Developers

Example Usage of
campaign_send

Send a campaign.

Description: Re-send an existing campaign using optional actions like 'copy', 'preview', 'test'.
Endpoint: /admin/api.php?api_action=campaign_send
HTTP method: GET
Supported output formats: xml, json, serialize
Requires authentication: true
Parameters:
* indicates requirement. Underlined params include in URL, otherwise as part of the post body. POST data must be formatted as
Content-Type: application/x-www-form-urlencoded
. We don't accept any other input formats like JSON.
Variable Description
api_action*campaign_send
api_outputxml, json, or serialize (default is XML)
email*Email address (of the contact) that will be receiving the email
campaignid*ID of the campaign you wish to send
messageid*ID of the campaign's message you wish to send (used in Split campaigns if you have more than one message assigned to a campaign).
typeType of the message you wish to send (can be used to send TEXT-only email even if campaign is set to use MIME, default is html).
action*Examples: 'send' = send a campaign to this contact and to append him to the recipients list, 'copy' = send a copy of a campaign to contact (campaign is not updated), 'test' = send a test email to contact (campaign is not updated), 'source' = simulate a campaign test to contact (campaign is not updated), return message source, 'messagesize' = simulate a campaign test to contact (campaign is not updated), return message size, 'spamcheck' = simulate a campaign test to contact (campaign is not updated), return spam rate, 'preview' = same as preview
Example response:
Variable Description
result_codeWhether or not the response was successful. Examples: 1 = yes, 0 = no
result_messageA custom message that appears explaining what happened. Example: Message sent
result_outputThe result output used. Example: serialize

PHP Example

This is an example of using the campaign_send call with PHP. You can replicate the same idea in virtually any other programming language. The example shown is using serialize as the output format. You can change that to XML or JSON if you would like.

<?php

// By default, this sample code is designed to get the result from your ActiveCampaign installation and print out the result
$url = 'https://account.api-us1.com';

// the API Key can be found on the "Your Settings" page under the "API" tab.
// replace this with your API Key
$api_key = 'YOUR_API_KEY';

$params = array(

	// this is the action that sends a camapign to a contact on the campaign ID and contact email you provide
	'api_action'   	=> 'campaign_send',

	// define the type of output you wish to get back
	// possible values:
	// - 'xml'  :      you have to write your own XML parser
	// - 'json' :      data is returned in JSON format and can be decoded with
	//                 json_decode() function (included in PHP since 5.2.0)
	// - 'serialize' : data is returned in a serialized format and can be decoded with
	//                 a native unserialize() function
	'api_output'   	=> 'serialize',

	// email address (of the contact) that will be receiving the email
	'email'        	=> '[email protected]',

	// ID of the campaign you wish to send
	'campaignid'   	=> 1,

	// ID of the campaign's message you wish to send
	// (used in Split campaigns if you have more than one message assigned to a campaign)
	'messageid'   	=> 0,

	// type of the message you wish to send
	// (can be used to send TEXT-only email even if campaign is set to use MIME)
	'type'        	=> 'mime',
	// possible values:
	// - 'mime'
	// - 'text'
	// - 'html'

	// action
	'action'      	=> 'send',
	// possible values:
	// - 'send': send a campaign to this contact and to append him to the recipients list
	// - 'copy': send a copy of a campaign to contact (campaign is not updated)
	// - 'test': send a test email to contact (campaign is not updated)
	// - 'source': simulate a campaign test to contact (campaign is not updated), return message source
	// - 'messagesize': simulate a campaign test to contact (campaign is not updated), return message size
	// - 'spamcheck': simulate a campaign test to contact (campaign is not updated), return spam rate
	// - 'preview': same as preview
);

// This section takes the input fields and converts them to the proper format
$query = "";
foreach( $params as $key => $value ) $query .= urlencode($key) . '=' . urlencode($value) . '&';
$query = rtrim($query, '& ');

// clean up the url
$url = rtrim($url, '/ ');

// This sample code uses the CURL library for php to establish a connection,
// submit your data, and show (print out) the response.
if ( !function_exists('curl_init') ) die('CURL not supported. (introduced in PHP 4.0.2)');

// If JSON is used, check if json_decode is present (PHP 5.2.0+)
if ( $params['api_output'] == 'json' && !function_exists('json_decode') ) {
	die('JSON not supported. (introduced in PHP 5.2.0)');
}

// define a final API request - GET
$api = $url . '/admin/api.php?' . $query;

$request = curl_init($api); // initiate curl object
curl_setopt($request, CURLOPT_HTTPHEADER, array('API-TOKEN: ' . $api_key));  //  Provide the API Token via the API-TOKEN header
curl_setopt($request, CURLOPT_HEADER, 0); // set to 0 to eliminate header info from response
curl_setopt($request, CURLOPT_RETURNTRANSFER, 1); // Returns response data instead of TRUE(1)
//curl_setopt($request, CURLOPT_SSL_VERIFYPEER, FALSE); // uncomment if you get no gateway response and are using HTTPS
curl_setopt($request, CURLOPT_FOLLOWLOCATION, true);

$response = (string)curl_exec($request); // execute curl fetch and store results in $response

// additional options may be required depending upon your server configuration
// you can find documentation on curl options at http://www.php.net/curl_setopt
curl_close($request); // close curl object

if ( !$response ) {
	die('Nothing was returned. Do you have a connection to Email Marketing server?');
}

// This line takes the response and breaks it into an array using:
// JSON decoder
//$result = json_decode($response);
// unserializer
$result = unserialize($response);
// XML parser...
// ...

// Result info that is always returned
echo 'Result: ' . ( $result['result_code'] ? 'SUCCESS' : 'FAILED' ) . '<br />';
echo 'Message: ' . $result['result_message'] . '<br />';

// The entire result printed out
echo 'The entire result printed out:<br />';
echo '<pre>';
print_r($result);
echo '</pre>';

// Raw response printed out
echo 'Raw response printed out:<br />';
echo '<pre>';
print_r($response);
echo '</pre>';

// API URL that returned the result
echo 'API URL that returned the result:<br />';
echo $api;?>

Questions? Discuss this API call in our developer forum