Table of contents
Step 1: Find your audience
To start, you need to decide on the group of people you'd like to send your email to. Once you decide, you'll search your database for people that are the right audience for the content in your email.
For example, I have an upcoming event in LA that I need volunteers for. So, I'm going to find all my volunteers in the LA area, and am going to send them an email to solicit some help.
First, navigate to the People section and click on the Filter button, then:
1. Click on Add criteria and find the criteria you'd like people to match. In the example above, I'm looking for people who have been tagged as volunteers, and live within 30 miles of Los Angeles, CA.
2. Click Save Filter As...
3. Give your filter a name and click Save.
You'll be able to use this saved filter to send your email blast to these people later.
Step 2: Create and send your email blast
Next, you're going to create and send/schedule your email blast.
There are two places to create a new email:
Click Communication to access your list of broadcasters, and select View all broadcasters (if you have more than one). Select New email blast from the dropdown menu on the right-hand side.
Then, select your desired broadcaster from the dropdown menu in the modal
or
Select the broadcaster you want to use to send the blast by going to Communication > [Select broadcaster]. Click on the Email tab and select New blast.
You'll be taken to the new blast page.
2. Enter a name (The slug will auto-populate based on the name, but you can change the slug if you like). Leave an optional short description or note in the “Description” text box.
3. If you are including links to your website in your blast, consider checking the provided checkbox. When checked, forms on your website will auto-populate with email information from the recipient’s profile. This could increase the number of people who complete the form, but could cause confusion if the email is forwarded to another recipient.
For example, you send an email blast with a link to your website's online petition. When Jane Doe opens your email and clicks on the link to sign the petition, the form will already have her email address field filled out. She only needs to type in her name and click "Sign petition" in order to take the action.
4. If you’d like to copy content from a drafted or sent mailing, you can use the "Clone from previous blast" dropdown menu.
5. Click Create and edit email blast. You will be directed to the Theme section of your blast.
Select a theme
Under Theme you may choose from a selection of available stock themes. Select a theme by hovering over the thumbnail image and click Use theme. This will save your selected theme and direct you to the “Body” section of your email.
Our default themes all use our drag-and-drop email-building experience. Choose the one that looks right for you, noting that you can edit colors in the email builder itself.
Note: If you prefer our classic email editor (which allows you to edit HTML directly) select one of the classic themes listed below the default options.
Here are the stock email themes that are currently available:
You may return to the Theme section at any time to select a different theme. When you create a new email blast, keep in mind that the most recently used theme for the specific broadcaster will automatically be selected.
Enter and preview content
Use the email builder to edit your email. You can add new areas with the content blocks and edit the images and text of the blocks on the right side editing panel.
The editing panel allows you to add smartfields, tables and to edit the font style of that section. It's a good idea to keep the same few consistent color and font styles going throughout your email so its easier to read.
When you save your content, the preview will refresh and update with your changes. Note that you can preview it in regular email format and mobile device format by clicking the corresponding button. Then, click Save and continue.
Add recipients
Now it's time to connect your blast to the recipient filter you created in Step 1.
1. Select the Filter radio button.
2. Select the filter you saved earlier from the "filtered by" dropdown menu.
3. Scroll to the bottom and click Update recipients and then Save and continue.
Review and schedule your email
Before you send or schedule your email, you can review the details of your email blast - including how it looks, the recipient list and the content. If you need to make any changes, you can return to the relevant tab and make edits.
Click Send email now to XX people to send your email blast immediately. This button will always display the number of recipients. If you do not see the option to send your email, check to see if you are still in your trial period. Email blasting is only available once your nation is out of trial.
Once you have sent your email, view the results by going to the Recipients or Dashboard areas of your blast.
Learn more about your email blast results.
Step 3: Follow-up
Now that you've sent your email blast, you'd like to know how many people didn't open it, and follow up with those folks again.
Email blast filters are the simplest way to target people based on their historical email engagement. These allow you to identify subscribers who have:
Opened/clicked an email blast from a specific broadcaster within a given window of time (e.g. "in the last 90 days", "between X and Y date"). The results will only include people who received a blast from the broadcaster in this time.
Opened or clicked on specific sent email blasts. The "Email blasts opened/clicked" criteria allows you to select one or more sent blasts by name, and toggle whether recipients must have opened/clicked all of those blasts, any of those blasts, or none of those blasts.
Any unverified opens from a specific broadcaster within a given window of time. The results will return recipients whose open activity could not be tracked for at least one email from the broadcaster within the given time.
Unverified opens in specific sent email blasts. The "Open is unverified in blasts (specific)" criteria allows you to select one or more sent blasts by name, and toggle whether recipients have any all no or only unverified opens returned for those emails.
Click on Add criteria and find the criteria "Opened email blast from" and change "has" to "has not."
📌Note: The "has not opened" filter will also return recipients whose open status is unverified.Click Save Filter As... then give your filter a name.
Using this filter, you can now follow the steps outlined in Step 2 to create and send another email blast specifically to these folks
You're well on your way to becoming an email blast champion! Remember, taking the time to understand your audience and send them content they are interested in will help raise your open rate and engage with your supporters in a meaningful way.