XML-based email campaign
We've created a new automation feature that allows you to inform your target audience about new products, offers and other webpage updates. Once set up, campaigns based on XML (Extensible Markup Language) data inclusion generate email content automatically.
To create XML-based email campaign:
1. Prepare an HTML email template
First, you have to prepare an HTML template in which to enter the XML data file information.
<table bgcolor="#EEEEEE" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" style="width: 100%;">
<tbody>
<tr>
<td align="center" valign="top" width="100%">
<table align="center" bgcolor="#FFFFFF" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" style="margin-top: 10px; margin-bottom: 10px; width: 600px;">
<tbody>
<tr>
<td bgcolor="#FFFFFF" style="font-size: 12px; color: #666666; line-height: 150%; font-family: Arial; text-align: left; padding: 20px;" valign="top" width="600">
<table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" style="width: 100%;">
<tbody>
<tr>
<td style="font-size: 12px; color: #666666; line-height: 1.5; font-family: Arial; padding-bottom: 20px;" valign="top" width="600">
<p style="margin: 0px; padding: 0px;"><span style="color: #88a017; font-size: 18px;">Lorem ipsum</span></p>
<p style="margin: 0px; padding: 0px;">Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet, consectetur adipiscing elit. Donec ut risus id lacus rutrum lobortis. Suspendisse eget risus id sapien luctus pharetra eget sed metus.</p>
</td>
</tr>
</tbody>
</table>
<table align="center" border="0" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="5" style="width: 100%;">
<tbody>
<tr>
<td align="center" style="font-size: 11px; font-family: Arial; color: #666666;">This email was sent from #[CAMPAIGN:SENDER_NAME]# to <a href="mailto:#[EMAIL]#" style="font-size: 11px; font-family: Arial; color: #4d749c;" target="_blank">#[EMAIL]#</a>.</td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td align="center" style="font-size: 11px; font-family: Arial; color: #666666;">#[LIST:COMPANY]# | #[LIST:ADDRESS]#</td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td align="center" style="font-size: 11px; font-family: Arial; color: #666666;"><a href="#[LIST:URL]#" style="font-size: 11px; font-family: Arial; color: #4d749c;" target="_blank">Why am I receiving this email?</a></td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td align="center" style="font-size: 11px; font-family: Arial; color: #666666;"><a href="#[UNSUB]#" style="font-size: 11px; font-family: Arial; color: #4d749c;" target="_blank">Click here to unsubscribe</a> | <a href="#[UPDATE_PROFILE]#" style="font-size: 11px; font-family: Arial; color: #4d749c;" target="_blank">Update your profile</a> | <a href="#[FORWARD]#" style="font-size: 11px; font-family: Arial; color: #4d749c;" target="_blank">Forward to a friend</a></td>
</tr>
</tbody>
</table>
</td>
</tr>
</tbody>
</table>
</td>
</tr>
</tbody>
</table>
2. Prepare XML data The next step is to prepare XML data source. It must contain the data about your products in the website or any other information you wish to display in your email content.
5,- 8,93 44 http://www.somedomain.com/product-nr-1 http://www.somedomain.com/product-nr-1/image_name.jpg
9,90 30,- 67 http://www.somedomain.com/product-nr-2 17,90 33,15 46 http://www.somedomain.com/product-nr-3 3,90 10,- 61 http://www.somedomain.com/product-nr-4
3. Prepare HTML code for your XML data Prepare and format HTML code to suit your needs for displaying information about your products taken from XML data source.
#[XMLBLOCK01:URL=http://www.yourdomain.com/products.xml|LOOP_ELEMENT=product|ITEMS=3]#
<h1>Category Name</h1>
#[XMLITEMS]#
<table border="0" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" style="padding: 0px; width: 100%;">
<tbody>
<tr>
<td style="padding: 10px 10px 10px 10px;" valign="top" width="150">
<img src="#[XMLITEM:image]#" border="0" alt="" width="150" height="150" style="display: block;"/>
</td>
<td style="padding: 10px 10px 10px 10px;" valign="top">
<h2>#[XMLITEM:description]#</h2>
<p> Price: #[XMLITEM:price]#</p>
<p> Discount: #[XMLITEM:discount]#</p>
<a href="#[XMLITEM:url]#" style="color: #006699; text-decoration: none;"> read more </a>
</td>
</tr>
</tbody>
</table>
#[/XMLITEMS]#
#[/XMLBLOCK01]#
XML merge tag explanation in HTML code:
- #[XMLBLOCK01:URL=http://www.yourdomain.com/products.xml|
- LOOP_ELEMENT=product|ITEMS=3]#
- HTML part that includes product data taken from a given source.
- This merge tag has following attributes: After you end XML block session, type:
- #[/XMLITEMS]#
- #[/XMLBLOCK01]#
- Your email template may contain more than one XMLBLOCK merge tag.
- URL - link to an XML source
- LOOP_ELEMENT - repeated XML tag name that contains information about each item
- ITEMS - number of XMLBLOCKS included in a template
- #[XMLITEMS]#
- HTML part between XMLITEMS tags will repeat.
- #[XMLITEM:image]#, #[XMLITEM:description]# etc.
- Indicates the content taken from appropriate XML tag within iterable LOOP_ELEMENT. Basically this syntax allows you to reference any tag value defined for your LOOP_ELEMENT.
- In our example LOOP_ELEMENT is product and names following after #[XMLITEM: are the names of XML tags that product element contains in XML data source: description, price, old_price, discount, url, image.
LOOP_ELEMENT values are taken from XML data source
...
5,-
8,93
44
http://www.somedomain.com/product-nr-1
http://www.somedomain.com/product-nr-1/image_name.jpg
...
