Rock's Communication Engine

Like a car engine, Rock's communication tool has a number of different parts or components. Most of them can be found in the Communications screen (Admin Tools > Communications). We'll be talking about many of them in depth throughout this guide, but you can read an overview of all of the parts in the Communications chapter of the Admin Hero Guide.

Mediums and Transports

Like everything in Rock, the communications features are designed to be extensible for the future. That means the messages of tomorrow won't be limited by the messages of today. The communications engine is based on two types of components: mediums and transports. Let's look at how that works.

A medium can only use one transport at a time. So, you can't have your email medium set up to use both Mailgun and SendGrid. Because the transport gets attached to the medium, you usually set up transports first.

Communications Send Job

Usually when you send a communication, it will be sent immediately to a communication queue that gets processed in almost real-time. There is, however, a Rock Job that runs every 30 minutes to look for communications with a pending status. You can view this under: Admin Tools > System Settings > Jobs Administration > Send Communications.

You don’t need to worry about this job, but we wanted to point it out, so you know more about how communications are sent.

Unsubscribing From Emails

It's very important that recipients of your emails have a way to unsubscribe from future emails, and that requests to unsubscribe are processed in a timely manner. Failure to do so can have legal implications, including fines of up to $51,744 for each individual email sent. Not to mention, your email reputation (a metric used by ISPs to help determine if your organization's email is spam) will suffer, resulting in a loss of deliverability.

To learn more about unsubscribing and what you can do to ensure you remain in compliance and stay off of spam lists, check the Unsubscribing section in the Configuring Email chapter below.

Bounced Mail

We know you have much to share, so let's make sure you have the opportunity to do that. You have to process bounced mail to keep your email addresses accurate and improve your email reputation.

Bounced messages are emails that are returned back to you after you send them because an email address is incorrect or no longer valid. Rock can automate this process if you use an email integration (i.e., Communication Transport) that supports the notification of these messages. Currently, the only core integration that supports bounced mail processing is Mailgun. You can read more on this integration in the Integrations chapter of this manual. Third-party provided solutions may be available for other services.

The Fundamentals

Below is an overview of how the SMS Pipeline feature works. If some of these concepts are foreign to you right now, don’t worry. We’ll go over all the details in the next section.

1. An incoming SMS message is received into the pipeline.
2. The message flows down the pipeline, through a series of Actions. Actions are activities that the system performs, like launching a workflow.
3. Each action has filters. The pipeline uses filters to analyze the message and its contents against criteria you provide. If the message meets your criteria, then the action is performed. If not, the message moves to the next action. This process repeats until an action is performed.
4. When an action is performed, the pipeline looks at the action’s Continue setting. This determines if the message should continue down the pipeline to the next action, or if the matched action is all that’s needed.
5. If a message continues down the pipeline after an action has already been performed, it works the same way as described in #3 above. Satisfying the filter criteria for one action does not mean the message automatically satisfies the filters on the remaining actions.

These general steps are repeated for each new message you receive. That means you can use a single pipeline to perform different actions for a variety of scenarios.

Anatomy of Actions

Actions automate many of the tasks you would want to perform in Rock after receiving a text message. For instance, you might want to send the person an automated reply message. Or you might want to launch a workflow if the person’s message contains certain keywords.

Each action you add has its own settings and filters, giving you full control over what should happen and when.

There are four SMS Pipeline actions:

• Give
• Launch Workflow
• Reply
• SMS Conversations

We’ll use the Reply example pictured below to describe the properties of actions in general. Then in the following sections we’ll dive into each type of action individually. The below page can be accessed from Admin Tools > Communications > SMS Pipeline.

1 Actions

These are the actions you can add to the pipeline. Click and drag the desired action into the center of the page to add it.

2 Name

This is the name of the action, which displays within the pipeline in the center of the page. The default name will be the type of action it is. If you have the same type of action in your pipeline more than once, you’ll want to change their names so you can easily tell them apart.

3 Active

The action will only be performed if it is active. You might want to disable actions that only apply during certain times of the year, so you don’t need to delete them when they’re no longer needed.

4 Continue

After an action is performed the process will check the Continue setting for that action. If Continue is enabled, the message will continue down the pipeline to the next action. When Continue is disabled, the process ends with that action and any remaining actions in the pipeline are ignored.

