How to Use the Datacrushers “Drag and Drop” Email Editor.

With our “Drag and Drop” editor, you can easily design professional emails for your business simply by selecting different components (text, dedicated buttons, images, and more!) and placing them wherever you choose within the body of an email. This new email suite will streamline the process of creating unique templates for any email campaign your business needs. 

But Wait, There’s More! 

Not only is this new email editing suite easy to use - it was also designed to allow you to create responsive emails that look great on desktop and mobile! The best part is that you don’t need to worry about resizing or reformatting a single thing to ensure that desktop and mobile viewers are getting the best and most responsive, email-viewing experience possible. 

The Basics: What You Need to Know About the Drag and Drop Editor: 

The Basics of The Drag and Drop Editor: How Do You Use It? 

The email editor has two distinct sections as part of its Visual Mode:

Are you a risk taker? Do you enjoy causing yourself needless frustration? “HTML Mode” is available for advanced users: (Click here to learn more!) 

HTML Mode enables you to customize emails any which way you like. However, if you choose to edit an email in HTML Mode - you cannot switch back to Visual Mode for that specific email. We highly recommend you to first compile the body of an email using Visual Mode, and then go ahead with any customization you want in HTML mode. 

To clarify – if you edit an email using HTML mode, you cannot continue editing that email in Visual Mode. 

This restriction is on a one-to-one basis. In other words it ONLY applies to any, singular, email edited with HTML Mode. It will NOT prevent you from using Visual Mode with any future emails. 

Editing the Components of Your Email: 

Every component featured in the component selection panel, has a name that is directly related to its unique function. When you place a component into the body of an email, it becomes its own container that you will then edit to meet your needs. The name of the container can be edited to whatever you want – this new name will not appear in a user’s email. The reason you can rename these fields is that it allows for easier collaboration. If you share access to your Datacrushers account with multiple people on your team, by giving a container a unique name it can act as an easy point of reference. 

Every component in Visual Mode includes the following features: 

From left to right they are: Edit (the specific component) - Color Picker -Copy - Delete. 

Color Picker: This allows you to choose the color of a components container. To change the color of your container, simply pick one from the color selection panel. Alternatively, if you know the colors HEX code, you can manually type in the field labeled CSS color.
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Since the first part of the email that needs to be designed is in and of itself the container, choosing a color and border style from the get go will help you build out the rest of your email with ease. 

Copy: 

This choice simply replicates the field you are working on. Any styling choices you have selected will be copied to the new field. However, any edits you make to one container will not automatically appear in the other. 

Delete: 

This is straight forward. Clicking on the “delete” button will simply delete the container and everything included in it. 

Important! There is no way to recover a field once it has been deleted. CTRL-Z will not save you! 

Very Important! The Drag and Drop email editor does not feature auto-save functionality! Please make sure to save your changes regularly! You can save any changes simply by clicking on the button labeled “save” at the top center of the editing display. 

The Basic Editor:

The Basic Editor features 8 Components: 

Text: 

The image below is of the Text component after it has been placed into the body of your email. 

When you click on the text container, an inline text editor will appear, as featured in the below image. 

This inline text editor allows you to insert tags, and customize the size, shape, font, placement, and color of the copy used in your email. The inline text editor and all its features are available in every component that includes text. 

Inserting Tags: 

Tags allow you to insert pre-made data into parts of your text container. So for example, things such as the name of your business and the name of the email recipient will appear automatically. Simply click on “Insert Tag” to open a drop-down menu with submenu tags for the following:

This allows you to insert all the store-specific tags you could want. 

This is somewhat limited compared to the other options as it can only provide basic data such as a customer’s first name, last name, and email address.
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This provides all the tags you could possibly need for a post-purchase email campaign. To learn more using the Order & Cart Info tag, click the button below.

This is what you will want to use in order to place a coupon in the text field. 

Button:
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The image below is of the Button component after it has been placed into the body of your email. 

The button component will enable you to place a Call to Action (CTA) anywhere within the body of an email. 

You can edit the text featured in your button by using the inline text editor. Simply click on the text to write whatever you would like.
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Now, to edit the color of your button, press on the color picker icon.
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Of course, a CTA is useless without a link that takes viewers to a specific part of your website. Simply paste a link in the field labeled “Button Link.” 

There are two types of links supported by this field: 

Static Link: This is a fixed link back to a specific part of your website. This is what you want to use to take shoppers to a homepage, sale page, or any other webpage that will get them to make a purchase. 

Dynamic Link: This a special link that is created in response to a specific event such as a cart abandonment during the checkout process. To learn more about using dynamic links for cart recovery, click the button below. 

(Learn more about using Dynamic Links for Cart Recovery)

Image: 

The image below is of the Image component after it has been placed into the body of your email. 

The image container can only display one picture. However, there is no limit* on the number of image containers you can place in an email, thus there are no constraints on the number of pictures you can include.

*Theoretically. 

Editing Your Image: 

To edit an image, simply click on the small-gear icon. 

