This article pertains to site managers of Get Connected, Corporate Connect, Campus Connect, and Community Connect sites. It goes over some of the most commonly used filters for sending messages to users via the Email Blast.
About the Email Blast
The Email Blast is a tool available to site managers. It is located in the Communication > Email Blast area of your site manager panel, and it has two main areas: The User Filter and the Message fields.
- The User Filter enables you to select a group of users based on one or more common criteria, such as skill, need responses, or even birthday or email domain. Once you have submitted a user filter (or a combination of filters) and sent the accompanying email, your message will be sent to those users.
- The Message area contains typical email fields, including fields for subject line and message body.
Both a filter and a message can be saved for later use. For example, you can save a filter for people who have a particular interest so that you don't have to run the same filter every time you want to send a message to those people. To learn more about the Email Blast, click the article Email Blast: Reaching Out To Your Site's Volunteers. To learn more about the User Filter, see our article titled ... wait for it ... The User Filter.
What's Covered in This Article
This article focuses specifically on the different user filters that may be useful to you as a site manager. It goes over how you can filter your user list by:
- User Role (such as site manager, agency manager, program manager, or volunteer)
- Volunteer Response Data (such as need responses and fanned agencies)
- User Profile Information (such as email address, birthday, or data last logged in)
- Agency/Program Managers (filters the managers of agencies or programs who meet filter criteria)
- User Tag
- Extra Data (primarily responses to custom questions on your site)
- Event RSVP
Note: This article does not cover the filters used by Service Learning (SLM) and ReDI sites. For information on those user filters see SLM User Filter and Email Blast Options (for SLM) and The ReDI System: Filtering and Emailing Volunteers for Disaster Response (for ReDI).
Filtering the User List By User Role
If you want to email only your site's agency or program managers (or only those users who aren't agency or program managers), you can do so. You can also send an email to designated site managers and designated user-group leaders. Here are some commonly used filters for emailing site members by user role. If you are a Community Connect site, your User Filter will show the word "program" rather than "agency."
| To filter and email ... | Use this filter: |
| All users who are designated site managers | User Data > User Type > is > Manager |
| All users excluding designated site managers | User Data > User Type > is > User (This filter will include users who are designated as agency or program managers, as well as users who are volunteers.) |
| All users who are agency managers | Volunteer > Agency Manager> is an Agency Manager (This filter will include both primary and secondary agency managers.) |
| All users who are not agency managers | Volunteer > Agency Manager> is not an Agency Manager (This filter will include users who are designated as site managers, as long as they aren't also designated as agency managers.) |
| All users who are user group leaders | Service Learning > Leader> participated in > [Select block or semester.] |
Filtering the User List By Volunteer Response Data
The User Filter can be used to volunteers who have responded to a certain need, fanned a particular agency or program, or participated in a selected initiative. But that's not all! See the table below for ways you can filter your volunteer list based on their response data. Community Connect users should note that they may see the word "program" rather than "agency," and "opportunity" rather than "need."
| To filter and email ... | Use this filter: |
| All volunteers who fanned a selected agency | Volunteer > Agency Fan > is a fan of > [Select agency.] |
| All volunteers who responded to a selected need | Volunteer > Need Responses > has responded to > [Select need.] |
| All volunteers who have been approved (or declined) for a selected qualification | Volunteer > Qualification > has been approved for > [Select qualification.] Volunteer > Qualification > has been declined for > [Select qualification.] |
| All volunteers with an expired or pending qualification | Volunteer > Qualification > is expired for > [Select need.] Volunteer > Qualification > is pending for > [Select need.] |
| All volunteers who have received a selected benchmark | Volunteer > Benchmark > has received > [Select benchmark.] |
| Volunteers who responded to a need within a selected initiative | Volunteer > Initiative > has participated in > [Select initiative.] |
| Volunteers by number of need responses | Volunteer > User Need Response > Greater than > [Enter number.] Volunteer > User Need Response > Less than > [Enter number.] Volunteer > User Need Response > Is equal to > [Enter number.] |
| All volunteers who responded to a need within a selected advanced-event (AEM only) | Volunteer > Advanced Event > has respond to > [Select advanced event.] |
Filtering the User List By User Profile Data
As a site manager, you have a wealth of options for filtering and emailing your site's users based on their profile information. Listed below are some of the most commonly used filters in this area.
