Before working at Napier, seeing the back end of a website or a broken email with all the code showing, was like getting a glimpse into a world of mystery and intrigue that only a select, brainy few had any knowledge of. It made me think of glasses wearing, Star Wars T-Shirt clad, IT… to put it frankly… geeks. I didn’t understand it. My friend used to blog a lot, she used some basic code to jazz up her posts, a couple of <b> tags here and there, the odd <br>. I gave it a go myself but didn’t know where to start. That’s not to say I haven’t wanted to learn. So when, within the first few weeks of starting at Napier, I was told I’d been learning HTML for creating email templates I was excited at the prospect of finally understanding what it was all about.
Nesting tables…
So how did I go from knowing virtually nothing about coding, to creating my own responsive email template within a matter of weeks? I started off by using online resources, looking at the very basics of HTML. As well as this, I had an in-house teacher. Diana, the Digital Marketing Manager here at Napier, is extremely skilled in the ways of all things code related. She was (and still is, when I call on her in a coding pickle) very patient and got me up to speed quickly. It’s all about tables in email, tables within tables. Once I’d begun to get my head around all the nesting, Diana gave me various tests and tasks to complete. I had to write a template out on paper, I re-arranged the layout of existing templates by adding and removing sections, I used a validator to check a seemingly innocent piece of code to fix the bugs and eventually I was able to create my own template from scratch.
Getting Creative…
I studied art at university and a few years ago I took a part time course in directing & cinematography, so generally I come from a creative background and I was quite surprised to find that there is an element of creativity in coding. It is really satisfying seeing those little tags turn into something much more colourful and aesthetically pleasing. Of course it hasn’t been all fun and games, there have been numerous occasions where I have been mere inches from my computer screen, desperately trying to work out why a certain element is behaving a certain way or why an image isn’t moving where I told it to move, only to have Diana come and take a look and within seconds spot that I have missed a simple semi-colon. It really can be that small of an error which then sends the rest into disarray.
To infinity and beyond…
At Napier, digital marketing is a large part of what we do. With email marketing still an extremely powerful tool, driving more conversions than any other marketing channel, being able to create an email template is a valuable skill to hold. Learning HTML has enabled me to work on client accounts and get fully immersed in email campaigns. HTML is ever evolving, especially with more emails being viewed on smartphones and tablets, it’s important to be able to cater to the different devices by making emails responsive. So learning is an ongoing process and it is challenging, but it’s also stimulating – like trying to solve a puzzle. And has my option of the type of people that code changed? Yes, of course! I don’t own a Stars Wars T-shirt… I’ve got a NASA one instead.