Extract Text Version of the email body with no html tags using REST API from SFMC

Question

I was trying to extract the email body (text version) with no html tags from SFMC. But I had some hard timing on how to filter out the nodes in the email content to get the expected result, I couldn't find a piece of useful information in the salesforce documentation. I have invoked the https://{{et_subdomain}}.rest.marketingcloudapis.com/asset/v1/content/assets?$filter=assetType.name=htmlemail it gave me the results of the data which includes enterpriseId , memberId, thumbnail, category, content, data, views, configuration and items. But I had tried different filtering options with a simple filter and advanced filters to get the text version of the email (like subject, body).

Could someone help me share your thoughts? Appreciate your help and thanks for reading my message.

Answer 1

Unfortunately, this REST API endpoint does not return Text-version Content but only HTML-version:

Host: https://YOUR_SUBDOMAIN.rest.marketingcloudapis.com
GET /asset/v1/content/assets/
Content-Type: application/json
Authorization: Bearer YOUR_ACCESS_TOKEN

I've tried it with different emails and filters, yet this path: "items": { views": { "text": { "content": } } } was always empty.

However, you can do a preview of your email with this REST endpoint, considering that you have a Data Extension with a record suitable for preview, which will always correctly render an email:

Host: https://YOUR_SUBDOMAIN.rest.marketingcloudapis.com
POST /guide/v1/emails/{Email_ID}/dataExtension/{DE_ObjectId}/row/{Row_Number}/preview
Content-Type: application/json
Authorization: Bearer YOUR_ACCESS_TOKEN

• Email_ID - just retrieve from UI
• DE_ObjectID - millions of ways of getting it through scripts and API, the fastest IMHO would be to pick it from HTML when Inspecting Element inside the folder where DE is located:
• Row_Number - just exactly what it means, would be easier to have only one record in the case with a dedicated Data Extension for preview

As a result, you will have a response with that two ContentTypes where each will contain in the Content property needed information:

{
  "contentType": "vnd.exacttarget.message.email.subjectLine",
  "content": "xxx"
},
{
  "contentType": "vnd.exacttarget.message.email.textBody",
  "content": "xxx"
}

Lastly, please consider that this is the undocumented endpoint and is not officially supported by SFMC. The endpoint could be changed or removed whenever and thus use it at your own risk.