I’ve got a quick blog post here, easy to follow and implement, but makes things a whole lot simpler when trying to share files with your Contacts using D365 Marketing. Let’s look at how you can upload a file, then add a button to your Marketing Email and link it back to the document as a file download.
UPDATE: Reader Natval (see comments) raised that you need to install the Asset Library first. At the time when this post was written, if you already had an existing environment with D365 Marketing, the asset library was already there, no need to install for Real-time Marketing. Now, you have to actively install it and THEN can use this feature to add a file download. Details on installing (or even removing) can be found here: Install the asset library add-on (Dynamics 365 Marketing) | Microsoft Learn – Thanks Natval!
UPDATE: Reader Owen Scott (see comments) pointed out that files for regions Brazil, India, and United Arab Emirates are handled differently in terms of storage. Please review this page and the green tip section at the top for more information if you work in any of those regions: Real-time marketing asset library (Dynamics 365 Marketing) | Microsoft Docs
First things first, where do the files actually go? Although you don’t have to upload the file first, it’s a good starting point. Make sure you are in the Real-time marketing area, then go in to the Library section under the Assets area.
From the top, click on Upload, then Upload media items.
You can change the title, description and tags for the document, then click Upload now.
Once you’ve uploaded your document, you will notice it gets a public URL, making it accessible to anyone who has access to the internet. Great!
Now set up your marketing email. A common use case where a document needs to be shared would be any time a marketing form is filled out requesting access to a white paper or case study. So make sure you add a button to your email.
Click on the button then go to the panel on the right side to edit it. We can simply set the link to option as File download.
You now have a section where you can choose a file. Clicking on this area then displays an option to either browse the library or upload to the library.
Using the Browse library option then displays all files that have already been uploaded. One of them can then be selected.
The button is now linked to this specific file. After changing the button text, the email is ready to go!
Now when someone fills out the form requesting your content, you can use a customer journey to make sure the Contact is sent this email and can get access to the document or file you are sharing. Easy!
27 responses
Excellent – thank you
Always welcome my friend 🥰
What is the advantage of using this method? I’m not a fan of the Public URL it creates so I think I would sooner want to share a link to our regular file location.
Hi Steve. If you already have your files stored elsewhere, and those links are available to the marketing team to find quickly then sure, no need in moving all your files. That’s not always the case, so this way you can upload the files to the marketing app and easily access those files when creating your marketing emails. I agree, if you currently store files in a structure that creates a ‘pretty-url’, then the only way to continue would be to continue with your regular file location. Preference of the organisation I guess!
I think this feature isnot available anymore, i tried it on my environnement but i can’t upload a new pdf file or add it directly to my emails.
It is there nwayla, but only for Real-time Marketing emails. Is that what you were creating? Or were you in Outbound marketing?
Thanks for this post, Megan. One small thing I’ll mention, which threw me for a little while, is that if you using a trial or environment that originated in India, Brazil or United Arab Emirates, you cannot use this feature. Environments/Trials that originate in those locations (even if it’s in a North American tenant, strangely), provide the image-only upload interface, which throws the file type error. This was really puzzling until I empirically confirmed it was the case. So some of your readers may be facing this. This is documented in the green tip on this page: https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/dynamics365/marketing/real-time-marketing-asset-library.
Ouch, that is terrible! I guess it’s hard to know how long that tip has been there. I will add a note in the article to make sure people are aware and read that page. Thanks for pointing it out.
I just created a trial in Europe (crm4) for my MB-220 training but the capability is not available either.
Hi Robert, are you creating an Outbound email or a Real-time Marketing email? It’s there for RTM only.
I am not able to add any other media type except for images in the asset library area.
Hi Sagar, are you doing this in Outbound or Real-time Marketing? It’s only in Real-time Marketing.
Hi Megan,
I’m based in Europe, but I am also having the problem of only being able to upload images even though I’m in the Real Time Marketing area, any ideas?
Hi Ryan, is it a trial by any chance?
Hi Megan, no its a full subscription
I would suggest getting in touch with Microsoft support about it. I know with trials they only support uploading images, and documents and links to download documents is only supported in paid versions of Real-time marketing. If you have that, and still don’t have the ability to do it, support is really your last option.
Will do Megan, thanks for your help!
Really enjoy your content!
No problem, and you are welcome Ryan!
For people in Europe (at least), I think that you first have to install the asset library before you can use this feature. I will test it myself
Check it out
https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/dynamics365/marketing/real-time-marketing-asset-library
Hi Natval, thanks for the comment! I have updated the blog post to include a reference to your comment. You are correct, that you have to make sure the asset library for Real-time Marketing is installed first. Originally when I wrote this post back in February 2022, there was no option to install or remove, the asset library for RTM was just there automatically. This is why it was never mentioned in this article. So, yes, now you need to make sure it’s installed first. Thanks for flagging!
This should walk through how to do the install: https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/dynamics365/marketing/real-time-marketing-asset-add-on
Hi Megan,
Thank you so much for all the vlogs. Helps in understanding the scope the module has to offer in a much clearer manner.
Could you help me understand, if there is a way we could track the document downloads from any posts or probably webpages?
Thanks in Advance.
Best Regards,
Aayush
Hi Aayush/ There are no analytics on a file in the asset library, but you could potentially review the clicks on the link you added to your email to access the file. If you are wanting to look at analytics from your website in terms of clicks (downloads) then I would suggest reviewing your Google Analytics for that!
Hi, I tried adding a PDF as suggested and it’s working fine. The only problem arises when you view your email in browser this download button does not work.
Hi Sayali, not sure why that is happening. Maybe try contacting Microsoft support for assistance?
Hey Megan,
thanks for the awesome post. I have another question related to the emails. Is it possible to personalize attachments? for example using real time journeys to send out donation receipts.
Many Thanks,
alan
Hi Alan. The ‘documents’ would need to be generated and stored somewhere that is accessible to the outside world. For example, if you just added the document to a note as an attachment in D365 and tried to send a link to that, the recipient would have no way of downloading it because it’s behind a log in within D365 if that makes sense. Only users logged in to Dynamics could access it.
So, those documents would have to be stored on a server somewhere, such as your main website or other site where a person can click on a link to the document and download it. Even then, you would need to store the link to that document on the Contact record or related record so that you can use that to set it dynamically in the email. Short answer, it’s not easy. Longer answer, it is doable but quite a few steps and things to consider to achieve it.
Hey Megan,
thanks for your answer. I was kind of hoping that there is a possibility to just add a personalized attachment to the marketing mail in the journey. Or kind of “hack” it by manipulating the e-mail sent in a power automate or anything similiar 🙂
But it looks like we have to go the long way!
Cheers and thanks,
Alan