How do I customize an embedded link (per user) in Email?

K

Kurta

New Member
I would like to embed a link in email with a portion that varies per user. Clickthrough tracking does this very thing to provide information to MaxBulk Mailer. But I want to use it to trigger processing of the click in a script.

For example: http://surveysite.com/survey1.cgi?userID=<A UNIQUE IDENTIFIER GOES HERE>

I can put the unique identifier in the MaxBulk Mailer mysql database as a new field, but how do I merge it into the outgoing email text?

The intended use is:
=====
If you would like to take our preference survey, just click http://surveysite.com/survey1.cgi?userID=<A UNIQUE IDENTIFIER GOES HERE>
=====

Thanks for the help.

=====
Must be the weekend!
=====
Can this be done with MaxBulk Mailer?? Anyone?
 
Last edited:
K

Kurta

New Member
Hi Stan,
I apologize for asking the question. I tried watching the "tutorial" video - but there was nothing useful at the link marked "tutorial". After I did a google search against the site, I found the documentation (which I didn't know existed before). You might save yourself a TON of effort if, at the top of the MaxBulk Mail page, you put a link that says DOCUMENTATION HERE! or maybe NOOBIES START HERE!
Should be the very top of the page. My mistake was seeing "Support" and "Forums" in the top row, but NO LINK for DOCUMENTATION. Even if you go to the third level link for "manuals and tutorials, you start to see specialized stuff first. Having details in different languages is great. Cluttering a single page with links in 5 different languages? Not so great. (Actually, really bad because 80%-90% of everything on the page is irrelevant to any particular user!) Suggest you have a LANGUAGE setting in the top corner of every page. Once you click/set it, that's what you see. So, German? Click/set the German flag and you don't see Spanish/English/Swahili/Dutch/Russian. The pages are no longer cluttered with 80% of the links being IRRELEVANT (based on language). Might consider promoting pages based on how often they're viewed... but basic documentation should be right up front.

Used to be a QA Manager at one of the world's biggest online stores (with my team responsible for content over 1/2 the US + Canada +Japan) so I can say with authority, the way your links are (dis)organized is NOT the way to do it - and you're creating more work for yourself.

Frankly, I'd rather just look up the answer in documentation than pollute the forum with basic questions. It's faster, less work for you, less work for me, and I make better progress. I bet you'd rather spend more time on the boundary conditions (and more interesting problems) than telling new users the same thing over and over again.

No charge for the basic assessment! ;-)
 
stanbusk

stanbusk

Administrator
Staff member
The documentation is a bit old an outdated, this is the reason why I don't promote it too much. I am in the process of updating it, at least the English version and indeed, nowadays I would use a different language selection approach. The current one is difficult to maintain. In other parts of Maxprog web site, we already use a language pull-down menu. The old approach was (I believe) for search engine indexing.

In the new documentation/manual, I would like to add videos as well, it looks like people no longer want to spend time reading.

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