Sitecore tip 36: watch goal language versions in Marketing Automation

When creating cool demo’s or testing some stuff on local environments you hardly run into real life situations with real life issues. Recently I discovered something when I helped a customer creating their first automation campaigns with Sitecore Marketing Automation.

The situation

Somewhere in the automation flow a goal trigger listener was used to check if the visitor has triggered the goal. When you use the default English language for goals you will notice nothing. But when you work with multiple languages and a goal has no English version, you will not be able to select them in Marketing Automation.

In Sitecore 9.0.x the goals will appear but you will see no display name. This is illustrated in the left part of the image below. In Sitecore 9.1 you will simply not see the goal in the list (see the right part in the image below). I created a goal “2nd Dutch goal” only in Dutch and it was not listed.

Does the goal even work?

Good question! Yes it does, even if the goal does not have an English version. But how can you use the goal then, I hear you ask? Well, the above mentioned issue only appears when using the goal listener or the complete goals option of the start element.

When you use a custom listener, the rules engine will show the goals, even without an English version. Kind of a work around.

So, be aware of creating goals in English. See it as a best practice. And if you don’t, use the custom listener to work around and still configure goal triggers. Simple as that.