Messages appear in the app’s Messages screen. Usually, you’ll chose to enable notifications for each Message. There are several kinds of notifications that may be sent:
Push notifications appear on iOS and Android even when the app is not open. When you send out a push notification, it may appear on the lock screen of each user’s phone, or in the notification bar at the top of their screen. The user can configure their device to control exactly how these notifications are presented (or they may be turned off).
Web push notifications work with desktop browsers (e.g. Windows, macOS, ChromeOS).
Note that users select the Classes/Groups they are interested in, and will only receive messages for those Classes/Groups.
With the Mass Notification option, you can use the Dashboard to also send email and/or voice messages to imported staff, parent and student contacts who have never used the app.
When staff are on the move, or if they want to take and share a photo, it can be more convenient to use the optional Quick Share app feature, rather than accessing the App Dashboard to create a Message. Learn more:
You can send messages from the App Dashboard to users who have subscribed to a particular class or group (Message to Class/Group), to all app users (Messages to All), or to specific individuals (Message to Individuals).
If your app has the Quick Share feature, you can also send messages right from the Messages screen of your app!
From the Messages page of the App Dashboard, click Add Message (in the upper right).
Choose one of the following, and then click Continue:
Enter the text of your message. The text can include web links. By default, you may see a simple plain text box. In that case, if you’d like full formatting capabilities and a subject line, click FORMATTING:
Optional:
Click Send (or Save) when done.
You can attach images, documents, or audio files. At the bottom of the Add Message page, click Add another Attachment. Then you can upload an image file (jpg, png, or gif), document (PDF; see Documents), or audio file (mp3).
The filename will appear in Name field, but you can put a brief description here. This name is used in the attachment link or in text messages.
The message text cannot be left blank. Even if your image or attachment conveys everything you want to say, consider:
Audio (.mp3) attachments can be recorded right in the Dashboard,
and are particularly useful for Mass Notification phone calls.
Read more: Mass Notification > Voice
You can also simply link to documents available online, right in the message text.
Check out the field trip photos at https://instagram.com/p/sxe9_lo6Jp/.
This will turn into a working link in the app.
After you save the Message, the URL will be shortened and will look like apzr.co/....
If you are sending out a survey form or other web link, you may want to have the web page open immediately when the user taps on the message on the Messages screen, rather than just including a link in the message text as described above.
To do this:
The available languages for your app are currently: Chinese (Simplified), French (Canada), Spanish (USA).
Under Message Options, if this feature is configured for your app, you will see a Translate checkbox. If you’d like users to receive messages translated according to their preferences, ensure this checkbox is checked.
Next to the checkbox, the target languages are listed. Note that if no user has requested a particular language, it will not be listed.
If you’d like to review the translated text before sending, click the TRANSLATE NOW button next to the Translate checkbox.
You can also save the message as a draft, if you’d like a colleague to review the translations.
App users will receive the original, untranslated message unless they have chosen a language preference on the Sign Up screen or the Settings screen of the app.
Translated messages will be shown in the app, as well as in push, SMS text, and email notifications.
Users will see translations on the Messages screen of the app. However, for website posts, the message details screen may show your original post only.
To opt out of translation for website, social media posts, contact Support. Translation is also available for Email-to-App.
To change the languages available in your app, go to Dashboard > App Content > Advanced > Configuration > APP DESIGN, and edit Translation Options. Be sure to hold down the control key (or command on macOS) to add to your existing selections. If you change the set of languages, an app update will be required, so contact Support after making a change. Then, users will need to set their preferred language on the app’s Settings screen.
The following video demonstrates how translation works in the Dashboard. (Update: You no longer need to click the Translate button if the Translate checkbox is selected.)
Often, you may want to create a message based on an existing one, or have a prewritten message template that you can quickly use, e.g. for a snow day or emergency.
To create a message template, just create a draft message and give it a future date.
To use an existing message or message template for a new message, select the message in the message list, and then choose Copy to New Draft Message.
Many schools are now using recurring messages for daily health checks (COVID-19) or other regular reminders and forms.
To make a message repeat, choose an option for the Recur field (next to Scheduled For). In the Message list, you’ll see a 🔁 icon in the Scheduled For column that indicates that the message is recurring.
You can choose when the message should repeat.
Weekdays means to send the message Monday through Friday, starting on the scheduled date.
