While similar to the Send Communication Action, App Alerts and News lets you organize, create and schedule a variety of communications specifically for the Mobile Attendee App or Mobile Organizer App.
Clicking on the App Alerts and News Action Button brings up the App Alerts and News Communication Panel:
New Tab
Your options include:
- Headline - enter an appropriate headline that your attendees will see first in their Mobile Apps.
- App - choose either the Attendee App, Organizer App, or EventStream.
- Type - select the type of communication you plan on sending:
- News - these are news items that you will publish to the Mobile App. Use the dropdown list to select which App (and which News section in that app) you are publishing to.
Tip: In the Mobile App setup, you will need to add a News section to your App.
- Alerts - these are communications written on the fly and sent out to all users of the Mobile App. Use the dropdown list to select which app you are publishing to.
Tip: In the Mobile App setup, you will need to add an Alerts section to your App.
- Send To - select which contacts you wish to send this news or alert item to. You can filter on any aspect of the EventsAir database, such as by registration type, function selected or more.
- Publish Time - select the date and time for when these alerts or news updates are sent. They will not be visible in the Mobile App before then.
- Body - this will change based on which option you select. News items will get a full HTML editor; otherwise, you will see a text window to enter your alert.
- Image - this useful feature lets you create a News icon to display on the Mobile App. (News only - Alerts do not have images.)
This image will be automatically resized to no larger than 100x100 pixels, so it can be displayed to the left of the Headline in the list of News articles.
Queued Tab
This tab displays a list of all planned news or alert items prior to being sent out. You are able to return to this tab at any time to review and update content and images for your news and alert items.
Tip: It can be very useful to plan ahead for your news items, so you can easily update content prior to the items being sent out at their scheduled times.
Sent Tab
This tab will list all of the Alerts and News messages that have been published to the Mobile Apps.