5 Expire Date

If you open the Advanced Settings, you'll see an Expire Date. The Rock Cleanup job will delete the action from the pipeline automatically after this date passes. If you have actions that are only temporary or only apply to a particular time period, this means you don't have to remember to update your pipeline when the action is no longer needed.

6 Log Interaction When Action Runs

Also located within the Advanced Settings, you can choose to have an interaction written when the person sends a text. This is a great way to find out when and how often each keyword is getting used. See the info icon for additional details.

7 Filters

Filters decide whether an action will be performed. If a message meets the action’s filter criteria, then the action is performed. If not, the process moves to the next action to evaluate that set of filters. If no filters are applied to an action, every message that reaches the action will cause the action to be performed.

8 Action-Specific Properties

This area will appear for actions where additional setup is needed. It will change depending on the type of action. We’ll cover these properties in the next section.

SMS Pipeline Actions

As noted in the prior section, all actions share some common properties. However, each type of action has unique features and properties that we’ll describe in detail below.

SMS Conversations

This action will send the message over to the SMS Conversations page, at which point you’re messaging with the person directly. There is only one filter for this action, and no additional unique properties.

Remember, the phone number filter references the number to which the person sent the message, not the person’s phone number. If this is left blank, then every message that reaches this action will go to the SMS Conversations page.

As pictured above, the SMS Conversations action is typically at the bottom of the pipeline. If the person’s message doesn’t meet the criteria for any of the other actions, this is how you can ensure it doesn’t fall through the cracks.

Reply

The Reply action is an easy way to automate responding to an incoming text. You can customize the content of your response and personalize it for the recipient using Lava. The reply action can in some cases eliminate the need for a workflow if a specific message is always to be returned.

1 Message Filter

You can check the content of the incoming text message against key words you provide. You can add as many of these conditions as needed. You can also select whether the message requires "any" or "all" of those criteria to match.

2 Response

This is the content of your organization's response, which will be sent if the incoming message meets the filter requirements. You can personalize the response using Lava.

The example pictured above will only perform the Connect Response action if the words "serve" or "volunteer" are somewhere in the message's text. If the incoming text says "I would like to serve" then the contents of the Response field will be sent to the person as a text message. In this particular example a workflow might also be launched for this message, because the Continue option is enabled.

Launch Workflow

As the name implies, this action will launch a workflow. You’ll want to configure your workflow to receive information from the pipeline, using the same workflow attribute merge fields we cover in the SMS Pipeline Workflows chapter of the Blasting Off with Workflows guide.

1 Workflow Type

You’ll use the drop down to choose your preconfigured workflow.

2 Pass Nameless Person

You can control whether Nameless person records (see Nameless People) should be passed to your Workflow.

3 Workflow Name Template

This Lava-enabled field is where you can create a string to use as the workflow name.

4 Workflow Attributes

This lets you pass information, like the person or their phone number, to the workflow you want to launch. See the SMS Pipeline Workflows chapter of the Blasting Off with Workflows guide for details on setting this up.

Give

This action enables Text Giving functionality, allowing a person to send a text to donate using their phone.

The Give action isn't ready to use out of the box. An administrator will need to configure the settings for the Utility Payment Entry block in addition to SMS Pipeline setup. For details on Text Giving and the required configuration, head over to the Rock Solid Finances manual.

SMS Pipeline In Action

Let’s look at a completed pipeline to see how this all comes together. This pipeline has four actions and was designed to handle inquiries about small groups and connecting. Below each screenshot we’ll highlight the key points.

As pictured above, when an incoming text contains the word 'group', an auto-response will be sent to the person with more information about joining a group. In this case the processing stops, because the Continue option is not enabled.

If the SMS message doesn't contain the word 'group' then the "Connect Response" action will be evaluated because it's the next in line. If the message contains the word 'volunteer' or 'serve' an auto response gets sent with more information about getting connected to a serving team. The arrow on the action indicates that the continue functionality is enabled, and the next action will run if the message meets the requirements.

You'll note in the screenshot above that the workflow action has the same filters as the "Connect Response" action. That means any message which activates the "Connect Response" action will also launch this workflow.

Lastly, the pipeline continues down to the “SMS Conversations” action so that a staff member can directly connect with this person.

In this case, the "SMS Conversations" action has no filters applied. Knowing this, and looking at the pipeline as whole, all incoming SMS messages will end up in the SMS Conversations page except messages that contain the word 'group'.

