Put each student’s name and course in my automatic emails
An email that says “Hi Emma, how is Baby Massage going?” reads like it came from you. One that says “Hi there, how is your course going?” reads like it came from a machine. Your automatic emails can now say the first.
The prompt
“In my [journey, e.g. new student] emails, greet each person by first name and mention their course. Show me how the first email would look for [a student’s name, or a sample student] before I switch anything on.”
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Five details, filled in for each person. Ask Bernard to use any of these in a journey email, in the subject or the body:
{{first_name}}- the person’s first name, or “there” if bernard doesn’t know it.{{name}}- their full name, or “there”.{{course_title}}- the course they’re enrolled on, or “your course”.{{course_level}}- their level, for example “Level 3”. This one can be blank: see below.{{last_lesson}}- the last lesson they finished, or “where you left off”.
You don’t need to type any of these yourself. Say “greet each student by first name and mention their course” and Bernard writes them in. If a word in double braces is not one of these five, bernard refuses to save the email rather than send it with a gap.
Where the level comes from. A student’s level comes from their own enrolment first (useful when one course is taught at two levels), and otherwise from the level you set on the course itself. If neither has one, the level is left out: a made-up level would be worse than none. Ask Bernard to set the level on a course, and write sentences that still read well without it.
The last lesson is the last one bernard has recorded. Bernard fills it in from the lessons it has recorded as finished. Not every kind of lesson tells bernard yet when it is finished, so for some students this will say “where you left off” for a while. Word the sentence so that reads naturally too.
Preview before you switch anything on. Ask Bernard to show you a step as one real student would get it, or as a made-up sample student. The preview is the same rendering the real email uses, so what you see is what they get, and it tells you which details came out blank. Nothing sends until you approve the journey - see How do automatic emails work? for how that approval works, and Change or pause my automatic emails for editing the words later.
Questions people ask
- Which details can an automatic email fill in?
- Five: the person’s first name, their full name, the title of the course they’re on, their course level, and the last lesson they finished. Each one is filled in separately for every person who gets the email.
- What if bernard doesn’t know someone’s name?
- It says “there” instead, so “Hi there” rather than “Hi ,”. The course title falls back to “your course” and the last lesson to “where you left off”.
- Why is the level blank for some students?
- A level comes from the student’s own enrolment, or else from the level you set on the course. If neither has one, it is left out rather than guessed. The preview tells you when that happens, so you can reword the sentence before you approve anything.
- Can I see the email for a real student before it goes out?
- Yes. Ask Bernard to preview any step for a student you name, or for a made-up sample student. Nothing is sent by a preview, and nothing starts sending until you approve the journey and switch it on.
- Do the details work in the subject line too?
- Yes. The subject and the body can both use them, and they are filled in the same way.