Forward email Makreto button not working in Outlook

[akshat_goyal]

Hi,

When we are forwarding an email to outlook the CTA button in that email not working, the url is not working, but when we forwarding same email to gmail the button working fine. below is the button code of marketo module that we make. 

<table class="mktoModule section" mktoname="Button" id="headerTextWithCTA" role="presentation" width="100%" border="0" cellspacing="0" cellpadding="0" bgcolor="#ffffff"> 
                        <tbody> 
                          <tr> 
                            <td valign="middle"> 
                              <div> 
                                <div> 
                                  <!--[if mso]>
      <v:roundrect xmlns:v="urn:schemas-microsoft-com:vml" xmlns:w="urn:schemas-microsoft-com:office:word" style="min-height:40px;v-text-anchor:middle;width:260px;line-height: 25px;" arcsize="10%" strokecolor="#000099" fillcolor="#ffffff">
        <w:anchorlock/>
        <center style="color:#000099;font-family:sans-serif;font-size:16px;line-height: 25px;">
    <![endif]--> 
                                  <div style="background-color:#ffffff; border:2px #000099 solid; border-radius:4px; color:#000099; display:block; font-family:sans-serif; font-size:16px; line-height:20px; text-align:center; text-decoration:none; width:260px; -webkit-text-size-adjust:none; mso-hide:all; padding: 10px 0px; margin: 0px auto;"> 
                                    <div class="mktoText" mktoname="CTA Button" id="testingmarketocta">
                                      <a href="https://google.com" style="color: #000099; display: inline-block;">Call to Action</a>
                                    </div> 
                                  </div> 
                                  <!--[if mso]>
      </center>
      </v:roundrect>
    <![endif]--> 
                                </div> 
                              </div> </td> 
                          </tr> 
                        </tbody> 
                      </table>

Regards,

Akshat Goyal

[SaurabhGoyal_GN]

@akshat_goyal - Try this code - 

<table  align="left"  border="0" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0">
 <tr>
        <td valign="top" style="vertical-align: top;mso-line-height-rule:exactly;">
            <div>
                <!--[if mso]>
                <v:roundrect xmlns:v="urn:schemas-microsoft-com:vml" xmlns:w="urn:schemas-microsoft-com:office:word" href="www.goggle.com" style="width:260px;height:60px;v-text-anchor:middle;" arcsize="10%"  strokecolor="2px #000099 solid" fillcolor="#FFFFFF">
                <w:anchorlock/>
                <center style="font-weight: 500;color:#000099;font-family:sans-serif;font-size: 16px;line-height:25px;padding: 0;text-align: center;"> Call to Action
                </center>
                </v:roundrect>
                <![endif]-->
                    <a class="main" href="www.goggle.com" target="_blank" style="font-weight:500; background-color:#ffffff;width:260px ; border-radius: 4px; color:#000099; display: inline-block;font-family:sans-serif; font-size: 16px; line-height: 60px; border:2px #000099 solid; text-align: CENTER; text-decoration: NONE;  -webkit-text-size-adjust: none; mso-hide: all; ">
                        Call to Action
                    </a>
            </div>
        </td>
</tr>
</table>

You missed the URL in outlook hack. If you want link to be working when the email is forwarded, you need to have the href tag in outlook hack. 

[SanfordWhiteman]

That Outlook-only href is missing a protocol, and it also won’t be tracked unless you change <v:roundrect to <a:roundrect.

Also note in general, since there’s no standard for inline forwarding, you shouldn’t expect links to work in 100% of cases — no matter how many hacks you apply!

[Dave_Roberts · Accepted solution]

The root of the issue with stuff like this (conditional code in email) is that once it hits the email inbox, that inbox is going to actually change the code to format within what it understands. For example, if you were to send this email to a user who opened it in gMail, the Outlook code would get stripped out. Then, when that user forwarded it to an Outlook inbox, the Outlook could would be absent and you should expect that it'll break everytime. The same goes the other way around, Outlook (and all the rest) have their own quirks that'll strip out some code or omit some things that you need for the type of cross-inbox experience that you can deliver from Marketo.

Simply put, don't expect emails (even really well coded ones) to behave the same after they're forward from one inbox provider to another. 

A work around to this is to encourage the "Forward to a Friend" behavior using the native Marketo functionality which will actually send a copy of the email from Marketo in all of it's initial glory to the new recipient rather than the "rendered" code from that user's inbox. Here's a link to more info on the Forward to a Friend behavior in Marketo.