If we enabled Continue in the "Group Response" action, then every incoming SMS message would go to the SMS Conversations page. In that case, a message containing the word 'group' would not satisfy the "Connect Response" and "Launch Workflow" filter criteria, so those actions won’t be performed.

In this example pipeline, if an SMS message is received that says "I'd like to learn more about your services" it would pass through the pipeline straight to the "SMS Conversations" action. No automated replies would be sent, and no workflows would be launched for that message because it does not meet the criteria for those actions.

SMS Pipeline Lava

You can use Lava to customize and personalize your pipeline’s actions. There are different merge fields depending on whether you're working with the Reply or Launch Workflow action.

Launch Workflow Action Lava

Below is a list of Lava merge fields you can include in your pipeline when you're working with the Launch Workflow action. These are the same workflow attribute merge fields we cover in the SMS Pipeline Workflows chapter of the Blasting Off With Workflows guide.

SMS Pipeline Workflow Lava Merge Fields

Merge Field	Description	Field Type
{{ FromPerson.PrimaryAlias.Guid }}	The pipeline uses the person's phone number to look up the first person with that phone number. If it finds a match, it assigns that individual's record to FromPerson. If the phone number is used in more than one profile, the pipeline defaults to the first record of an adult with children.	Person
{{ FromPhone }}	The person's phone number, pulled from the inbound message, from the SMS gateway. This will automatically get added to the workflow as FromPhone and will include the country code (i.e., the raw phone number 18645555555).	Phone Number
{{ ToPhone }}	The SMS gateway number where the message was sent.	Phone Number
{{ ReceivedDate }}	The date the message was received.	Date
{{ ReceivedTime }}	The time the message was received.	Time
{{ ReceivedDateTime }}	The date and time the message was received.	Date Time
{{ MessageBody }}	The content of the SMS message that was received.	Text or Memo
{{ MatchedGroups }}	If the RegEx expression provided contains matched groups, they are loaded into an array here. This is an advanced feature, so if you’re not sure what this means, don’t worry. You probably don’t need it.	Typically, you fill in a text field with a merge expression of a single result from the MatchedGroups array.

Reply Action Lava

Below is a list of Lava merge fields you can use when you're working with the Reply action. Note that each uses a prefix of Message.

SMS Pipeline Reply Lava Merge Fields

Merge Field	Description
{{ Message.FromNumber }}	The person’s phone number from the inbound message
{{ Message.ToNumber }}	The SMS number where the message was sent
{{ Message.FromPerson }}	The pipeline uses the person's phone number to look up the first person with that phone number. If it finds a match, it assigns the value to FromPerson. If the phone number is used in more than one profile, the pipeline defaults to the first record of an adult with children. This is the full Person object, so, for instance, you'll need {{ Message.FromPerson.FullName }} to get the person's full name.
{{ Message.Message }}	The content of the SMS message that was received

Adding New Pipelines

Technically a single pipeline is all you need in Rock. After a while though, you might find that your single pipeline becomes complex, especially if you have multiple numbers that you are supporting. In this case you can create additional pipelines. Please note though that a single SMS phone number can only work with a single pipeline, but a pipeline can service multiple SMS numbers.

To start, navigate to Admin Tools > Communications > SMS Pipeline. From here you can add, delete or edit your list of pipelines.

Click the button to add a new pipeline or click an existing pipeline to access its details. You can edit the 'Default' pipeline that ships with Rock, or you can create your own. In this example we’ll add a new pipeline from scratch so you can see the process.

The first thing you’ll need to do is provide a name and description for the pipeline. If you have multiple pipelines, be sure to make the name and description clear.

Click the Save button, and that's all you need to start configuring your new pipeline using the instructions in the above sections. Remember, each pipeline can be associated with its own webhook (see below) for added flexibility.

Boosting Engagement with SMS

In the modern era, SMS messaging has become the predominant means of communication, surpassing phone calls and emails in popularity. SMS messages are typically read promptly and are more likely to elicit swift responses. However, it is not permissible for any organization to send an SMS message to an individual unless the recipient has explicitly given their consent by opting in. As a result, Rock has incorporated an SMS Opt-in Checkbox in most areas where mobile phone numbers can be entered.

