Customizing Your Emails

Change the layout, colors, text, images and more in your emails

Jonathan Fulcher avatar
Written by Jonathan Fulcher
Updated over a week ago

Emails in Okendo can be easily customized to better suit your unique brand style. Our styling tools make it super simple to change the layout, colors, text and images used in your emails.

Layouts

The first point of customization for emails is the Layout. Whenever you create a new email, you have the ability to choose the Layout that should be used for that email.

Choosing an email layout from the new email dialog

A Layout controls the core look and feel of an email such as where things are positioned and the order in which they appear. To understand this further, take a look at the "Side-By-Side" and "Stacked" review request email templates and how they change the way products and stars appear.

Side-by-side versus stacked review request email layouts

Note: The layout of the email cannot be changed after it is created. To try out a different layout, create a new email with that layout.

Styling

Global styling settings in the left panel on the edit email page

After creating an email from a Layout, use the styling controls to customize the look of various elements within the email. In the left panel, choose the "Global Styling" section to view the options for controlling the styles used in the email. Each type of email (review request, coupon, etc) provides different options for what can be styled. Every email also allows for the overriding of your Global Email Styling Settings so that the look of each email can be fine-tuned.

Text

Body text settings in the left panel on the edit email page

Text content forms the core of any email and is important in communicating your brand to your customers so we made it easy to edit the main text areas in all our emails. To do so, open the "Body" section in the left panel and edit the various text content areas in the email. You can also edit the footer text in the "Footer" section.

Substitutions

Each email allows for certain text substitutions which, when included in a text field, will be replaced with a real value when the email is sent. For example, {{customer.first_name}} would be replaced with "Jane" if the customer's full name was "Jane Smith". By using this effectively, you can greatly improve the personalization of the emails you send. A list of available substitutions can be found at the top of the "Body" section for each email.

Localization

Some email types provide localized default text which will automatically translate based on your store's language settings within Okendo. To tell if an email will be automatically translated, look for the "Override Localized Defaults" setting in the "Body" section of the left panel. To opt out of automatic localizations for this email, enable the "Override Localized Defaults" setting and enter the text you wish to use. Note that once you do this, the text in that email will no longer be automatically localized.

Images

Header settings in the left panel on the edit email page

The header image is an important part of any email as it's the main thing that grabs a customer's attention when they open an email. To set a header image in an email, open the "Header" section in the left panel and upload an image (Note: if you plan on using the same image in the header for most of your emails, it's better to set the image up as a global default in your Email Styling Settings). Once the image is uploaded you can tweak the width of the image so that it shows at the right size.

Next Steps

Now that you know how to customize your emails, it's time to put them to use. Find out how in our Using Your Emails guide.

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