Branding Your Email Replies with a Mandrill Template

By default, your Agent's email replies go out as clean, plain messages. If you'd rather they carry your logo, colors, and footer, you can wrap them in one of your own Mandrill templates. You pick the template per mailbox, so an Agent answering on several addresses can look right on each one. This article shows you how.

This is optional. Email works perfectly well without a template, so skip this if a plain reply suits you.

How It Works

Your Agent writes the answer. Your template decides how it looks.

Think of the template as stationery. It holds your header, logo, colors, and footer, and it leaves one blank space in the middle. We drop the Agent's answer into that space, and Mandrill assembles the finished email before sending it.

That blank space has a name: *|BODY|*. Your template has to include it, or there's nowhere for the answer to go.

What You'll Need

A working Mandrill Connector with a Channel bound to an Agent. Get email running first. See Connecting Email via Mandrill.
A template in your Mandrill account that includes *|BODY|* where the reply text should appear.
Someone comfortable with HTML email. Mandrill's template editor is a code editor, so this part usually goes to whoever looks after your email design.

Step 1: Build Your Template in Mandrill

In your Mandrill account, go to Outbound → Templates and create a template. Design it however you like: header, logo, brand colors, legal footer, the works.

Then put *|BODY|* where you want the Agent's answer to appear. Type it exactly like that, with the pipes and asterisks.

Two things to get right before you leave the page:

Note the Template slug. That's the short name Mandrill uses to identify the template, and it's how we find it.
Click Publish, not just Save draft. A draft template isn't live, so publish it once you're happy with it.

The Mandrill template editor under Outbound, Templates, showing the template Name and Template slug fields on the left and the HTML source on the right. The |BODY| merge tag is highlighted in the middle of the layout, in the section commented as the agent response, with Save draft and Publish buttons at the top.

Note: *|BODY|* is the only piece of the Agent's reply we pass to your template. You can't pull in the guest's name, the Place, or other details yet.

Step 2: Pick the Template on Your Agent's Channel

The template is a per-Agent choice, so you set it on the Channel, not on the Connector.

Open the Agent, and go to Channels.
Click Add channel, then pick your Mandrill Connector and its mailbox address. (If the Channel already exists, open it instead.)
Under Reply template (optional), pick your template.
Click Add channel to save.

The dropdown reads the templates straight out of your Mandrill account, so what you see there is what's really available. Leave it on No template (send the reply verbatim) and replies go out plain, exactly as before. You can switch back to plain any time.

The Add channel dialog with the mailbox selected and the "Reply template (optional)" dropdown open. "No template (send the reply verbatim)" is ticked at the top, one template is selectable, and the rest are greyed out with a red warning reading "No |BODY| tag" beside each name.

Template Greyed Out?

If a template appears greyed out with a No *|BODY|* tag warning next to it, that template has nowhere to put the Agent's answer, so we won't let you pick it. This is common if your Mandrill account already holds marketing templates, like booking confirmations or pre-arrival mails, that were never meant to wrap a reply.

Go back to Mandrill, add *|BODY|* to the template, publish it, and it'll be selectable straight after.

Can't See Your Templates?

If the dropdown can't reach your Mandrill account, you'll see a message saying so, plus a plain text box. Type the template slug in by hand and it'll work exactly the same. It's also worth checking that your Connector's API key is still valid.

One Template per Mailbox

The template sits on the Channel, not on the Connector. So if one Agent answers on several mailbox addresses, each one can carry its own template. A reply to groups@yourhotel.com can look quite different from one to spa@yourhotel.com, all from the same Agent and the same Connector.

Note: Bind each mailbox address to one Agent only. An address bound to two Agents doesn't give you two looks, it gives you unpredictable results, including duplicate replies to your guests.

What Stays the Same

A template only changes how the reply looks. Everything else works exactly as it does without one:

The subject line still picks up its "Re:" and threads properly in the guest's inbox.
The reply still comes from your mailbox address.
Automated messages still get dropped, so nothing loops.
The Agent writes the same answer either way. The template just re-wraps it.

What's Next

Connecting Email via Mandrill -- the full email setup, if you haven't run through it yet
Set Up Your Brand Name, Logo, and Colors -- give your Agent a matching look in chat
Integrating TrustYou Agent Web Chat -- add the Agent to your website as well
Agent Settings to Review Before Going Live -- run through the pre-launch checklist