How to use templating syntax to create an order placed email for Shopify

Overview

You can use templating syntax to insert dynamic data from your Shopify store’s order placed data. Read on to learn more about templating syntax in automation emails and see a plain text template you can use as the basis of your order placed email.

In this guide

Prepare your email for templating syntax with an assignment tag

The assignment tag tells the email builder how to render the templating syntax into plain language.

Without the assignment tag, your templating syntax will not render and will appear to contacts as raw templating syntax.

Insert assignment tag {% set order = trigger.getOrder() %} in a text element at the very top of your email before adding one of the example snippets so that your syntax will populate. This tag will not be visible in emails contacts receive.

All other elements in your email must be below the text element containing the assignment tag.

The screenshots below show a draft email with an assignment tag correctly set, templating syntax that renders basic information about an order, and the results of previewing the draft:

⚠️ Previews of templating syntax pull from a randomly selected contact profile

The email builder’s preview function displays the syntax rendered as the plain language using data from a randomly selected contact profile.

You may see some pieces of syntax “disappear” when you click Preview. This means that the randomly selected contact did not have that data in their profile.

For example, if you insert contacts’ billing address with templating syntax in your email and the randomly selected contact profile does not have a billing address, the billing address syntax will appear blank.

To force a new randomly selected contact profile, log out of Sendlane and log in again.

Provide context for all templating syntax tags

Templating syntax returns raw data with no labels

For example, the order number tag {{order.name}} returns a raw order number with no indication that it is an order number. If you do not include text in your email that provides context for your templating syntax, your email will be difficult to understand.

The table below shows the results of templating syntax with and without manually added text to provide context:

Templating syntax Renders as
{{order.name}} #1032
Order number: {{order.name}} Order number: #1032

Basic order placed template for Shopify

You can copy and paste the entire text based template below into an email in an automation with a Shopify Order Placed trigger and click Preview to see dynamic data populated. When you paste the template into the email builder, press Ctrl + Shift + V on Windows or Cmd + Shift + V on macOS to paste without formatting. 

{% set order = trigger.getOrder() %}

Order number: {{order.name}}
Order date: {{order.processed_at }}

Billing Address
{{ order.billing_address.first_name }} {{ order.billing_address.last_name }}
{{order.billing_address.address1}}
{{order.billing_address.address2}}
{{order.billing_address.city}}, {{order.billing_address.province_code}}, {{order.billing_address.zip}}
{{order.billing_address.country_code}}

Shipping Address
{{ order.shipping_address.first_name }} {{ order.shipping_address.last_name }}
{{order.shipping_address.address1}}
{{order.shipping_address.address2}}
{{order.shipping_address.city}}, {{order.shipping_address.province_code}}, {{order.shipping_address.zip}}
{{order.shipping_address.country_code}}

Order contents
{% for product in order.line_items %}

{{product.quantity}} x {{product.title}} {{product.variant_title}}

{% endfor %}

Advanced enhancements to the basic order placed template for Shopify

⚠️ Product templating syntax in order or checkout automations requires a loop function to display all items in an order

If you use product related templating syntax without a loop, only one product from the order or checkout will render in the email.

To add a loop function:

  1. Copy the following loop tag {% for product in order.line_items %}
  1. Paste the loop tag directly above the beginning of your product related syntax
  1. Copy the following end loop tag {% endfor %}
  1. Paste the end loop tag directly below the end of your product related syntax

For example, the syntax below will display a list containing the name of each product in the randomly selected order or checkout used by the email builder preview:

Order 

{% for product in order.line_items %}
{{product.title}}
{% endfor %}

Checkout 

{% for product in checkout.line_items %}
{{product.title}}
{% endfor %}

Troubleshooting

My email preview is blank!

Check for the following issues if your email containing templating syntax is blank:

  1. Your email is missing the assignment tag. Add the assignment tag to the very top of your email and click Preview again.
  1. The preview randomly selected a profile that does not contain the data pulled into your email. Log out of Sendlane and back in to force another profile to be selected, and ensure that at least one order has been placed in your Shopify store.
When I paste the sample template into the email builder, I get a Unexpected token "operator" of value "<" error

The email builder can sometimes erroneously recognize pieces of templating syntax as URLs. If you see a Unexpected token "operator" of value "<" error and parts of the template appear to be links, remove the template and paste it in again by pressing Ctrl + Shift + V on Windows or Cmd + Shift + V on macOS to paste without formatting.

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