Contact data not evaluated in Journey Builder

Question

I am new to Journey Builder.

I have created a sendable DE (Subscriber DE) and 2 emails. The DE has following fields: SUBSCRIBERKEY, EMAILADDRESS and STAGE.

STAGE field is set to 1 for all subscribers and will be updated during the journey.

What I wanted to implement with Journey Builder is:

1. In Week1 send Email1 to all contacts with STAGE = 1
2. After sending Email1, update some subscribers in DE and set STAGE = 2
3. In Week 2 send Email 2 to all contacts with STAGE = 2

In Contact Builder:

1. I have created an Attribute Group (Subscriber Attributes) and
2. Linked Contact ID with SUBSCRIBERKEY in Subscriber DE. The subscriber's SUBSCRIBERKEYs match with those in Subscribers in SFMC.

Steps performed:

1. I created a Journey and select Subscriber DE as Audience, then added Subscriber Attributes > Subscriber DE > STAGE into Filter Criteria: STAGE equal to 1.

2. After first Email I added decision split and used the same field in Filter Criteria: STAGE equal to 2.

3. I then saved and tested the journey but never seen any contacts evaluated and accepted into the journey.

I read a previous post and found someone said population should be added. I navigated to the data extension but found it strange that all the data extensions are available except Subscriber DE.

Please discuss how can I make this work completely as per the steps I have performed already.

Answer 1

From the screenshots everything looks ok actually. Please try creating a new entry source and a new journey and see if it works.

Again please make sure there is correct data in the sendable DE with stage=1 before you activate the journey

Also make sure the SUBSCRIBERKEY field is of "Text" Data type,

"EMAILADDRESS" field is of type EMAILADDRESS and "SUBSCRIBERKEY" is used as the send relationship on "All Subscribers"

Answer 2

I think the Data extension is hidden in the page. Just scroll up and down or navigate to next page and see if you can find the DE.

To send the first email you don't need a population but to actually look into the current data(stage field) and decide whether to send the second email or not, you would need a population and configure the contact builder.

First, let's figure out why none of the contacts has been evaluated. I believe you chose "Email Audience" as entry source. If yes, what is the entry schedule you have defined?

If you chose "Run once the journey is activated" then your DE should contain the data before you actually activate the journey. If you populate the data after you activate the journey, then the contacts will not enter into the journey.