Furthermore, we recognize that every organization is unique and may have distinct legal requirements. Therefore, the verbiage for the SMS Opt-in checkbox can be completely customized to meet your specific needs. You can customize the SMS Opt-in message at Admin Tools > System Settings > System Configuration under the UI Settings Tab.

Add SMS Phone Number

You need to have a phone number before you can start sending and receiving texts. We recommend Twilio, and have a whole section for setting up Twilio in a later chapter. Even if you don’t have a phone number set up yet, it’s important to be familiar with the System Phone Number settings because they are referenced later in this chapter.

These settings can be accessed and maintained from Admin Tools > Communications > System Phone Numbers.

1 Basic Settings

Here you can give the number a name, make it active or inactive, and you can choose a description. A good description can be very helpful if you have multiple phone numbers. Only Active phone numbers can receive responses. You might use a phone number for a large event and then inactivate it until the next event

2 Phone Number

Be sure that the phone number is in the Phone Number field and that it is in the format of "+15555555555" (or similar for international numbers).

3 Assigned to Person

The person you select here will receive the incoming messages sent to the SMS Phone Number you’re viewing. This only happens if SMS Forwarding is enabled. Be sure the individual you select has a valid SMS phone number on their record.

4 SMS Enabled

This simply indicates whether the number can be used in SMS contexts within Rock.

5 SMS Forwarding

If enabled, then incoming messages to this SMS Phone Number will be sent to the Assigned to Person and to the SMS Pipeline. If this is not enabled, then the conversation will still go to the SMS Pipeline or SMS Conversations, but it will not be sent to the Assigned to Person.

6 SMS Received Workflow

You have the option of automatically launching a workflow when a response is received. Use this field to indicate which workflow should launch. Don’t forget, you can use the same phone number to launch different types of workflows using the SMS Pipeline.

7 SMS Notification Group

The members of this group will be notified when a message is received to this number. This option only works with a Rock Mobile app, via push notifications.

8 Mobile Application

Using this requires that you have Mobile configured correctly. This determines which mobile application to use when sending notifications.

In addition to the Assigned to Person settings described above, you can apply security to each System Phone Number individually. Simply click the icon when viewing the Phone Number to apply security for that number. Please note that the security does not transfer over to SMS Conversations, Communication Wizard and Simple Communication blocks.

You may also want to review the block settings for SMS Conversations to further refine how your numbers are used and who can see them.

SMS Conversations

In the prior chapter we explain why many of your incoming SMS messages will end up getting passed from the SMS Pipeline into SMS Conversations. Now, let’s take a step back and see how to manage those messages, or messages that are sent to SMS Conversations directly. Navigate to People > Communications > SMS Conversations to start.

1 New Conversation

This will open up a new conversation window to start a conversation with a selected individual. You can send the SMS message directly from Rock, and even include an image.

2 Recipient Filter

Use this filter to search for specific recipients. This is a fast alternative to scrolling through a lengthy list of people to find the conversation you're looking for.

3 Available SMS numbers

You can change between currently active SMS numbers by clicking the drop-down here. Changing the number will show you conversations associated with that number. If only one number is available, then the dropdown is replaced with a label.

4 Show/Hide

You can choose to show or hide messages that have already been read.

5 All Responses

This panel displays all the responses to the selected SMS number. Clicking on any of the listed responses will show you the conversation with that person.

6 Message

All you need to do is type your message here and hit Send to keep the conversation going. Your outgoing messages and responses will be shown in the screen above.

7 Add Note

The conversation you're having with the person can hold important information. By adding a note directly from SMS Conversations, you can track details about the conversation in a more visible and accessible way. The block's settings let you limit the Note Types that can be used.

8 Send Image

Click the icon to upload and send an image to the person.

We realize that every organization is different, so we add in settings to allow you to customize each feature for your needs. Suppose you have the Students Director and First Impressions Director using communications for scheduling different events with their volunteers. This could be done with the out of the box SMS Conversations page, or you can customize this so the two can only see their own SMS number on different pages.

Create Multiple SMS Pages

You can create multiple pages with the SMS Conversations block on them. Then on each page you can specify who has access and which number(s) can be used. Each ministry could have their own SMS Conversations page, for example. To learn more about creating pages and adding blocks check out the Designing and Building Websites using Rock guide.

Nameless People

Sooner or later, you’ll start receiving SMS messages from people and phone numbers you don’t recognize. If you’re worried that this will cause a snag in your processes, don’t be.