| To filter and email ... | Use this filter: |
| All users with a specified email domain (useful for emailing employees of a company, or reaching out to users who may have been affected by technical difficulties with a particular email provider) | User Data > Email Address > ends with > [type domain] |
| All users with a specified tag (useful for emailing users with custom tags) | User Data > User Tag > is > [Select tag.] (See Filtering the User List by Tag for more information on user tags.) |
| All users with a particular skill or interest | User Data > User Causes > [Select cause.] User Data > User Interests > [Select interest.] (Community Connect sites may see "User Skills" in place of "User Interests.") |
| All users within an age range | User Data > Date of Birth > after > [Select date.] User Data > Date of Birth > before > [Select date.] User Data > Date of Birth > on > [Select date.] User Data > Age Range > is > [Select age range.] |
| Users filtered by when they joined your site (useful for celebrating site-membership anniversaries) | User Data > Date Added > after > [Select date.] User Data > Date Added > before > [Select date.] User Data > Date Added > on > [Select date.] |
| Users filtered by when they last logged in to your site (useful for reaching out to users who have not visited the site in a while) | User Data > Date Last Logged In > after > [Select date.] User Data > Date Last Logged In > before > [Select date.] User Data > Date Last Logged In > on > [Select date.] |
| Users filtered by their company name | User Data > Company > contains > [Enter part of the company name.] Note: To filter by users who have not entered a company in their profile, filter by User Data > Company > is empty.. |
| Users who belong to a selected user group | User Data > User Group > belongs to [Select user group.] |
| Users who may not be receiving your site's notifications | User Data > User email status > [Select status.] Statuses are has bounced or dropped, has been marked as spam, and opted out of notifications. |
| All users who are site managers | User Data > User Type > is > Manager |
| All users who are agency managers | Volunteer > Agency Manager > is an agency manager. (Community Connect sites may see "program" rather than "agency.") |
| All users who have met a selected benchmark | User Data > Benchmark > has achieved > [Select benchmark.] |
| Users who wish to be notified in case of disaster | User Data > Disaster Notification > volunteers who wish to be notified |
| Users filtered by status (active, inactive, imported, pending) | User Data > User Status > [Select status.] Note: Select the Imported status when you are ready to activate your imported users. |
| Users who have met a selected qualification | Volunteer > Qualification > has been approved for > [Select qualification.] |
The above list does not cover every option in the User Data portion of the filter. To learn more, take some time to explore the user filter on your site and see what other possibilities are available.
Filtering the User List By Agency or Program Manager Data
Using the Agency/Program options in the User Filter, you can filter your users not only by their role as agency or program manager, but by agency- or program-specific criteria. For example, you can filter and email all agencies or programs that have selected a particular cause, or who have added a new need within the past few weeks. Here are some useful filters that apply to users who are agency/program managers. Note that Community Connect sites will show "program" rather than "agency" in these filters.
| To access and export ... | Use this filter: |
| All agency or program managers | Volunteer > Agency Manager > is an Agency Manager. (Select is not an Agency Manager to export all users who are not agency managers.) |
| Agency or program managers whose posted needs have responses by volunteers within a selected user group | Agency > User Groups > has responses by group > [Select user group.] |
| Agency or program managers who added a need before, after, or on a selected date (useful for reaching out to agencies or programs that have not been active recently) | Agency > Date New Need Added > after > [Select date.] Agency > Date New Need Added > before > [Select date.] Agency > Date New Need Added > on > [Select date.] |
| Managers of agencies that have been identified as partner agencies | Agency > Partner Status > is partner. (Select is not partner to export all agency managers who are not associated with partner agencies.) |
| Managers of agencies or programs that have used a selected initiative | Agency > Initiatives > has used initiative > [Select initiative.] |
| Managers of agencies or programs that are associated with a selected cause | Agency > Causes > has cause > [Select cause.] |
| Managers of agencies or programs that have participated in a selected service-learning block (SLM clients only) | Service Learning > Agency Managers > Participated in > [Select block.] |
Filtering the User List By Tag
Your site's user profiles, when viewed from your site manager panel, each include a Tag field. You can use this field to attach custom designations to individual users, such as "court-mandated" or "attended orientation," or even a rating on a numbered scale. Once users are tagged, you can filter the user list by tag and email those users who share a selected tag. Note that tags private and are for site-manager use only. They do not appear on the front end of your site or in the user profile, and your site's users will not know what tags have been attached to their profiles.
To filter users by tag, run a filter on User Data > User Tag > is, and then select a tag from the dropdown.
Note that some tags are applied automatically. For example, if a user was imported into your system on a certain date, they will have a tag (such as import-feb-1, as shown above) to designate this. Also, if a user has logged into your site using their Facebook login, they'll be given a "facebook-connect" tag. As with custom tags, you can filter and email your users based on these automatically assigned tags.
Filtering the User List By "Extra Data"
"Extra data" is a placeholder term for user data that has been added to your site primarily via custom questions, either in user-registration process or as part of a need response or hour-submission form. Filtering by extra data, you can email all volunteers who selected a certain answer to a custom question. In the example below, the site has a registration about which branch of the military users have served in, and the site manager is filtering users by "Navy."
The User Extra option is listed in the dropdown following a User Data selection, as shown above.
Filtering the User List By Event RSVPs
\If your site uses the Events RSVP feature, you an reach out to your volunteers who RSVP'ed (or did not RSVP) to a posted event. To do so, run a filter on Events > Event Attendance > Attended, and then select the event. Note that selecting Attended will filter all users who RSVP'ed "yes" to the event (whether the event has occurred or not), and selecting Did Not Attend will filter all users who either did not RSVP or who RSVP'ed "no" to the event.