You can create as many templates as you need within your Airship account, these can either be created from scratch (see below) or you can choose an existing email that would form the basis of a great template.
To use an existing email, click on Emails > Saved emails > open your chosen email > tap the three dots in the top right corner > select "Save as Template"
This email will now appear in your template page & you can go on to create emails directly from this new template or amend any parts of the template you need to.
Screenshot of template page
How to create an email template from scratch
If you’d rather create some brand new templates you can create these within the “Build an email” page.
Head to Emails > Build an email & select Build a new template
You’ll now be sent to a page that is very similar to the email builder and here you can create the blocks and desired layout for your template.
Content Panel:
To the right of the template builder, you can find the addable options available for your template.
Blocks:
Blocks can be used to break up your template and to add different design elements to suit the content you are creating. By adding blocks to your template, it separates the content from one another into rows, this allows you to drag and drop different layouts alongside each other.
Body:
The body option allows you to change the formatting of the entire template, rather than individual elements. This is a great way to make sure your background, font, and colours are consistent across your whole template.
Images:
You can add image blocks using this option, you will most likely want to customise this when you build your emails so you could upload a placeholder image to indicate where images can be added.
Addable content explained:
Columns: Columns allow you to divide up blocks and split up your content.
Heading: A heading is similar to a title, standing out boldly at the beginning of text to introduce what the text is about.
Text: This inserts a text block into your email, you can then format the text to suit your brand.
Image: This is where you can upload any images, they can be in GIF, JPEG or PNG format.
Button: Add interactive buttons into your email, allowing the email recipient to be taken to whichever URL you would like.
Divider: Dividers create visible break ups of the email page.
HTML: HTML allows you to add any pre-made emails or email templates that have already been created using HTML language.
Menu: Menu allows you to add an interactive listed menu for the email recipient to click, this is an alternative to adding buttons to your email as the menu option is more condensed and ordered
How to preview your template:
If you would like to see how your template will look to the email recipient when viewing on a desktop or mobile, you can do this by pressing the eye on the black tool bar on the bottom left of the email building canvas.
Desktop / Mobile view:
To switch between the preview of mobile and desktop - above your created email, the two buttons that display Desktop | Mobile, are clickable.
By selecting desktop, this will show the preview of the emails from a desktop, by selecting mobile, you will be able to preview the email for mobile viewers.
You can choose to hide and display blocks within the different views, this can be useful if you want to display a more compressed version of your email when it is displayed on mobile.
You also have the option to remove stacking in your email if you want any of your blocks to appear side by side instead of on top of each other.
Locking certain elements of your template
Within the template builder you can choose to lock off certain elements within your layout to make sure your brand is consistent across any emails sent out.
You can choose whether to lock entire blocks so that they cannot be edited once an email is created using this template or you can pick and choose what can be done within each block.
Selectable: This will stop anyone being able to select this block within their email (this includes the content)
Draggable: This will allow you to keep a block in the same place within the email, the content can be changed but the position of the block will stay the same
Duplicatable: This will stop any duplication of this block.
Deletable: This will make the block un-deletable so that it will appear in all emails created from this template
Hideable: This will stop the block from being hidden and so it will appear in all emails created from this template
Locked: This will lock all of the above.
If you completely lock an element this will mean the content cannot be changed, this might be most useful for header or footer blocks that don’t need different content depending on the email being sent.
Once you’re happy with the layout of your template you can send a test send to ensure it renders as expected within your inbox, click on the three dots in the top right corner > select test send > enter your email.
You can always come back and change the template as and when you need to, for example if you have a rebrand.