Rock will try to match the phone number of a new incoming SMS message to a person in the system. If it can’t find anyone with that number, Rock will create a Nameless Person record instead. This allows your processes to continue as normal, without knowing their name or other contact information. In most cases this will result in the message being passed from the SMS Pipeline to the SMS Conversations page. Other possible actions are limited because we don’t know who the person is.

1 Phone Number

Typically, a name is shown here. Since Rock doesn’t know the person’s name, you’ll see the phone number instead.

2 Unknown Person

This indicates the conversation is with an unknown (i.e., nameless) person.

3 Link To Person

Click this button to link the phone number to a new or existing person record. We’ll cover that in detail below.

As new texts come in, you might lose track of your nameless people in the SMS Conversations page. Luckily, you can go to Admin Tools > Communications > Nameless People to see and manage your list of nameless records.

1 Phone Number

All of the phone numbers Rock can't link to a person record are listed here.

2 Link To Person

Click the button to link the phone number to a new or existing person record (see below).

Where Did My Nameless Person Go?

Each night, the RockCleanup job will go through the Nameless record types to look for a matching person record. If it finds a match it will merge them for you and the Nameless record will be removed.

Linking to an Existing Person

Once you know for sure who you’re talking to, you'll want to link the phone number (and the conversation) to an actual person in Rock. You'll do this from the Link Phone Number to Person page. You can get there from the SMS Conversations page or from the Nameless People page as described above.

1 Add New Person

As pictured above, this page lets you quickly and easily create a new person record to be linked with the phone number.

2 Link Existing Person

Clicking this button will give you a person picker screen so you can look up the existing record to be linked with the phone number.

Respond from a Device

When you send an SMS message (see the Communication Wizard chapter) you'll select an SMS number to send from. When Response Recipient Forwarding is enabled as described earlier, responses will be forwarded to the response recipient's mobile phone with the sender's name and a response code.

The response code consists of the @ symbol followed by a three-digit number (e.g., @347). If further follow-up is required, the response recipient can use this code to reply back.

If your mind is swimming a bit, that’s OK. Let's look at an example. In our example Jenny has just sent out a bulk SMS message to several attendees reminding them of the car show that afternoon. Let's walk through a conversation she has with Alisha.

1 Bulk Message

The original bulk SMS message. Notice Jenny has cleverly used merge fields to personalize the text message with each recipient's name.

2 First Response

Alisha then responds to the message.

3 Response Code

The response goes back to Rock's SMS phone number. Rock then looks up that number's response recipient and relays the message to Jenny's phone. Because the message is no longer directly from Alisha, Rock adds Alisha's name to the message and also the response code @671.

4 Sent to Alisha

Jenny decides she would like to continue the conversation, so she writes a quick message back including the response code. Rock will use this code to match the conversation back to Alisha.

5 Shows Message

Alisha receives Jenny's response. Note how Rock has removed the response code. To Alisha it appears that she is texting Jenny directly.

Notice that both sides of the conversation are texting to Rock's SMS number (555) 351-5392. Little does Alisha know that Jenny's real number is 867-5309.

Communication Transports

Communication Transports (Admin Tools > Communications > Communication Transports) are where you provide the necessary details for Rock to connect with your email service provider. These details are typically provided by your service. Check out the Integrations chapter for assistance with this setup.

Communication Mediums

Communication Mediums (Admin Tools > Communications > Communication Mediums) represent the available communication methods in Rock, including email.

1 Active

Ensure this option is selected to enable email communication from Rock.

2 Transport Container

Choose the email service provider you've configured in Communication Transports. This setting helps Rock know which service to use for sending emails.

3 Unsubscribe HTML

Customize the appearance and destination of the unsubscribe link in Rock emails. This link, at the bottom-right of the email by default, allows recipients to opt out of future communications.

If you’re using Mailgun, be sure to check that your Tracking Settings in Mailgun are turned off, to avoid having two Unsubscribe options at the bottom of your emails.

4 Non-HTML Content

Provide an alternate message for recipients who are unable to view HTML emails. The recipient will see a generic message with a link to view the rich text email on your website. This ensures that all recipients can access the email content, regardless of their email client's capabilities.

5 CSS Inlining Enabled

Keep this option set to "Yes" for better email styling compatibility. Inline CSS styles enhance the visual presentation of emails across different email clients.

