_Open Data View General Inquiry

Question

I am planning on using the _Open data view in my queries in automation studio, but I am not entirely sure how data gets stored there. I will phrase my question in the following scenario: I sent 2 emails to data extension A containing 2 subscribers.

Subscriber 1 opened email 1 and email 2

Subscriber 2 opened email 1 only

Subscriber 2 is also in data extension B and opened email 5 from DE B after email 1 from DE A.

Would Sub 1 show up only once in the _Open with all the data coming from last email sent (email 2) i.e. the date, JobID, etc. would be only for email 2? Sub 2's data would be only for email 5 DE B?

The IsUnique column is for when a subscriber opens the same email more than once or has opened more than one email?

Final question: is there any way to get more than 6 months of open data on a per subscriber basis?

Thanks in advance

Answer 1

Open DataView is filled in on the 'back end' of SFMC. The user has no control over this DV.

Basically view it as a SQL table without any primary keys, meaning every record is a new record (append only).

The data can usually be referenced via foreign key on JobID (the unique number assigned to each email job) or SubscriberKey/ID

So in your example:

Subscriber 1 would be on the DV twice due to the 2 opens on different jobs.
Subscriber 2 would be on the DV twice due to the 2 opens on different jobs as well.

This DV is not dependent on sending data source, it registers every single open.

The IsUnique Column is there to be able to differentiate from when a person opened it for the first time, compared to any further times they opened. To give you a view on total vs. unique opens per job.

The only way to get beyond the most recent 6 months of data would be by pulling multiple tracking extracts (believe it needs to be in 90 day increments) and using the CSVs stored in there.