key. Paste in your API key, choose your identifier, and select Connect.
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  7. The integration card flips to Connected.

You only need to do this once. You won't be asked for this key again — every Playbook that uses Attentive pulls the credential from here automatically.
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Step 2: Using it in a Playbook
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OuterSignal offers two Attentive action types:

  • Attentive Attribute — sets custom attributes on a subscriber's profile. Best for data that should live on the record permanently and be available for segmentation — persona, total spent, order count, or anything you want Attentive segments to filter on or SMS/email copy to reference.

  • Attentive Event — sends a custom event (with optional properties) to Attentive, which can trigger matching journeys. Best for firing off a specific automation the moment something happens — a customer entering a "High-Value" segment kicking off a VIP welcome journey, or entering "At-Risk" triggering a win-back flow.

If you just want the data available, use Attribute. If you want something to happen the moment a customer matches, use Event.

To use either:

  1. In OuterSignal, go to Playbooks → Create Playbook and pick the segment you want to act on.
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  2. Select Add an Action, then choose Attentive Attribute or Attentive Event.
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  3. Under Identify subscriber by, choose Phone or Email. Phone is used when available and falls back to the other identifier if missing — never both at once.
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  4. Configure the rest of the action — custom attributes (for Attentive Attribute) or event type and properties (for Attentive Event). Template variables like {{persona}}, {{segment_name}}, and {{email}} are available for both.

  5. Select Add Action → Review & Create → Create Playbook.

Since the identifier is set per action, different Playbooks (or different actions within the same Playbook) can use different identifiers if needed.
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Step 3: Finding your attributes in Attentive
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Unlike some integrations, Attentive doesn't require you to create the custom attribute ahead of time. The first time a Playbook writes to an attribute — whether via Attentive Attribute or as a property on a Custom Event — Attentive creates it automatically if it doesn't already exist.
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To confirm an attribute is receiving data:

  1. Log in to Attentive and go to Subscribers.
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  2. Open an individual subscriber who should have been synced by the Playbook.

  3. Check their Attributes tab — any attribute set by OuterSignal will show there under the name you used in the Playbook mapping, along with the most recent value and when it was collected.

To use the attribute in a segment:

  1. Go to Segments → + Create Segment → Dynamic segment.
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  2. Under Choose condition, select A subscriber's characteristics.
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  3. Search for the attribute name and build your condition from there.

One thing to know: field names and values in Attentive are case-sensitive, so Persona and persona are treated as two different attributes. Keep naming consistent across your Playbooks to avoid accidentally splitting your data.
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⚠️ If you (or someone on the customer's team) already created the attribute manually in the Attentive UI with a fixed set of allowed values, the API can only write values matching that list — it won't add new ones. This mostly comes up if someone built the segment structure before connecting OuterSignal.
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FAQ
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Where do I enter my API key? Always in Settings → Integrations → Attentive — never inside a Playbook. The Playbook builder doesn't have a field for it.
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Where do I choose phone vs. email matching? Inside each Playbook action, under "Identify subscriber by" — not during account connection. It defaults to Phone, with automatic fallback to email if phone isn't available on a given record.
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Do I need to build an app in Attentive just for this? Yes — Attentive requires a custom app to generate an API key rather than a single account-wide key. This is a one-time setup step in Attentive's App Marketplace.
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What's the difference between Attentive Attribute and Attentive Event? Attribute sets fields directly on the subscriber's profile — use it when you want the data to persist and be available for segmentation. Event sends a custom event to Attentive that can trigger an Attentive journey — use it when you want persona or segment changes to kick off a messaging flow rather than just updating a data field.

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