Creating Email Templates

Email templates are message blueprints that you can reuse across multiple email campaigns. They contain a subject and preheader text, body content, links, and images, and you can customize them with user profile data, event data, data feeds, and Catalog data.

This article describes how to create an email template, configure its settings, design its content, preview it, send test messages, and use it with a campaign.

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# Permissions

To create and edit templates, you'll need the Create and Manage Templates permission.

# Creating a new email template

To create an email template that you can reuse for a single or multiple email campaigns:

1. Go to Content > Templates.

2. Click New template > Email.

3. Give your template a name that will make it easy to find when you (or your teammates) are setting up campaigns or journeys. This field has a 150-character limit.

4. Click Create template.

   

There are other ways to create templates, too: as you're setting up a new campaign, and by using Iterable's API. For more info, read Working with Templates.

# Configuring the details of an email template

To update template details such as message type, from email, subject, etc., open it up and configure the options in the Details area.

To update these options, click Edit details. As you make changes, the template preview updates. When you're done editing, click Save or Cancel.

Below are descriptions of the various settings you'll see in the Details area.

# Message type

The category to associate with your template, which will affect who receives campaigns based on it.

To learn more, read Message Channels and Message Types.

# From email

The email address that campaigns using this template will send from.

If your project is configured to allow dynamic sender email addresses, you can use a Handlebars expression to customize the sender on a per-user basis. This might be useful, for example, to make it look as though the email was been sent by an account manager familiar to the recipient. For details about how to set this up, read Dynamic Sender Email Addresses.

# Reply to email

The default reply-to address users will see when replying to this email.

• Add Cc — An email address to CC each time a campaign sends a message using this template. Iterable CCs this address for each recipient of a campaign.

• Add Bcc — An email address to BCC each time a campaign sends a message using this template. Iterable BCCs this address for each recipient of a campaign. This field is designed to be used for CRM email addresses.

# Subject

The subject line for campaigns that use this template.

# Preheader

Text to display after the subject line, to provide additional context. When no preheader text is provided, most email clients use text from the start of the email body.

# Data feeds

Data feeds allow you to fetch user-specific data from external URLs (your own or third-party) and use it to personalize your messages. For example, a restaurant chain might use a data feed to fetch information about locations close to the user, and then highlight them in their messages. To tell the data feed which user you need information for, you can pass query parameters in the data feed URL.

To enable data feeds, check Data feeds. Then, select an existing data feed from the dropdown or click Add a new data feed.

For more information about data feeds, related configuration options, and how to use them, read Personalizing Templates with Data Feeds.

# Google analytics

Appends utm_source, utm_campaign, and utm_medium parameters to links in your messages, for Google Analytics tracking.

To learn more, read:

• Integrating Iterable with Google Analytics
• Google's Collect Campaign Data with Custom URLs

# Link parameters

Custom URL parameters that are added to your email campaigns. These custom parameters give you the opportunity to track custom metrics, that you define, when a customer clicks on a link in your campaign. This helps track which clicks came from which campaign, and when using other analytics providers besides Google Analytics.

https://www.example.com/?campaignId=1234567

Check out Link Parameters for more detailed information.s

# Designing the content of an email template

To edit your template's design and content, click Edit design on the template page.

In design mode, you can:

• Choose a template editor to edit your template's content. If you're using the WYSIWYG or Side by Side editor, you can switch between the two in Preferences.

  Unsure which template editor is right for you? Check out Template Editors.

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  To personalize your templates, use Handlebars, data feeds, and Catalog data.

• Insert a snippet into your template's content by clicking the Snippet button. For more info about snippets, read Adding a Snippet to a Template.

• Create and insert an SMS Smart Opt-In link with disclaimer text. For more information, read SMS Smart Opt-In.

• Manage custom fonts and decide whether or not your template should convert CSS to inline styles in Preferences.

