Merge tags & Special links settings
Merge tags are available in all BEE Pro plans and BEE Free. However, this article talks about custom merge tag and special link settings. This applies to the Team and Enterprise BEE Pro plans.
Dynamic content in emails is created through syntax we call merge tags and special links. This can allow you to customize your email for the recipient. Your sending platform may have different names for this type of content.
BEE itself is not a sending platform, so it can't generate dynamic content for you. This must be generated by an entity that has access to your mailing list. We offer this feature so you can create dynamic content placeholders within BEE. Once your export or import to your sending platform, they will validate the syntax.
Merge tags
Merge tags are used in email as placeholders that are replaced with real values at the time the email is sent. They could be recipient-specific (e.g. first name, email, the latest product ordered, etc.) or system-wide (e.g. today's date, sender's name, etc.). Consult with your email service provider to learn more about which merge tags you can use in your emails.
When you add your own merge tags to the system, they become available in the BEE builder. They are located in the Merge tags menu in the text toolbar and via the "@" shorthand. Here is an example of a user adding the "Last order date" merge tag to a text block.
To add and manage merge tags in your BEE Pro account, click on the Settings page. You will see an area of the page entitled Merge tags.
To add a new merge tag, click on Add a merge tag. Specify a name (it will be shown in the builder when you select a merge tag) and the placeholder syntax.
To edit or remove a merge tag, simply mouse over it and click on the corresponding link.
Special links
Most providers use special syntax for the system links that perform actions such as:
- Unsubscribing a recipient
- Loading a Web version of an email
- Sending the email to a friend
You can add these special links to your account settings. This will ensure they are available in the builder.
To add special links to your BEE Pro account, click on the Settings page. You will see an area of the page titled Special links.
To add a new special link, click on Create new special link and specify a name, the link URL, and a category.
To edit or remove a special link, simply mouse over it and click on the corresponding link.
Why use merge tags & special links?
Merge tags and special links are inserted into your design as code and are treated as such during export. They're never encoded and you can be sure they'll populate in the HTML as-is. This ensures that your sending platform will properly validate the syntax. We recommend using merge tag and special link settings as a best practice.
Alternatively, merge tags inserted as plaintext (and special links inserted as typical URLs) are treated as such during export. This can result in values being encoded in the HTML output. Encoding is common if your syntax includes certain special characters. (e.g. < > { } & etc.)
If your merge tag or special link gets encoded, the sending platform may not recognize it. As a result, your dynamic content may fail. In other cases, your sending platform may experience errors with your design.
If you have any questions, feel free to contact us.
Comments
10 comments
I really welcome these changes! With these features, we could now use Campaign Monitor with Beefree Pro, without having to edit by hand the generated HTML to include tags.
Regrettably, it seems that the proposed "special links" for CM are not correct. By importing a HTML from BF Pro to CM, it finds the "webversion" tag does not find the unsubscribe tag.
Tags in CM are not "[unsubscribe]" but like this:
Is there a work-around, or a plan to fix this?
Introducing a custom HTML block in the editor (as well as in this post), all "custom tags" are removed. Here is a link to the documentation of CM
https://help.campaignmonitor.com/topic.aspx?t=40
You can edit all the Special Links in your BEE Pro account. It's not clear what merge tag needs to be put in the HREF statement with Campaign Monitor. The documentation that you pointed us to does not clarify that. We are referring to the equivalent to this for MailChimp: http://kb.mailchimp.com/merge-tags/the-unsubscribe-merge-tag
What is the equivalent to that with CM? That way we can update our default "Special Links".
In CM, the tags are like HTML "elements" for paragraphs or divs, i.e. it needs to be opened and closed. This enable to customise the content of the text linking to the unsubscribe page - which is nice.
It is not possible in this editor to introduce HTML Tags, these are removed.
The link to the CM documentation contains information under the chapter "Custom coded emails", i quote:
For custom coded HTML, the element automatically generates a personalized unsubscribe link for each recipient."
I tried to use the Special Links as well, but it does not generate the desired results. I tried also to introduce the tags with a "Custom HTML Block", but BeeFree Pro remove the tags - as not HTML Standard (like DIV, P, etc.)
Any other ideas? I subscribed to the new Team Edition mainly for this feature, as it would save me a lot of time editing the code manually after importing it to CM, but it does not work as I want.
Thanks for the additional information. We'll review the information internally and get back to you!
Any update on this, i.e. the compatibility of the merge tags with Campaign Monitor? I upgraded to the Team Edition only for this feature, but I tested today again, and it is not stil working (unsubscribe tags not recognised as such in CM, requiring additional coding for each mailing developed with Beefree).
Otherwise, still the best editor available on the market - by far!
I'm not quite sure I'm doing this right. Can someone help me. Thanks.
Hi, thank you for your request. We sent you a ticket to check if your settings are ok. Cheers.
Guys, my company uses beeplugin in the Startup plan, can I add the function of special links?
Hi Luciana! You can definitely implement special links with a Startup plan for BEE Plugin. For more details, please refer to https://docs.beefree.io/special-links-merge-tags/. You can also open a support ticket through the developer portal if you need further assistance.
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