Tyron_Pretorius
Level 9 - ChampionAnyone who has tried to create an email template within Marketo will know what a pain this is! I am going to show you the best way to create Marketo email templates that scale elegantly across different screen sizes and look amazing no matter what device or email client is being used.
I will also show you how we can use variables and tokens within our Marketo email templates so that emails are easy to modify in the email editor, can be populated via API, and can be reused across programs to reduce the number of emails we need to build.
If you want to import the email template I work with in the video below into your Marketo instance then you can download the email template here .
As outlined in the documentation a Marketo email template is made up of the following:
A module consisting of image and text elements populated by variables
Building your email template in this structured fashion using modules and variables will set you up for success by making your emails super easy to modify in the email editor AND by making your emails easy to update via API (see around minute 5 in this video ).
Take a look at the Marketo Dynamic Email Content via API post to see how you can streamline your email creation process by automatically populating emails with content from a Google Sheet.
By far and away the best way to create Marketo email templates is by using a drag-and-drop email building tool such as Stripo to design the email template and then import this email template into Marketo. As I am sure you might already be familiar, Marketo is not great for trying to design email templates. There is no drag-and-drop builder and the only way for you to build email templates is by modifying HTML and CSS code within the template builder: not fun!
Using a 3rd party drag-and-drop email design tool will ensure that the email design is dynamic, will scale well across different screen sizes, and will look good no matter what device or email client is being used.
Once you have the email designed and you have exported the HTML code then:
N.B. Once you import the code from your 3rd party tool you might need to use a HTML formatting tool to make this code a bit friendlier on the eyes.
Once you have imported the HTML code into your Marketo email template it is now time to “Marketofy” this code by adding in modules, elements, and variables.
The reason we need to do this is that if we try and create an email from the Marketo email template as is i.e. without “Marketofying” it then we will not be able to edit the email at all within the email editor (see the video above around 10:20).
How we go about adding modules, elements, and variables to the Marketo email template is tricky to explain over text so I recommend checking out the video at the top of the post to see how this is done.
In short and as shown by the images below the process involves:
Marketo email template code without modules, elements, and variables
Marketo email template code with modules, elements, and variables
N.B. I highly recommend adding some comments to the code to delineate the different modules from one another (like in the image above) because this makes it so much easier to find the right section when you want to update the template.
When defining email variables at the top of your Marketo email template it is necessary to:
The difference between local and global variables is that:
See the video above around 17:30 to get a walkthrough of the difference between local and global email variables and good examples of where each should be used.
N.B. Global email variables do not work in dynamic content sections.
Defining variables within the template code
Appearance of variables in the email editor
One way to level up your Marketo email templates is by using tokens so that one template can be used to generate an email with content that can be dynamically changed depending on the lead the email is being sent to (lead tokens) or the program (local tokens) or smart campaign (trigger tokens) the email is sent from.
For example, say you have a program for each ebook that contains a smart campaign that sends out an email to whoever fills out the form to request the ebook. By using a local program token in each ebook program that contains the link to the ebook and by using this local program token in your Marketo email template you can then have one single email to send out the links to all ebooks.
You can even try using trigger tokens in your email templates!
href=">>">Download it now
Local program tokens available for use in Marketo email templates
Now that we’ve done all the hard work let’s make sure that our Marketo email template is ready for the big time!
If you use a 3rd party email design tool like Stripo their templates should automatically scale across different screen sizes and look good no matter what device and email client combination is being used. They should also have preview tools that enable you to see what the email looks like on different screen sizes and maybe even on different devices and email clients.
However, once we have imported this template into Marketo and possibly made tweaks to the HTML code to “Marketofy” it we should do more checks to make sure that everything is still working as expected.
I highly recommend using a tool like Email on Acid to test out your Marketo email template. By sending a sample of your email template to these tools you can ensure that your email scales well and that it looks good across popular device and email client combinations.
Testing your Marketo email template across different devices and email clients
This is definitely not as rigorous a check as using a 3rd party email testing tool but at the very least you should send a sample of your Marketo email template to as many of your own email addresses across as many email clients as possible. Then you should check how the email looks on both your desktop and your mobile.
Nice work! We now have a fully functioning Marketo email template that looks good across all screen sizes, devices, and email clients.
Also if you want to level up your automation game and start populating emails using the Marketo API then check out the Marketo Dynamic Email Content via API post.
