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Marketing teams with AEP invest heavily in data — datasets, schemas, audience definitions — but accessing that data typically requires a data engineer or a deep familiarity with the AEP UI. Marketers who want to build a new audience, check segment status, or understand what data is available are often blocked waiting for technical help, or they skip the data entirely and work from intuition. Connect Adobe Experience Platform and Gradial becomes your natural-language interface for audience management — creating segments, retrieving audience definitions, and feeding them into AJO journeys, CJA analysis, and downstream activation systems. Marketers can describe an audience in plain language, see the definition before anything is created, and move directly into activation — without leaving Gradial or opening a support ticket.

What You Can Do

Audience Creation

Describe an audience in plain language and Gradial drafts the segment definition using available AEP datasets. Review the definition before anything is created.

Audience Retrieval

Retrieve existing audiences by name or ID. Inspect audience metadata including namespace, status, evaluation time, profile count, and segment definition.

Cross-System Activation

Use AEP audience context to feed AJO journeys, inform CJA analysis, or activate through Marketo, SFMC, or another connected marketing system.

Dataset Exploration

Query available datasets and schemas to understand what data is in scope before building or refining an audience.

Prerequisites

  • An active Adobe Experience Cloud organization with AEP licensed and live
  • Access to the Adobe Developer Console to create a project and generate server-to-server OAuth credentials
  • Your IMS Org ID and the sandbox name Gradial should connect to
  • A product profile with AEP API access configured in Adobe Admin Console
  • A Gradial organization Administrator role to complete setup

How to Connect

1

Create an Adobe Developer project

  1. Go to Adobe Developer Console and sign in with your Adobe ID.
  2. Select your organization from the org switcher.
  3. Click Create new project and give it a name (e.g., Gradial – AEP Integration).
2

Add the Experience Platform API

  1. Inside your new project, click Add API.
  2. Filter by Experience Cloud and select Experience Platform.
  3. Choose OAuth Server-to-Server as the authentication type and click Next.
  4. Select or create a Product Profile that grants AEP API access.
ScopeRequiredPurpose
AdobeAnalyticsYesAccess AEP datasets and schemas
openidYesRequired for OAuth token exchange
read_organizationsYesResolve IMS org context
additional_info.projectedProductContextYesConfirm AEP product entitlement
  1. Click Save configured API.
3

Copy your credentials

From the project’s OAuth Server-to-Server credential page, copy:
  • Client ID
  • Client Secret
  • IMS Org ID
  • Technical Account ID
  • Token URL
Keep the Client Secret secure. It grants API access to your AEP organization and should be treated as a sensitive credential.
4

Add the integration in Gradial

  1. In Gradial, go to Settings → Integrations.
  2. Find Adobe Experience Platform and click + Add.
  3. Fill in the connection details:
FieldValue
Integration NameA display name (e.g., Acme – AEP Production)
IMS Org IDFrom step 3
Client IDFrom step 3
Client SecretFrom step 3
Technical Account IDFrom step 3
Token URLFrom step 3
SandboxThe AEP sandbox Gradial should connect to (e.g., aep-prod)
CapabilitiesSelect the capabilities to enable: AEP, CJA, AJO, or activation via Marketo
  1. Click Save. Gradial validates the credentials before the integration goes live.
5

Assign to an Environment

  1. Go to Settings → Environments and select the Gradial Environment where AEP should be available.
  2. Add the integration to that Environment. For full Adobe workflow coverage, add AEP, AJO, and CJA integrations to the same Environment.
  3. Repeat for any additional Environments.

How It Fits Into Broader Workflows

Use caseHow to use it
Audience creationDescribe a target group in plain language — Gradial drafts the segment definition from available datasets and shows it to you before creating anything
Audience retrievalAsk Gradial to retrieve an audience by name or ID and surface its full definition, status, profile count, and namespace
Journey activationUse an AEP audience as the entry condition for an AJO journey — reference the audience in the same Gradial thread where you’re building the journey
Analytics hand-offFeed an AEP audience into a CJA analysis thread to understand how that segment behaves across channels
Cross-system activationActivate an AEP audience through Marketo, SFMC, or another connected system in the same Gradial thread

Audience Management

Use Gradial to create and retrieve Adobe audiences in AEP so marketers can define target groups and reuse them across AJO journeys, campaigns, and CJA analysis.
Create an audience
“Create an Adobe audience for retail cart abandoners (Gradial Retail Cart Abandoners June 2026) who added items to cart but did not purchase. Use the available retail cart datasets, follow the standard naming convention, and show me the audience definition before creating it.”
Retrieve an audience
“Retrieve the Adobe audience named retail_cart_abandoners. Show me its audience ID, namespace, status, last evaluation time, profile count, and segment definition details if available.”

Adobe Journey Optimizer

Use Gradial to retrieve AJO journeys, inspect each journey step, view the connected audience and authored email, and prepare safe campaign or content updates for review.
Retrieve a journey
“Retrieve the AJO journey named Gradial-Retail-Cart-Reminder. Show the journey as steps, including the read audience step and send email step. When I select the email step, render the exact authored email from AJO.”
Prepare a journey update
“Open the send cart email step in the AJO journey. Show me the current email, then prepare an updated version with a 48-hour free shipping message. Do not publish, send, or activate anything until I approve it.”

Customer Journey Analytics

Use Gradial to query and analyze CJA data so teams can understand customer behavior, journey performance, and campaign impact across Adobe data sources.
Analyze journey performance
“Analyze cart abandonment performance in Customer Journey Analytics for June. Show abandonment volume, conversion rate, and the main drop-off points by journey step or channel.”
Generate a report
“Create a CJA report for the retail cart abandonment journey. Include audience size, email engagement, conversion trends, and key recommendations for improving the journey.”

What’s Not Covered Yet

  • Real-time event streaming from AEP — Gradial reads processed data, not live event streams.
  • Adobe Target experiments — use the Adobe Target integration for A/B and multivariate testing.

Troubleshooting

IssueCauseSolution
401 UnauthorizedInvalid or expired credentialsRegenerate the Client Secret in Adobe Developer Console and update Gradial
403 ForbiddenMissing API scopes or product profile accessConfirm the product profile has AEP API permission in Adobe Admin Console
Empty audience resultsSandbox mismatchVerify the sandbox name matches the environment where audiences are defined
Token exchange failsMissing required OAuth scopesRe-add the API in Adobe Developer Console and confirm all required scopes are selected

Good to Know

  • One credential set covers the full Adobe suite: The same OAuth Server-to-Server credentials work across AEP, AJO, and CJA when the product profile has access to all three. You don’t need separate Developer Console projects for each Adobe product.
  • Sandbox selection matters: Audiences, journeys, and datasets are sandbox-scoped. Make sure Gradial is pointed at the sandbox where your working data lives.
  • Pair with AJO and CJA: AEP is most powerful when combined with the Adobe Journey Optimizer and Adobe Customer Journey Analytics integrations in the same Gradial Environment.

Support

Contact your Gradial onboarding lead or email [email protected] for help with setup.