Better email template editor

Better email template editor

Hello,

I'm not sure if this is something that has been already discussed, but at the moment I'm finding it difficult to use the email template editor.
I'm not a designer myself, therefore I'm mainly relying on templates made by other people or taken from the Marketo template library, but sometimes it happens that I need to tweak the template a little bit; with the editor Marketo is providing right now it can be difficult to look for specific parts of the code, mainly because there are no visual aids.

Can we have an editor that is more similar to the one for landing pages? Things like coloring aids, line number and the possibility to see where a tag is opening and closing through indentation would be great.
7 Comments
Anonymous
Not applicable
One of the ways around this that I currently use is cut and paste the code into a real HTML editor (I use Coda for Mac) and then re-paste it into the Marketo template editor. But you're right, it'd be nice to have a better editor. 
David_Gallaghe2
Level 5
I used to use a really cool drag and drop email template designer back in the day (pre-marketo) that integrated with MailChimp and Mac Mail - @Marketo - you may want to pick up a copy and play with it.

-> http://www.equinux.com/us/products/maildesigner/index.html

It could offer a cool insight into drag and drop layout elements, text vs image area definitions and other nifty tricks for creating cool looking emails without us content makers needing to get too down and dirty in the realm of HTML.

I could also see layout templates working out really well in the world of landing pages too.

Anonymous
Not applicable
Our company recently released a responsive email template builder that is fully Marketo comaptible for only $2 a template. You can customise colour palettes and layouts with a few clicks of a mouse. 

You can check it out here:
http://launchpoint.marketo.com/hoosh-marketing/1489-marketo-email-templates-builder/
Anonymous
Not applicable
This is my number one desire. All of the users I administrate complain about the editor. It is very clunky and outdated. We need something nice like Mailchimp and Campaign Monitor have.
Anonymous
Not applicable
We work with an outside consultant that does the bulk of our graphic design and website curating. While I have been able to put together some quick templates for responsive emails (we had 0 before I started), I asked those with access to all of our graphics to make one that I could then modify into multiple templates for different size emails.

Long story short, validating email without line number is stupid. It is 2015. If I want to scroll through endless lines of code and use the find function, then I'll just build these templates in Notepad.
kh-lschutte
Community Manager
Status changed to: Open Ideas
 
michellechopin
Level 7 - Community Advisor

Having recently submitted a request for help in the Community because I couldn't see/find the visual editor in a template I asked my Designer to help me with, I learned very publicly that there IS no editor...and I'm surprised that nothing has changed in the 6 years since the original post. While I have a Designer on my team, if I want to set up a template on my own, or in the case of smaller teams who don't have access to resources that can write HTML at this level, this is a huge challenge for content marketers.

 

I'd love for this idea to re-surface as a key consideration for the product cycle as there are so many content marketers who could benefit from this. For a system as robust, powerful, and (honestly) pricey as Marketo, there's no reason that folks should have to use external systems just to get a visual on the code they're working in. Upvoting!