Another option is School Days. This option requires a block schedule or Schools Days schedule. The message will be sent every day that has a block order, or that is marked as being a school day.
Weekly means to send the message every week at the same date and time. For example, if you schedule the message for the upcoming Monday at 8am, it will repeat on the following Mondays at 8am.
If you have a recurring weekly message on Mondays, you can reschedule it for a Tuesday after a holiday. However, after the Tuesday, you’ll see it is then scheduled for the following Tuesday. In that case, you can manually reschedule the upcoming notification for a Monday again.
Please contact Support if you need an option for recurring messages that is not currently available.
To cancel or temporarily suspend a recurring message, uncheck Show in App, or choose Hide (Cancel) from the Action Menu.
To resume a message that was suspended as described above:
You can create a form in Microsoft Forms, Google Forms, SurveyMonkey, etc., or Appazur Forms, and sent it as a Message.
One option is to simply paste the link into the text of your Message as described above for Links, or attach a URL to the Message.
However, to streamline things for your recipients by removing the need for them to tap a link in the app, use a One-Tap Link:
With Appazur Forms, your users will already be signed in when they open the message in the app, so they won’t need to sign in or enter their name into the form. Appazur Forms are a simple, lightweight solution that is fast and responsive in your app to make it quick and easy for users to submit responses. Learn more.
A Message to All is a message to anyone who has installed the app, even if they haven’t signed in, or even if they have not subscribed to any Classes or Groups.
If you do not wish to include everyone who has installed the app (even if they haven’t signed in) then uncheck the Everyone option. This will limit the recipients to only signed-in or imported users.
As an alternative to Message to Class/Group, when you create a Message to All you can uncheck Everyone and then choose whether to include Staff, Parents, Students, or Other. For example you could uncheck Staff to send to all users except staff (although a staff member who is also a parent would still get the message).
Be aware that because your app allows users to sign up for an account, whether each account is a Parent, Student, or Other is self-declared.
In addition, your app users include some Unspecified accounts, likely because you had an earlier version of the app. As a result, some parents or students may not be included if you choose only Parents or Students.
When you are viewing a list of Messages in the Dashboard, you can use the Filter (top right of page) to show a subset of messages, for example:
Messages to Class/Group sends a message to anyone who has subscribed to the targeted Class or Group(s).
From the Add Messages page under Messages to Class/Group, you may select one or multiple classes/groups to receive the message. Select multiple classes or groups by holding down the Control key (or Command key on a Mac) when you click.
When you are viewing a list of Messages in the Dashboard, you can use the Filter (top right of page) to show a subset of messages, for example:
Messages to Individuals sends a message to one or more parents, students, other or staff.
When you are viewing a list of Messages in the Dashboard, you can use the Filter (top right of page) to show a subset of messages, for example:
Replies to a message are not visible to other recipients of the original message.
There are currently two ways that recipients could privately reply to your message if you select this option.
Chat. Recipients can reply to you via Chat if all of the following is true:
Email.
If you do not choose Allow Replies, email replies will go to the default Reply-To address.
Chat is an optional feature for your app. Your option is: Enabled. Allow Replies default No.
In the USA, due to COPPA, the app is not for use by students 13 years of age or younger.
Chat conversations can be initiated by either:
Chat is only available if both parties are signed in to the iOS or Android app. Parents/students will not be able to initiate a Chat with staff who are not signed in to the app.
You can read more about the optional Chat feature here: Help > Chat
You can change the message text at any time.
You can change the Scheduled For date/time.
If a Message has not been sent, you can uncheck Notify to prevent Push Notifications/Emails/SMS Text Messages from being sent.
The following options are available in the Action Menu:
You cannot delete a message because the system needs to keep a record of what was communicated. Instead, to remove it from the App (and Digital Signage, if applicable), choose Hide (Cancel) from the Action Menu. This has the same affect as unchecking Show in App (and Show on Digital Signage, if applicable).
This report will show you the details of the notifications that were sent.
To access the report, from the Messages list in the Dashboard, click the link in the Report column.
Notification statistics are shown as: # successfully delivered / # attempted
For push notifications, the number of attempted notifications is the number of iOS and Android devices to send to. The number successfully delivered may be lower, for example, if anyone has uninstalled the app since the last notification was sent.
You can use the links in this report to drill down further to see exactly which email and voice messages were delivered.
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