Although the last update of WA software allowed site admins to create membership entries without email addresses, this only addresses a small part of the problem.

We want to move away from costly site admin intervention, ideally new members will create their own entries and we will only validate them once dues have been paid.

This means that we really do still need to allow:
(1) members to sign up without email addresses and
(2) members to sign up with duplicate email addresses.

I assume that (2) will have to mean moving away from having the username == email address and the introduction of proper unique usernames for login purposes. This in itself will be a very welcome addition.

Regards,
Ian
worthing and adur chamber of commerce

We've had a number of similar ideas - allow administrators to setup multiple "from" emails addresses (sender email) and use them in various scenarios like email blasts, event reminders, membership emails, etc. Currently all emails are sent from single FROM email, defined at Settings > Your Account > Organization Details > Email Settings

I merged all posts together so we can address them together properly. Quotes from some of original posts and comments:

"To avoid all site-related emails coming from a common sender, and risking email fatigue for our members, it would be terrific if one-off and system emails had a feature to customize the "From" email field to be someone's personal address, or even just a different alias. This would allow emails for specific purposes (e.g., particular forums or events) to come from an appropriate contact rather than our entire organization, which is less likely to be read."

"We would like to have an additional "From email for events", so that events would come from that address instead of the "From email" used everywhere."

"We would like to create additional emails associated with the *******.org domain through WA, so that our organization's officers have org-specific addresses they can send emails to other members from. Thank you!"

"We have various committees (governance, event planning, membership, public relations, and financial), each of which has its own email address. The committee chair and secretary sometimes each have their own email address. We would greatly appreciate having membership-related messages (membership application, invoices, confirmation messages) go to the membership committee email address, and event-related messages (registration, payment) go to the event planning committee address."

Our membership would like the ability to see archived e-blasts sent to "All" members. In our membership model, all members are "equal." I could see this further broken down by Group, e.g., members belonging to Board group could view archive message sent to their group; e-blast sent to "all" members could be view by "all" members, etc. Also, having the ability to show messages sent within a certain time period, e.g., messages sent within the last 6 months (rather than messages archived forever).

Even better, have the ability to search e-blast message text by keywords much like the forums. The search results would need to take into account whether the member searching is authorized to see say Board messages. It might be easier to simply offer search for messages sent to "all" members.

I am guessing another function page devoted to e-blast archive viewing/searching would be necessary.

PBGVone
* * * PBGV's rule * * *

Constant Contact just launched AppConnect -- a destination for software providers, and developers who want to integrate or connect an application to Constant Contact. AppConnect gives others access to their web service APIs so they can create tie-ins with their contact and reporting data. Constant Contact gives their service away to many non-profits and chambers of commerce. At present, companies export email lists out of W/A and into Constant Contact. The downside is the extra work involved with moving the data and keeping both data sets up to date; plus the "email history" is being lost from the member's record. The upside is Constant Contact's ability to track deliveries, opens, click throughs, etc. It would be great if it were possible to link the two programs using this new AppConnect capability.

I would like to have the ability to modify the event notification email reminder time. As currently designed, the notification goes into the queue 30 minutes before meeting time. This doesn't mean it goes out at that time so members are getting the email 9-12 minutes after that, whichi gives a 20 minute notice. The reason we put an event reminder on the day of the event is so people don't forget it and ensure it's part of their daily schedule. This 20 minute notice does not do that especially considering our meetings go out to members across the community and all have to drive to the meeting location. By the time this notice goes out, for those that remember, they have already left, for those that have forgotten, 20 minutes isn't enough time to get them there on time.

To resolve this I would like to see the ability to modify the time so I can adjust the time the notice is sent out, or if that is not feasible, at least give a one hour notice.

Fred

Our team regularly sends out email blasts using WA, but one thing that really would make a difference for us that does not currently seem to be available is the ability to add in social media buttons, such as a Facebook "Share" or just social icons in general, to any part of an email template, as well as the option to be able to share the email in its entirety via email or social media. One example that is currently out there is MailChimp which, for instance, allows one to drag in a social widget into their email's footer if they should find this useful. A social widget something like the Sharing Buttons Gadget -- https://help.wildapricot.com/display/DOC/Sharing+buttons+gadget.

Further, we envision/hope for some way that we can include the sharing tools in individual sections of an email in a way that only the section at hand can be shared, if desired.

This would be a huge step in terms of marketing and take sending out emails to a whole other level, and we truly hope the team at Wild Apricot will consider adding these types of features.

We are "Husky" development team at Wild Apricot named, responsible for emailing area of the product.

We’re putting finishing touches for our next release in Aug-Sep, which will include big improvements to our emailing workflow. These improvements are the first step to centralize emails management into one module and allow email scheduling and many other features in the future​.

But we need your help to make sure we’re on the right track.

There is one feature that we didn’t change but we would like to improve: “Adding Recipients”. Before we design improvements, we want to know a few things about how you currently send an email and any pain points that are specific to this particular step of choosing email recipients.

If you’re willing to help us, please answer the following questions.

1. What kind of newsletters/campaigns do you have?

2. How often do you send emails via Wild Apricot?

3. What is the starting point of creating a recipient list?

4. What parts/modules of the system do you usually send emails from??

5. What are the pros and cons of the current "add recipient" dialog?

The more detailed your response, the better.

You can answer right here, in this thread.

Thanks!
Best regards,

Lily, Husky Team at Wild Apricot
Emailing development crew