Queries are a set of saved targeting steps. You can use them in reports and email targeting. This article explains how to save a reusable query in Action Network.
Prerequisites:
Further reading:
In this example, we will be making a query that targets Roseville School Board voters by using the precincts in that district.
First, go to "People" in the top ribbon:
Then, select "Queries."
Name your Query:
Now, we will add the criteria. Recall that in this example, we want to target voters in the Roseville ISD by selecting all precincts that are in the school district. We can get this list from VAN (see Filter a List Based on Precinct if you need help finding the precincts in VAN).
We'll use Custom Fields in Action Network to add all of the precincts we want to query. See Target by Precinct in Action Network for more details on custom fields.
To add a custom field in Query Mode, select "choose a filter."
Select "Field Value"
Select "Precinct 2022"
And then type the precinct exactly as it appears in VAN.
As we add more precincts, it is important to make sure the query is selecting people from ANY precinct in our list using OR, not ALL precincts in our list using AND. If we use AND, the query will return 0 people, because no one can live in multiple precincts.
To make our query use OR, we will select OR in the top left corner of the green box. This will turn the box orange.
Add a new precinct by selecting "Add rule" in the top right corner of the orange box and repeating the steps of selecting Field Value, Precinct 2022, and writing in the precinct as it appears in VAN.
Now, we can continue adding precincts until we have finished our list.
Save the query using the "Save Query" button at the bottom right.
To use this query in an email, first draft your email. Then, in the targeting step, turn on Query Mode:
And then load the query you have created from the "Import Query" dropdown:
This way, you don't have to re-target a school district every time you want to email.
You can make queries based on criteria other than precinct as well. See Action Network's documentation on Queries for more examples.