Create an eNotice

This article refers to our legacy product, eNotify, which will no longer be available and support for the product will be discontinued, effective August 1, 2023. For the best Finalsite experience, we recommend using our Finalsite Messages, which provides enhanced security and reliability for your school's email communication needs. Visit our client portal for additional information and next steps.

Set up an eNotice

On the Dashboard or eNotices tab of eNotify, select the green "Create new eNotice" button to begin. On the Compose eNotice screen, set up your To, From, and Subject information, as well as other options.

The "To" section presents four green buttons with different ways to address your eNotice. Use one or all of the following methods to craft your recipient list:

• Lists: Send your eNotice to one or more Mailing Lists.

• Dynamic filters: Use a Dynamic Filter to create a custom list of recipients from Constituent Manager.

• Groups: Select one or more groups from Groups Manager to receive your eNotice.

• Constituents: Choose individual members from Constituent Manager.

“From” indicates the address from which the eNotice will appear to be sent. Any replies to the eNotice, however, will be directed to the address selected from the "Reply To" dropdown menu. Manage these addresses using the Sender Address Manager on the eNotices tab. The "From Label" is what will appear in the user’s inbox, and if left blank it will default to the reply-to address.

Enter a subject line for your eNotice, and (optionally) select whether it is of High, Low, or Normal importance. Indicate whether the message is a solicitation, and decide whether to include an unsubscribe link (mandatory) and forward to a friend link. If you are using an eNotify Template, you’ll also have options for the unsubscribe and forward links in the Message Editor.

Compose an eNotice

After you've set up your eNotice, there are up to four options for how to compose your message: template, HTML, plain text, and site page.

Template

Templates are a way to create a fully designed, responsive, styled email to your constituents. You have to create a template first before it can be used to generate individual emails.

Once you have a template created, it will be saved in your template library and available for new eNotices. To attach a template to your eNotice, choose the "Template" tab, then click the "Select Template" button. Choose a template from the popup, then select the blue "Open Message Editor" button.

The Message Editor is identical to the Template Editor and performs all the same functions; however, making changes to the individual eNotice will not affect the template. The converse is also true: New changes made to the template after you've begun editing an individual message created from it won't affect the message.

Refer to the Templates section of the Knowledge Base for more information about editing templates.

HTML

If you're a whiz with code and want the ultimate level of control over the appearance of your eNotice, you may choose to enter your HTML content into the plain-text editor that appears when you choose this option. Please note that, due to the open-ended and profoundly complex nature of HTML emails, Support will not be able to help you troubleshoot any custom HTML that you create for your eNotices.

Plain Text

If you don't have time for frills and embellishments and just want to send a quick, plain-text message that's absolutely guaranteed to reach every recipient, choose this option.

Site Page

This option is only available to sites using Page Manager.

Note: This feature is still available but is effectively deprecated - website pages have become so much more complicated than email messages that sending a page as an email is virtually guaranteed to result in error messages and unsupported features for the recipient. The best practice by far is to copy any relevant information from the page to a new, customized eNotice.

Preview an eNotice

For all four Compose options, you can preview your message by selecting the Preview Notice button on the Compose eNotice screen.

If your message includes Dynamic Content, the Preview window will display live data (not placeholder content).

You can also send a test version to yourself to preview the notice in your own inbox. Select the "Send Test" option and fill in your email address to send the eNotice to yourself.

The preview and test send will not populate the personalization fields, because there aren’t any constituent recipients to draw from. To preview personalization fields, it is necessary to do a full send using Constituent Manager. You can enter yourself as a recipient using the Constituent "To" button.

For a Template eNotice, you also have the option to preview the eNotice inside the Message Editor using the eye "Preview on Desktop and Mobile" icon. The preview that appears offers the option to switch between a full-size screen view and a responsive, mobile view.

To close the preview, click the X in the top-right corner.

Send or schedule an eNotice

After you've finished setting up and composing your eNotice, you're ready to send it to your recipients (or schedule it to be sent at a later time).

We highly recommend that you do a test send before sending out an eNotice. Once you’re ready to do so, you can either "Send Now" or "Schedule Send."

To schedule a send for later, select the "Schedule Send" button and choose a date and time from the picker in the popup window. Select "schedule." The eNotice will close and be moved to the "Scheduled" folder.

To un-schedule a send, go back into the message and select "Schedule Send" again. Choose "clear schedule," and the eNotice will be returned to the Drafts folder. You can then go back to the "Schedule Send" window to set a new send time.