6 Bulk Email Threshold

Set a threshold to automatically designate emails as bulk when sent to more recipients than the threshold allows. The option to choose if an email is bulk or not will be removed when creating the communication. This helps manage email reputation and compliance with anti-spam regulations.

7 Request Unsubscribe Email

Specify the email address for unsubscribe requests. If left blank, the Organization Email in Global Attributes will be used. Because Rock always includes an API for processing unsubscribe requests (with Enable One-Click Unsubscribe enabled) the email option will probably never be used. However, it is required by email clients like Gmail. In the future, some email clients may choose to use this.

8 Enable One-Click Unsubscribe

Offer a convenient one-click unsubscribe option with a link at the top of the email. This enhances email credibility and complies with anti-spam regulations. It defaults to “Yes” which is the recommended setting.

9 Unsubscribe URL

Alternatively, provide a URL for unsubscribing. Clicking the unsubscribe link will redirect recipients to this page. This URL is only used if the Enable One-Click Unsubscribe option is turned off (which we don’t recommend).

For more information on the “unsubscribe” settings, see the Unsubscribing section below.

Safe Sender Domains

Many email service providers have implemented new restrictive policies on emails that are sent from a person's account (e.g., Yahoo.com) but did not originate from their email server. Because Rock sends email on behalf of others these emails can bounce in these situations. To prevent this, if an email communication is created with a From Address that is not in the Safe Sender Domains defined type, the Organization Email global attribute value will be used instead for the From Address and the original value will be used as the Reply To address.

You'll want to add all of your organization's email domains to the Safe Sender Domains defined type under:

Admin Tools > Communications > Safe Sender Domains

Broken Images

If you’re finding that some of your images aren’t appearing in your email, be sure your Public Application Root setting is configured with the proper URL. This can be modified under:

Admin Tools > General Settings > Global Attributes > Public Application Root

1 Broken Image

An email containing an image that can’t be found due to a misconfigured Public Application Root may look like this.

Your Public Application Root will be formatted like https://www.organization.com/ or https://rock.organization.com/ or similar, depending on your web address. Note that the forward-slash at the end is required.

Unsubscribing

Configuring email in Rock involves more than just sending messages; it's about safeguarding your communication channels and maintaining a positive sender reputation. Why? Because when your emails get marked as spam, it can harm your reputation and impact whether your messages reach their intended recipients. Not to mention the possible legal consequences.

Consider this: even if someone signed up for your emails, they might still report them as spam if they can't easily find the unsubscribe option. Or worse, they might start to unsubscribe but then resort to marking your emails as spam if the process isn't straightforward. That's why it's crucial to make unsubscribing as effortless as possible.

This is especially true for Gmail accounts. Gmail specifies that everyone must “make it easy for recipients to unsubscribe” and “if you send more than 5,000 messages per day, your marketing and subscribed messages must support one-click unsubscribe.” Gmail also indicates that if your unsubscribe method involves sending an email, the request to unsubscribe must be processed within two days. Why all the focus on Gmail? Well, with over 1.5 billion active accounts, it’s probably used by many in your target audience, so we want to ensure we're sticking to their guidelines.

We also look to Gmail's rules because they will help cover you from a legal perspective. Gmail policies are more stringent than the US CAN-SPAM Act, which also has requirements related to unsubscribing. Adherence to the CAN-SPAM Act is crucial. Otherwise you expose your organization to potential legal action and hefty fines from the FTC.

Now, let's talk about how Rock can help you comply with these requirements. We've designed features to streamline the unsubscribing process. For more details on these settings, see the Communication Mediums section above.

1 Bulk Email Threshold

Automatically categorizes emails as bulk if the recipient list exceeds this threshold, ensuring unsubscribe links. This hides the bulk option for new communications.

2 Request Unsubscribe Email

Generates an email for unsubscribing, which must be processed within two days. If Enable One-Click Unsubscribe is set to “Yes” (which we recommend) this email address should never be used.

3 Enable One-Click Unsubscribe

Our recommended default setting of “Yes” is in line with Gmail's requirements.

4 Unsubscribe URL

Provides an alternative to one-click unsubscribing, directing recipients to a specified URL.

With the above configuration in place, your emails will generally have two “Unsubscribe” options as pictured below.

