Adding a Snippet

To add a snippet, first follow these steps:

  1. From the Snippet Editor home page, select the universe that the new or edited snippets should be saved to.
  2. Click EDIT SNIPPETS. You see the index page, which lists any existing snippets.
  3. Click Add. The Edit Snippet page is shown.

Now you can start designing your snippet.

Step 1: Basics

First you need to set some basic details.

  1. In the Title box, type a title for the snippet. This will be shown to agents in the menu of the HTML editor.
  2. Under Active, click Yes to activate the snippet for use by agents. (The Active feature lets you disable a snippet without deleting it.)

Step 2: Content

Next, in Text, enter the content of the snippet. You can use the toolbar to format and edit the snippet's content.

The Toolbar

The toolbar lets you do things like change the font, insert special characters, and center text.

The toolbar in the snippet editor

Most of the options in the toolbar should be familiar to you from other word processors, but here’s a description of the miscellaneous buttons:

Button Description
Insert/edit link

Insert/edit link: Click to insert a hyperlink into the snippet. You’ll be prompted to complete the following fields:

  • Url: Type the web address to visit when the user clicks the link, for example http://inisoft.com/.
  • Text to display: Type the link text that the user should click, for example visit our website.
  • Title: (optional) Type text to show when the user hovers over the link.
  • Target: Select whether or not the link should be opened in a new window.
Insert/edit image

Insert/edit image: Click to insert an image into your email message.

Before you do this, check that:

  1. The image is located on your organization’s website or secure server. (Note that the image cannot be hosted on the same server as Syntelate XA or Syntelate Studio due to how the HTML Editor handles the image’s URL.)
  2. You have a note of the full URL for the image.
  3. The image is an appropriate file size and has appropriate dimensions. Keeping the file size low, e.g. less than 1 MB, will ensure that the customer sees the image immediately when they open the email. And by ensuring the image has appropriate dimensions, you will avoid wasting time on resizing it after you insert it. (Another reason to avoid resizing images is to uphold the branding guidelines of your organization.)

When you click the button you’ll be prompted to provide the following information:

  • Source: The full URL of the image, for example: http://www.yourcompany.com/myimage.png.
  • Image description: (Optional) Use this to provide a text description of the image. It’s displayed on-screen when the user cannot view the image, say because of a slow connection or because they use a screen reader.
  • Dimensions: (Optional) Enter the size of the image, width by height, in pixels. If you don’t enter anything here, the image size is automatically detected.
  • Constrain proportions: (Optional) This setting is useful if you need to re-size the image without distorting it. When this is checked, the image width and height will scale together. So, if you re-size the height, the width automatically changes, too.
Table Insert table: Click to insert a table into the snippet.
Source code View source: Click to view or edit the source HTML for the snippet.
Clear formatting Clear formatting: With text selected, click to clear all formatting (such as bold and color) from the selection.

Inserting a Merge Field

You can also insert a merge field into your snippet. For example, say your customers’ details are stored in a table called CONTACT: you could create a snippet that starts Dear [CONTACT.FIRSTNAME]. When an agent uses this snippet, the appropriate data is inserted (for example, Dear Emily).

To insert a merge field, use the Insert Field section.

  1. Select your universe in the Universe dropdown.
  2. Select the table in the Table dropdown.
  3. Double-click the field that you want to insert.

When you have finished creating the snippet's content, you are ready to move onto the next step.

Step 3: Allocating Categories and Groups

Note: Ignore this step if you have not yet added snippet categories or groups. The next step for you is to add some categories (and following that, some groups):

  1. Save the snippet you've designed.
  2. Exit the Edit Snippet screen.
  3. Go to Edit Categories and follow the instructions at Adding a Snippet Category.

If you already have snippet categories and groups, continue with Step 3.

To assign a snippet to a category or group, double-click the category or group in the list of Available Categories / Available Groups. Alternatively, use the Allocate All button to assign the snippet to all (filtered) categories/groups.

Note: A snippet must be assigned to at least one category and one group to be available for use by agents.

If you assign a snippet to a category or group in error, you can remove it again by double-clicking the category or group under Selected Categories / Selected Groups.

Note: To change the order in which snippets are listed within a category, go to EDIT CATEGORIES (in the Snippet Editor) and move the snippets into the preferred order.

Step 4: Save

Once you’re happy with your snippet, click Save to save.

Step 5: Refresh the Server

Refresh the web server .