4. Place prepared XML data HTML content into your HTML email template Now paste the product HTML content into your email template. This is how email template looks like in the end:
<table bgcolor="#EEEEEE" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" style="width: 100%;">
<tbody>
<tr>
<td valign="top" align="center" width="100%">
<table align="center" bgcolor="#FFFFFF" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" style="margin-top: 10px; margin-bottom: 10px; width: 600px;">
<tbody>
<tr>
<td bgcolor="#FFFFFF" valign="top" style="font-size: 12px; color: #666666; line-height: 150%; font-family: Arial; text-align: left; padding: 20px;" width="600">
<table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" style="width: 100%;">
<tbody>
<tr>
<td valign="top" width="600" style="font-size: 12px; color: #666666; line-height: 1.5; font-family: Arial; padding-bottom: 20px;">
<p style="margin: 0px; padding: 0px;"><span style="color: #88a017; font-size: 18px;">Lorem ipsum</span></p>
<p style="margin: 0px; padding: 0px;">Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet, consectetur adipiscing elit. Donec ut risus id lacus rutrum lobortis. Suspendisse eget risus id sapien luctus pharetra eget sed metus.</p>
</td>
</tr>
</tbody>
</table>
<table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" style="width: 100%;">
<tbody>
<tr>
<td valign="top" width="600" style="font-size: 12px; color: #666666; line-height: 1.5; font-family: Arial;">
#[XMLBLOCK01:URL=http://www.yourdomain.com/products.xml|LOOP_ELEMENT=product|ITEMS=3]#
<h1>Category Name</h1>
#[XMLITEMS]#
<table border="0" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" style="padding: 0px; width: 100%;">
<tbody>
<tr>
<td style="padding: 10px 10px 10px 10px;" valign="top" width="150">
<img src="#[XMLITEM:image]#" border="0" alt="" width="150" height="150" style="display: block;"/>
</td>
<td style="padding: 10px 10px 10px 10px;" valign="top">
<h2>#[XMLITEM:description]#</h2>
<p> Price: #[XMLITEM:price]#</p>
<p> Discount: #[XMLITEM:discount]#</p>
<a href="#[XMLITEM:url]#" style="color: #006699; text-decoration: none;"> read more </a>
</td>
</tr>
</tbody>
</table>
#[/XMLITEMS]#
#[/XMLBLOCK01]#
</td>
</tr>
</tbody>
</table>
<table align="center" border="0" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="5" style="width: 100%;">
<tbody>
<tr>
<td style="font-size: 11px; font-family: Arial; color: #666666;" align="center">This email was sent from #[CAMPAIGN:SENDER_NAME]# to <a href="mailto:#[EMAIL]#" target="_blank" style="font-size: 11px; font-family: Arial; color: #4d749c;">#[EMAIL]#</a>.</td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td style="font-size: 11px; font-family: Arial; color: #666666;" align="center">#[LIST:COMPANY]# | #[LIST:ADDRESS]#</td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td style="font-size: 11px; font-family: Arial; color: #666666;" align="center"><a href="#[LIST:URL]#" target="_blank" style="font-size: 11px; font-family: Arial; color: #4d749c;">Why am I receiving this email?</a></td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td style="font-size: 11px; font-family: Arial; color: #666666;" align="center"><a href="#[UNSUB]#" target="_blank" style="font-size: 11px; font-family: Arial; color: #4d749c;"> Click here to unsubscribe</a> | <a href="#[UPDATE_PROFILE]#" target="_blank" style="font-size: 11px; font-family: Arial; color: #4d749c;">Update your profile</a> | <a href="#[FORWARD]#" target="_blank" style="font-size: 11px; font-family: Arial; color: #4d749c;">Forward to a friend</a></td>
</tr>
</tbody>
</table>
</td>
</tr>
</tbody>
</table>
</td>
</tr>
</tbody>
</table>
5. Create and send emails based on XML The last step is to create and send your email campaign. Here is an example of how to do that using API functions :
$listId,
'subject' => 'Test Newsletter Subject',
'from_email' => 'example@example.org',
'from_name' => 'DEMO, Inc.',
'tracking' => array(
'opens' => true,
'html_clicks' => true,
'text_clicks' => false
),
'analytics' => array(
'google' => 'my_google_analytics_key'
),
'title' => 'Test Newsletter Title',
'generate_text' => true, //auto generate plain
);
$content = array(
'html' => file_get_contents('xml-campaign-template.html'),
);
$cid = $api->campaignCreate($type, $options, $content);
header("Content-Type: text/plain");
if ($api->errorCode){
echo "Unable to load campaignCreate()!\n";
echo "\tCode=".$api->errorCode."\n";
echo "\tMsg=".$api->errorMessage."\n";
} else {
echo "New Campaign ID:".$cid."\n";
//Send campaign
$retval = $api->campaignSendNow($cid);
if ($api->errorCode){
echo "Unable to load campaignSendNow()!\n";
echo "\tCode=".$api->errorCode."\n";
echo "\tMsg=".$api->errorMessage."\n";
} else {
echo "Campaign Sent!\n";
}
}
Here is an example of how your email campaign looks in the email clients of your subscribers:
You can download a full example of HTML email template and simple API code for creating and sending XML-based email template here Note To understand all the benefits you can get using XML-based email campaigns read our blog post Send Automated Emails Based on XML
Note To understand all the benefits you can get using XML-based email campaigns read our blog post Send Automated Emails Based on XML.
Send out email campaigns automatically You can automate the process of creating and sending XML-based email campaigns. All you have to do:
On how to create scheduled task (cron job) please find information on the internet.
- Copy attached file mgapi_campaignCreate_and_Send.php (found here) to your server.
- Set up scheduled task on your server that executes mgapi_campaignCreate_and_Send.php file.
- Wait until the scheduled task fires file execution.