1 Header Unsubscribe

Supports one-click unsubscribe functionality, though it’s not universally supported by all email clients.

2 Footer Unsubscribe

The older method of directing recipients to the Rock Unsubscribe page on the external site.

When someone is taken to the Unsubscribe page on the external site, they’ll see the page pictured below. Upon arriving at the page, they can proceed to set their email preference.

1 No Mass Emails

This will mark the individual’s “Email Preference” to “No Mass Emails” on their profile.

2 Receive All Emails

The person’s profile will be updated to have an “Email Preference” of “Email Allowed.”

3 Update Email Address

The person will be presented with a field for entering their new email address, and their “Email Preference” will be set to “Email Allowed.”

4 No Emails

The person’s “Email Preference” will be set to “Do Not Email.”

5 No Longer Involved

The person’s “Record Status” on their profile will be set to “Inactive.” This ensures that they will not receive future emails.

If the person didn’t unsubscribe from a communication list, their Person Profile email settings in Rock will be updated to “No Mass Emails.” If it’s already set to “No Mass Emails” then it will be updated to “Do Not Email.”

Changes to a person’s Email Preferences are logged in the Person History area under the History tab in the Person Profile.

Communication List Categories

You can create categories to further identify and filter your communication lists. The Communication List Categories page is located at Admin Tools > Communications > Communication List Categories.

Rock ships with one category, called "Public", but you can create as many categories as you want. For example, you could create a category called "Staff Only" to use when creating communication subscription blocks you want only to be available to staff members. Categories can have child categories as well. You can use communication list categories in a number of ways: for paring down the recipients in your communication lists, in creating subscribe/unsubscribe blocks in your organization's website, for creating data views to use when filtering communication lists... The more you use them, the more you're going to see how extensive they are. We'll be talking about communication list categories a little later in the Communication Preferences chapter.

Keep in mind that the category's security will be used to decide if the individual can see the communication lists associated with that category. This means an administrator can set up a new category (e.g., Staff) and then add security to that category such that people with access to view that category will be able to see any communication lists that are tied to that category. Don't forget, the admin would have to configure the Communication List Subscribe block's settings with the new category.

Segments

Segments provide a way to select and filter your lists based on any field in the system. You can use data views to further pare down, or segment, who you’re communicating with in a particular list. They can be global to all lists or unique to a specific list. When using the Communication Wizard, after selecting a communication list, you can add any segments you want to use to filter that list. For example, if you only want the communication to be sent to members who are age 35 or older, you’d select the segments “Members” and “35 and older”. (More on that in the next section.)

It's important that you think through your list strategy. A smart use of segments can cut down on the number of lists you will need.

Data views can be created, modified and deleted in the Communications Segments category of the Data Views screen, located at Tools > Data Views. For more information about data views, see the Filtering Using Data Views section of the Taking Off with Reporting manual.

Sending a Communication Using the Communication Wizard

To begin a new communication, go to People > New Communication. The first screen you'll see, pictured below, is where you'll pick who you want to send the communication to. This can be done by using a Communication List or by adding individuals manually. There are other ways too, like if you arrived at this screen from a grid.

1 Use Simple Editor

Click this button to launch the Simple Editor.

2 Full Screen Toggle

This button will change the view of the page into a full screen. The same button is used to return the screen back to its original state.

3 Manual List

If you want to select individual recipients manually, you can do that here. This lets you create a list of people without using a configured Communication List. If there are more than 1,000 recipients you'll only see a summary of those who may not receive the communication because, for instance, they don't have an email address or SMS phone number.

4 Communication List

After a Communication List has been created, you can select it here. Depending on the other settings you choose on this page, this will be the list of people who receive the communication.

5 Segments

The Segments feature lets you filter people in the Communication List according to your selections. For instance, you could apply the '35 and older' segment to only communicate with people from the 'Members and Attendees' list who are 35 and older.

6 Recipients Must Meet

If you’ve chosen more than one Segment then this lets you decide if the people who receive the communication should meet all of the segment requirements, or any one of them.

7 Prevent Duplicates

This setting is only visible if enabled in the block's settings. People within a family will often share an email address or SMS phone number. Selecting this option will cause only one communication to be sent per email address or phone number. For instance, if spouses share an email address, then only one of them will receive the communication, personalized to that person.

Click Next to advance to the Communication Details screen.

