Note
The term Content Blocks has replaced what were formerly known as Mailing Snippets in Deliver. The terms are equivalent and may appear in either form throughout Slate documentation.
Please Note: Inbox Snippets are distinct from content blocks.
Content Blocks are used to insert HTML content conditionally into Deliver mailings, decision letters, merge fields on forms, or portals. While Translation Codes and Liquid markup can also be used to insert conditional content into a message, content blocks allow for HTML editing and formatting of the content prior to being merged into the mailing.
Tip
Before adding a content block to a mailing, first create the content block content.
Content blocks are applied to a Deliver mailing by referencing an export present in the recipient list query. In the Deliver mailing that should display the content blocks, navigate to its recipient list by clicking Edit Recipient Lists. Add any exports that will be used as merge fields in the mailing, as well as any necessary filters.
To insert a content block as a merge field within a mailing:
- Within the Edit Message view of the mailing, place your cursor where the content block content should be merged.
- Click the Merge Field button
in the top row of the WYSIWYG editor. - From the list, select Other.
- Enter the following text:
where NAME OF EXPORT is the name of the export in the recipient list query, and KEY OF SNIPPET is the key of the content block that contains the codes to merge into the message.NAME OF EXPORT | snippet: "KEY OF SNIPPET" - Click OK.
To merge in the "Interest" export for the Slate University example, this merge field would look like:
Within the Slate University example mailing, the message content looks very simple. The content blocks for each corresponding major will merge into the message, however the internal view of the message itself looks like:
When previewing this message, the content block merge field dynamically displays the content block corresponding with that record's academic major interest. For instance, this sample record has an academic major interest of Physics, so the content block with the value of "Physics" displays:
Tips
Including a default content block with the content block key ensures that every recipient has content merged in from the content block. If no default content block is included, records without data that matches one of the content block values would have a blank line where the content block would otherwise display.