Message Templates
Templates for email and PDF.
HTML with Handlebars.
Paste your email HTML into the built-in TinyMCE editor. Drop Handlebars placeholders like {{customer.name}} or {{invoice.total}} wherever you want personalised content — subject line, body, even inside PDF attachments.
CSS stored separately.
Email clients need inline CSS to render reliably. Paste your stylesheet into the CSS form on the template detail page and YouDoCRM saves it as a linked file. Edit the HTML later and the CSS file stays put.
Personalised and inlined at send.
When a message is sent, YouDoCRM resolves every Handlebars placeholder from the relevant record and injects the CSS inline. The recipient gets an email that looks the same in Gmail, Outlook, Apple Mail or any other client.
HTML templates with inline CSS, done properly.
Reliable email rendering has always meant inline CSS. Most teams copy stylesheets into their HTML by hand. YouDoCRM does it for you, at the moment each message is sent.
Write the template once in standard HTML with Handlebars placeholders. Paste the CSS into a separate form. YouDoCRM stores the CSS as a linked file and injects it inline into every message generated from the template — personalising the content from the customer, invoice, lead or project record at the same time.
Works equally well for transactional emails, batch-run statements and marketing campaigns. No proprietary merge fields. No vendor-locked template format. No subscription tier that limits how many templates you can save.
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HTML in one editor, CSS in its own form.
The template detail page has two distinct inputs. The HTML goes into the TinyMCE editor — the same WYSIWYG editor used across YouDoCRM — where you can write content, drop in Handlebars placeholders and preview the structure. The CSS goes into a dedicated form on the same page.
When you save the template, YouDoCRM writes the CSS out as a linked file. From that point on, editing the HTML does not touch the CSS file. At send time, the CSS file is injected inline into the generated email — which is what every major email client needs in order to render the message reliably.
- TinyMCE editor for the HTML body.
- Separate form for the CSS stylesheet.
- CSS saved as a linked file on save.
- Injected inline at send for reliable rendering.
Organised by category. Duplicated on demand.
Assign every template to a category — transactional, marketing, statements, customer onboarding, whatever taxonomy your business uses. The template list can be filtered and grouped by category so the team finds the right template quickly, and it stays finding.
When you need a variant of an existing template — a second campaign with different wording, a localised version, a seasonal version — use save as copy. A duplicate of the template and its CSS file is created, ready for you to adjust. The original stays as it was. There is no limit on the number of templates you can store; storage is whatever your disk allows.
- Assign templates to any category.
- Filter and group the list by category.
- Save-as-copy for variants.
- Unlimited templates — disk-limited only.
Attach a PDF or Word doc — personalised at send.
The template system extends beyond email bodies to the documents attached to them. Two options, both native to YouDoCRM:
Upload a fillable PDF and YouDoCRM reads the PDF form fields. When an email is generated from the template, the fields are populated from the customer, invoice, lead or project record — and the completed PDF is attached to the outbound email.
Upload a Microsoft Word .docx with Handlebars syntax inline and YouDoCRM renders the document to a PDF at send time, with every placeholder resolved from the relevant record. One Word template, every recipient gets their own personalised PDF.
Few cloud CRMs offer this natively. Most require a paid document-generation add-on from their marketplace, or expect you to mail-merge in Word yourself and attach the result. YouDoCRM does both out of the box.
- Upload a fillable PDF — fields filled at send.
- Upload a Word .docx with Handlebars — rendered to PDF.
- No paid document-generation add-on required.
- Generated attachment archived with the sent message.
Template features at a glance
The practical detail behind a well-behaved template system.
Standard Handlebars
Industry-standard Handlebars syntax — not a proprietary merge-field format. Anyone on the team who has written a Handlebars template before will be productive immediately.
Categories
Group templates by purpose — transactional, marketing, customer onboarding, statements — so the right template is fast to find, even as the library grows.
Save as copy
Duplicate a template and its linked CSS in one click when you need a variant for a different campaign, language or season. The original stays intact.
Unlimited
No cap on the number of templates you can save. Storage is the disk on your own server — no subscription tier dictates how many templates your team is allowed to keep.
Frequently asked questions
Short answers on how YouDoCRM's message templates behave.
Email clients render inline CSS reliably but handle <style> blocks inconsistently. YouDoCRM stores the CSS as a linked file so that, at send time, it can be injected inline into every generated email — giving you one stylesheet to maintain and rendering that looks the same across Gmail, Outlook, Apple Mail and the rest.
Messages that have already been sent are unaffected. When YouDoCRM dispatches a message, it copies the template and its CSS and stores the copy with the message — so the record of what was sent remains exactly as it was sent. Your edit applies to future messages, not past ones.
Yes. Use save as copy and YouDoCRM duplicates the template along with its linked CSS file. You can then adjust the copy for a new campaign, language or season without affecting the original. Category assignment and metadata come with the copy so it slots straight into your library.
Yes. Preview the template with the CSS applied, using sample data for the Handlebars placeholders so you can see how the personalisation renders. Preview works inside YouDoCRM — no export step, no mail-test detour.
Create whatever categories make sense for your business — transactional, marketing, statements, onboarding, reminders — and assign each template to one. The template list can filter and group by category so the team finds the right template quickly, even as the library grows.
No. The only limit is the disk space on your own server. YouDoCRM is a single self-hosted licence — there is no subscription tier that caps your template library or charges extra when it grows. Save as many as your business needs.