You can use the value-field next to “Dimensions” to resize your images by typing in a new value. Alternatively, you can allow it to “auto” size an image for you. 

You can upload an image simply by dragging it with your mouse in the area labeled “upload your own image.” 

Image from your gallery: Images uploaded into an email in this manner are automatically saved on our servers. This way you can simply click on “image from your gallery” to bring up a collection of previously-used images for your email. 

Image From URL: This will allow you to add a link to an image found anywhere on the web, subsequently that image will appear in the email. 

Image Link to: This field will allow you to add a link to any image you upload. This way the image becomes responsive, and if a viewer clicks on it, they will find themselves on the webpage you linked to. This is ideal for products that you want shoppers to purchase. 

Multiple Images:  The same as the image component but allows you to put more than one image on the same line.
By clicking on the small gear icon you can choose how many images you want.

Text + Image: 

The image below is of the Text + Image, component after it has been placed into the body of your email.

This field places the text on the left and an image on the right. It includes all the text editing features, as well as image placement and resizing options.
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Editing the image:

This works exactly as it does in the regular image editing options explained earlier in this guide. 

Image + Text: 

This is the same as the “Text + Image” component. The only difference is that images appear on the left, and text is on the right. That’s it – nothing more. 

Divider:

The image below is of the Divider component after it has been placed into the body of your email.
This allows you to add a dedicated “divider” line to separate the different containers within the body of your email. 

The color and size of the divider can be changed to suit your unique needs. For example, if you need more space between containers but don’t want to use a color, you can set the border style to “hidden” in order to add more space between containers. 

Social Widget: 

The image below is of the Social Widget component after it has been placed into the body of your email. The Social Widget allows you to include links to all of your businesses social media channels. 

By default, all of today’s most popular social media platforms are pre-selected. 

Simply click on the checkbox next to the social media platforms you are not using to remove them from the widget. 

For the sites you do want to link back to, copy the URL of your sites social media channels and paste into the adjacent field. 

You can change the background color to either gray, black, or white. Alternatively, you can use the color picker to create a custom background color. 

Now this is where the Datacrushers Drag and Drop email editor really separates the JV team from the Hall of Fame players. The Commerce Editor has all the power-features eCommerce retailers need to go from running their business at just super-sonic speeds, to hyper-sonic sales and revenue recovery. 

The Commerce Editor features 5 Components: 

Note:The headers (titles placed next to features within a container) found in all of the Commerce components, can all be customized to display any which way you want.
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Stacked Cart:

The image below is of the Stacked Cart component after it has been placed into the body of your email.

This component is useful for a number of different email campaigns, such as post-purchase and cart abandonment. 

It can be customized to show the name, quantity, price, item count, and total order, as well as total paid for the order.
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Stacked Cart is both mobile friendly and responsive. Viewers just need to click on an image and they will quickly find themselves back on your site. 

Cart:

The image below is of the Cart component after it has been placed into the body of your email.

This will allow your email to display the abandoned items on the left, and their quantity, price, and cart total on the right. 

We recommend using the Cart component if you do not have exceptionally high quality product images on your site. 

The Cart component is both responsive and mobile-friendly. Because it provides product details in a single line next to an image, it is really easy to view on mobile devices. 

Product: 

The image below is of the Product component after it has been placed into the body of your email.

This component connects directly to your Product Analytics data to show shoppers products they may be interested in buying. 

Further options include the ability to display the product title, price, or even a dedicated button. You can also choose to display products from your “Product Group” or search for a specific item to be displayed by looking up the product name. 

Finance Tag:

The image below is of the Finance Tag component, after it has been placed into the body of your email.

This option currently allows you to include a dedicated consumer loan financing offer from Affirm, Bread, SplitIt, or Charge After, within an email. 

You can choose to display your financing offer either with or without a tag. This means that products which are eligible for financing will show the option along size their details. Otherwise the financing offer will appear as a general option for all products featured in the email. 

The finance tag is useful in both cart abandonment, and regular email blasts to shoppers. To learn more about consumer loan financing, click the button below. 

Coupon: 

The image below is of the Coupon component after it has been placed into the body of your email.

This allows you to include a dedicated coupon, which can include whatever offer you want within the body of your email. 

The color, size, and shape can all be adjusted to match your needs. 

Furthermore, you can include a dynamic coupon through a customized API. Contact us by clicking on the button below to learn more about these dynamic coupons. 

(Contact Datacrushers to learn more about dynamic Coupons)

Finally: 

This is an example of what the body of an email could look like with all the viable options. This example email has not been edited, and all options have been left at their default state. 

Before the process is finalized, you can preview your email at any point during the editing process by clicking on the button labeled “Preview” in the top right corner. This will display your email as it will appear in a user’s inbox. 

Do not forget to click on the button labeled “save” towards the top of the screen to ensure your email is saved for future use. 

To learn more about how to use the eCommerce-specific components in the Drag and Drop email editor, simply click on any of the use cases featured below. 

Using the Drag and Drop Email Editor for: