Swap EN/FR Language Content with AMPscript

Question

I have a template in ExactTarget (Salesforce Marketing Cloud), with 2 stacked tables, one EN and another FR. I need the EN to stay at the top and FR at the bottom for EN subscribers and FR at the top and EN at the bottom for FR subscribers.

There is a field in the data extension for the Language with 2 possible values, either EN or FR.

How can I do that with AMPScript? Remember, it's a template with editable fields.

Thanks, VD

Answer 1

I don't think you can get around this without duplicating at least one of the content areas. I would use Content Areas as previously suggested, which can be retrieved inside the Template and edited. I'd also opt for using the ContentAreaByName() function, which is much easier to manage.

My Contents > Hello_FR

<h1>Bonjour</h1>

My Contents > Hello_EN

<h1>Hello</h1>

Template

%%[
var @lang
set @lang = AttributeValue("lang")
]%%

<br>@lang: %%=v(@lang)=%%

%%[ if @lang == "EN" then ]%%

  %%[ /* Retrieve from My Contents, Hello_EN and revise */ ]%%
  <custom type="content" name="EN Content 1"> 

%%[ endif ]%%

%%[ /* Retrieve from My Contents, Hello_FR  and revise */ ]%%
<custom type="content" name="FR Content"> 

%%[ if @lang == "FR" then ]%%

  %%[ /* Copy revised content from first Content Area above */ ]%%
  <custom type="content" name="EN Content 2"> 

%%[ endif ]%%

The process would be:

1. Create the template
2. Create the base content areas
3. Create the email, based on the template
4. Retrieve the content areas for EN and FR
5. Copy the contents of the first EN content area into to the last
6. Repeat steps 3-5 for each subsequent email

Answer 2

I would make a content area for each of your tables. Then, use AMPscript to look up which comes first, Like so:

%%[
   SET @contentAreaID_EN = 12321123 /*or whatever value, could use name too */
   SET @contentAreaID_FR = 122342123 /*or whatever value */
   SET @first_content_lang = LOOKUPROWS(VARIABLES_GO_HERE) /*or some other lookup, you only need to do one lookup*/
   VAR @first_area_id, @second_area_id 
   IF(@@first_content_lang == 'EN') THEN
      SET @first_area_id = @contentAreaID_EN
      SET @second_area_id = @contentAreaID_FR
   ELSE
      SET @first_area_id = @contentAreaID_FR
      SET @second_area_id = @contentAreaID_EN
   ENDIF
]%%

Then in your email, call each content area

%%=ContentArea(I1,S1,B1,S2,N1)=%% 
%%=ContentArea(I1,S1,B1,S2,N1)=%% /* look at our help.exacttarget.com for the specifics of these calls.

Good luck!