Here are other things you can do in design mode:

• Add locales, using the locales dropdown menu. When you switch to a new locale, you can define content to send to users tho use that locale. After you save a locale, it will appear in the Active section of the locales dropdown menu. For more information about locales, read Supporting Multiple Languages.

• Define HTML, plain text, and AMP for Email content to use with your template, with the content type dropdown menu next to the locales dropdown menu. Iterable generates plain text content automatically when your campaign is sent (so you can't preview it). If you need to overwrite Iterable’s auto-created plain text version, do so by toggling to the plain text editor view. Any links you add must include https protocol.

• Edit your template's details without leaving design mode by clicking the Details button. This will bring up a side panel where you can make changes.

• View how the template will look when rendered with dynamic data for a particular user of your choosing, by clicking the Preview toggle.

• See screenshots of how the template will render on various devices and in various email clients, by clicking Preview on devices.

• Open your email preview in a new tab by clicking the overflow menu, then Preview in new tab (from both Design and Preview modes.)

• Send a copy of the email to yourself or another internal user, with the Send proof dropdown menu, where you can choose To yourself, To an internal list, As random users, or To another address. For more info, read Sending Test Messages.

• Copy the template to the current or another project, by opening the overflow menu (three dots) and choosing Save as new template.

• Export the template's HTML, by opening the overflow menu (three dots) and choosing Export html. This will download a file to your local machine.

• View a spam report for your template, by opening the overflow menu (three dots) and choosing Spam report. For more info, read Viewing a Spam Report.

• View a preview of a template in a standalone browser tab, by opening the overflow menu (three dots) and choosing Preview in new tab.

# Previewing an email template and sending proofs

After configuring and designing your template, preview it and make any necessary fixes. There are a couple of ways to check your template: using the Preview page, and sending proofs.

# Previewing a template with user data

To see what your email will look like when rendered with different combinations of user data, data feeds, Catalog data, and on different devices, use the Preview page. On this page, you can load a user profile and see how the template will render for that user.

To preview an email template with user data:

1. With the template open, click Preview.

   

2. Enter the email address of a user in your project and click Load user data. That user's data will load.

   Feel free to play around with this data, modifying it as needed — your changes won't get saved to the user profile. Treat this page as a playground, and check how different combinations of data will cause your template to render. Make sure that the template looks correct in all the different ways it may appear to your users.

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   If the preview doesn't update after you've edited or loaded data, click the refresh icon.

3. To see how your template will render with a data feed loaded, click Load data feeds. Feel free to edit the loaded data feed data, to see how different data will look. This won't affect the data feed itself.

4. Click Exit preview to return to the template page.

For more information on previewing templates with data, check out Previewing Templates with Data.

# Previewing on devices

It's often useful to see screenshots of how the message will render on various devices, and in various mail clients.

To preview a template on different devices, open the template. Click the dropdown next to Preview, then Preview on devices.

# Sending a proof

After setting up your template, designing its content, and previewing it with user data, it's always a good idea to send yourself (and other internal users) some proofs. This way, you can validate the message from the perspective of your users.

To send a copy of the email to yourself or another internal user, open the template. Then, use the Send proof dropdown menu and choose To yourself, To an internal list, As random users, or To another address. For more info about these options, read Sending Test Messages.

# Sending an email campaign

You've built and tested your template. Now, you can use it with some campaigns. To learn how, read:

• Sending or Scheduling a Blast Campaign
• Activating a Triggered Campaign
• Tutorial: Build Your First Journey

When creating a campaign (whether standalone as part of a journey), you'll select a template — or the content of another, already existing campaign — to use as the starting point for its content. The new campaign will get its own copy of the template, so you can customize it however you like. No need to worry about affecting the original template.

Similarly, if you change a template that you've already used in a campaign, your changes will affect the template itself, but not the already-existing campaigns.

# Want to learn more?

For more information about some of the topics in this article, check out these resources:

• Working with Templates
• Personalizing Templates with Handlebars
• Link Parameters