In this article, we'll go through a high-level overview of the steps needed to put together an email campaign for personalized video.
Set up your email template and merge tags
The creation of your email campaign is best handled by someone with email marketing experience and access to your email marketing tool(s).
Keep in mind that you should set up your email campaign early enough to allow for configuration and testing. If this is your first Idomoo project, we would recommend finalizing the email at least three days before you plan to launch.
To set up an email campaign for personalized video we will be starting with merge tags.
Merge Tags allow you to show personalized content to contacts in your CRM database, and are commonly used to personalize an email with a customer’s first name or company name. Depending on your email client it may also be called: a personalization tag, personalization token, attribute field, or custom field. These all mean the same thing -- a reference to a column in your data file or database that will be replaced with a value specific to the recipient, such as a personalized video link.
Using merge tags, you can direct the email client to search for specific information on a contacts profile in your CRM. For our purpose we would want to create two merge tags for a campaign:
- Landing Page Link: For the personalized landing page URL you will find on your PURL file
- Thumbnail Link: For the personalized thumbnail image you will find on your PURL file
Questions on how to create a merge tag or use it in an email should be directed to your CRM or email platform support team. Below we have a list of different email clients and some resources to get you started!
Please note: Just because an email provider is not in this list does not mean that Idomoo videos won’t work with that platform. Please refer to your provider’s documentation or your Idomoo account manager or customer success representative for compatibility questions.
| Email Client | Personalization terminology | Supports dynamic images?* | Documentation Link on provider website |
| MailChimp | Merge Tag | Yes | Idomoo Resource, Mailchimp Documentation |
| MyEmma | Personalization Tag, customer field | Yes, via HTML in CYO templates | MyEmma How To, MyEmma Code-your-own guide |
| Campaign Monitor | Personalization Tag | Yes | Documentation, personalized images |
| Constant Contact | Custom Field | Yes, via HTML | Custom Fields guide |
| Hubspot | Personalization Tokens | Yes, via HTML | Creating a Personalization Token |
| SendinBlue | Attribute Fields | Yes | Personalize your emails with contact attributes |
| Drip | Content Snippet/Liquid Shortcodes | Yes | Add a link to a video, custom fields |
| Marketo | Token/Dynamic Content | Yes, using Snippets/HTML | Understanding dynamic content |
| Salesforce Marketing Cloud | Personalization String/Merge Fields/Substitution strings | Yes | Personalization strings |
| Outlook | Merge field | No | Insert Mail Merge Fields |
*Support for dynamic images is based on information reported to Idomoo by our customers. We have not directly tested compatibility with each of these platforms and cannot guarantee future compatibility. Please refer to your email marketing provider for the latest information on image support.
Depending on the platform you use, you may need to manually edit your email template html to include the merge tag for the video and image URLs. If so, you can refer to the code below as an example:
"[personalized_url]" and "[personalized_img]" should be replaced with the merge tag you’ve designated for the landing page URL and thumbnail URL, respectively. You may also want to adjust the max-width value, which sets the maximum width of the embedded image. The value used above, 600 pixels, should look good on most devices.
Email Template Best Practices
Now that you’ve created your merge tags you can start to build out the rest of your email. There is no one right answer in email marketing, so we encourage you to experiment to discover what works best for your audience. That being said, we do have a few best practices we can share:
- Remember the subject line's only goal is to make the customer open the email!
- Personalize your email subject line
- Indicate there is a personalized video in the email
- Consider adding a play button or other relevant emoji
- Make sure the customer doesn’t need to scroll to see the personalized thumbnail image
- Use a compelling thumbnail image that includes the viewer’s first name
- Use a thumbnail with a play button, but make sure it doesn’t obscure key information or personalization
Without a well-designed and functioning email your audience may never get to see their amazing video. That’s why it’s so important to create your email template early and begin testing it as soon as possible. If you ever need a second set of eyes, our customer success managers would be happy to take a look at your email before launch.
Generate your personalized videos
Videos can be generated with Idomoo in 3 ways, Batch mode on the Idomoo platform or via SFTP, or using our API. For this article, we will focus on batch and SFTP, both of which produce a CSV file similar to the below that we call a PURL file.
The PURL file is a combination of the data you upload to Idomoo, and the personalized landing page, video and thumbnail links that were generated using that data.
Upload your PURL file to your email platform and click send
The PURL file should be uploaded to your email platform as a list of contacts. During this process, depending on the tool you’re using, you should have the option to merge the column headers with your newly created merge tags.
The process will look a bit different in each email platform. Here’s an example from MailChimp:
Once you’ve uploaded your list, you’re ready for one final test and then it's time to hit send and get your personalized videos out there!