What it is and what it's for#
Almost everything that happens in the programme happens when someone comes back to the app. Notifications are what brings them back.
There are three different ways to reach a person, and it is worth not confusing them:
| Path | What it is | Who triggers it |
|---|---|---|
| Automatic alert | An alert on the phone sent on its own when a condition is met (for example, that the person has new challenges). | The system, every day, with nobody involved. |
| One-off send | An alert on the phone that you write and send to the people you choose. | You, from Send Notifications. |
| An email. It goes out from other screens (invitations, password recovery, a news post sent by email), it is not written here. | The system, or whoever publishes the content. |
Phone alerts and email are independent channels. Someone not receiving alerts on their phone does not stop emails reaching them, and vice versa.
How to set it up#
1. Automatic alerts#
They are in place from go-live and are not configured from the panel. Today there are three:
- 1
You have new challenges
Sent to anyone with pending challenges that have not been announced to them yet. Goes out once a day.
- 2
Your deadline is running out
Reminds people about challenges that are about to expire. It does not go out every day.
- 3
Due tomorrow
The last alert, the day before the deadline. Goes out once a day.
Each challenge is announced only once: as soon as a person receives the "new challenges" alert for a specific challenge, that challenge is marked as announced and is not counted again the next day. That is why the alert is not repeated even if the challenge is still not done.
The wording of these alerts is fixed and agreed when the programme is set up. If you need to change it, that is a request to the team, not a field in the panel.
2. Sending a one-off notification#
In Send Notifications you get the list of people you can reach, with these columns: ID, Name, Last Name, Email, Organisation Name, Location Name and Tribe. It pages 15 at a time and every column can be filtered and sorted.
The flow is always the same:
- 1
Filter
Use the column filters to narrow down to the group you want to reach: a location, an organisational unit, a tribe.
- 2
Select
Tick people one by one, or select in one go everyone left by the filter.
- 3
Write and send
Click Send notification to selected users. Send notification opens, with two fields: Title and Message. The Send button sends it.
The button is disabled until you have selected someone. And once you click Send, there is no going back: an alert that has been sent cannot be cancelled or edited.
This list only shows people who can receive alerts on their phone. Anyone without the app installed, or who has not granted notification permission, does not appear here. That is not a bug: there is simply no way to reach them through this channel.
3. Subscriptions#
Subscriptions is the full census, including the people you cannot reach. It is the screen to go to when someone says "I don't get anything".
| Column | What it tells you |
|---|---|
| User ID | The person's identifier. |
| Has any subscription? | Whether they have ever registered a device. If it is no, they have never granted permission. |
| User / Email | Who they are. |
| Device OS / Device Model | Which device they came in with. |
| Is Subscribed | Whether that device accepts alerts right now. |
| Last Active | When they were last seen on that device. |
This screen is read-only: nothing is enabled or disabled here. The permission is granted by the person on their phone and only they can withdraw it.
4. Email - Log#
Email - Log is the record of the emails the programme has sent. It only refreshes every few minutes, so a recently sent email takes a while to appear.
| Column | What it tells you |
|---|---|
| Created At | When it went out. |
| Msg ID | The identifier of the send. This is the piece of data to give the team if something needs investigating. |
| To Email / From Email | Recipient and sender. |
| Subject | The subject line. |
| Status | Whether it was delivered, whether it bounced or whether it is still on its way. |
| Opens Count / Clicks Counts | How many times it was opened and how many clicks it got. |
| User ID, Name, Last Name, Email | The person in the programme that email corresponds to. |
It is also read-only: nothing is resent or retried from here.
What the employee sees#
- On their phone, an alert with the title and the message. Tapping it takes them into the app.
- The first time they open the app, their phone asks whether they accept alerts. If they say no, they stop being reachable through this channel.
- There is no notification preferences screen inside the app. The employee does not choose which alerts they want or how often: the only switch they have is their phone's notification permission, in the system settings.
- In their inbox they receive whatever goes out through that channel: the invitation, password recovery and any news posts sent by email.
Frequently asked questions#
I sent a notification and several people say it never arrived. What do I check?
Look them up in Subscriptions. If Has any subscription? is no, they never granted permission and the alert never went out for them. If they have a subscription but Is Subscribed is no, they withdrew it later. In neither case is it a sending failure.
Why doesn't Send Notifications show my whole workforce?
Because that list is limited to people who can receive alerts. The difference between that number and your real workforce is, precisely, the people who don't have the app or haven't granted permission. The full census is in Subscriptions.
Can I schedule a notification for later?
No. Sends from Send Notifications go out immediately. The only things sent automatically are the automatic alerts.
Can I find out who opened a phone notification?
No. There is no open tracking for phone alerts. For email there is: Email - Log gives you Opens Count and Clicks Counts per send.
An email shows a bounce status. What do I do?
First check that the address is spelled correctly on the person's record. If it is, note down the Msg ID and pass it to the team: without that, the send cannot be traced.
Can I write an email by hand from the panel?
No. Email - Log only records what has already gone out. To reach a group by email, publish a news post and mark it to be sent by email. See News.
Limits and warnings#
- An alert that has been sent cannot be withdrawn. Check the Title and the Message before clicking Send: there is no draft, no preview and no undo.
- Filtering by location or tribe does not give you the whole location or the whole tribe, only the part of it that can receive alerts. If you are communicating something that absolutely has to reach everyone, this channel alone is not enough.
- Each new challenge is announced only once. If the alert arrives at a bad moment and the person dismisses it, it will not be sent again for that challenge. The reminder will reach them as the deadline approaches, not before.
- Automatic alerts depend on challenges having a deadline. A challenge with no deadline will never trigger the expiry reminders.
- The email log lags behind. If you have just sent something and can't see it in Email - Log, wait a few minutes before assuming it has failed.
- Nobody can grant notification permission on someone else's behalf. Not you, not the team. If an entire location receives no alerts, it is almost always that the app has not been installed there.
- Increasing how often you send alerts does not increase participation. A one-off send works when it brings genuine news; repeated every week, people withdraw permission and you lose them for good.