1 Communication Name

This is the name of the communication you’re sending. This is for internal use only, to help you identify which communications were sent as you look through your history of communications. The name you provide here will not be included in the communication you send.

2 Bulk

Here you choose if it's a bulk (group) communication. When you enable this option, Rock includes a link for the recipient to unsubscribe. You can change the default for this option in the block settings, but we recommend leaving it on. Note, this will be hidden and automatically enabled if the recipient count exceeds the threshold set on the Communication Mediums page. See the Configuring Email chapter for more information.

3 Communication Medium

The options you see here may vary depending on your Rock configuration/data. In this case we can choose to send an email, an SMS text message or a push notification. Or we can send it using different mediums based on each recipient’s communication preference.

4 Schedule Send

By default, the communication will be sent immediately after it has been created (and approved, if applicable). However, you can click here to specify a date and time on which the communication should be sent.

Click Next to advance to the Communication Template screen. This is where you’ll select the email template you want to use to create your communication. You can imagine how, after you’ve created a number of templates, having a Template Image Preview (i.e., thumbnail) will help you easily locate the template you want.

1 Category Filter

You can also use the Category Filter dropdown to help you locate your template. If you don’t see a template listed, you may not have permission to use it, or it might not be set up for use with the wizard. You can learn more about template security and support in the Email Template Survival Guide.

2 Template Selection

Rock ships with these three templates out of the box, but this list will expand as you create your own. Remember, the template is a starting point for how your email will look, but you’ll be able to customize many aspects of it in the following screens. Keep this in mind before creating new templates.

After selecting your template, click Next to advance to the Email Summary screen. The Email Summary screen is where you specify the sender, the subject and any files you want to attach to the message.

1 From Name

This will be the name that appears as the person, ministry, etc. who sent the email.

2 From Address

The email address you provide here will be seen by the recipient as the email address from which the email was sent.

3 Show Additional Fields

Click this link to specify a separate 'Reply to' email address, and to add email addresses to 'CC' and 'BCC' lists. These fields are optional and can be left blank.

4 Email Subject

The subject line of your email is added here. You can use Lava to personalize the email subject.

5 Email Preview

You can provide a concise summary that appears alongside your subject line in recipients' inboxes. This quick peek can entice them to open and read your message.

6 Attachments

You can use this to upload files that will be sent with the email as an attachment.

Click Next to advance to the Email Editor. If your communication will be sent by SMS or Push only, then the wizard will skip this screen.

Here’s where things get really fun. The Email Editor is a drag-and-drop visual email composer. This is where you configure the layout, images, text, buttons, etc., of your communication.

To add an element, simply drag it from the buttons bar to where you want it to be in your message. Notice that when you drag an element over a section, a transparent image of the element helps to show where you’re placing it.

After placing an element, you can edit it by clicking on the section it's in. The options associated with that element are displayed on the right side of the screen. Notice that the section you’re editing is highlighted with a green border, and you can view your changes in real time. When you’re done editing the section, click Complete. If you decide you don’t want that element after all, click Delete.

At any point while working in the Email Editor, you can send a test email to yourself by clicking the Send Test button. Click Preview to see both desktop and mobile previews of your design. Click Save to save a draft of your email.

We should pause a moment here to note the RSVP button, indicated by the icon. This element is used to send RSVP requests to groups, and it requires some setup in advance. For full details check out the Group RSVP section of the Rock Your Groups guide.

Emailing a Login Link

As you're crafting your communication you may find it necessary to include a link that will automatically log the person in to your website. This is easy to do using the PersonTokenCreate Lava filter. Simply add ?rckipid={{ Person | PersonTokenCreate }} to the URL of the page you want the person to visit. The example pictured below will log the person in and take them to the external site's homepage using a URL of https://yoursite.org/page/1?rckipid={{ Person | PersonTokenCreate }}.

A link like the one pictured above can be added to your email by using the button near the top of the editor. Unlike the example above, you'll want to provide friendly text for the link (e.g., "Click Here") instead of the URL itself. Using the URL as pictured above would result in a very long and ugly looking link in the recipient's email.

You can optionally add parameters to your PersonTokenCreate filter, to control how long the token is valid, how many times it can be used or which page it should be used for. Check out our PersonTokenCreate Lava documentation for full details.

Depending on your Security Settings a tokenized link may not be able to be generated for all of your recipients. Out of the box, a person token can't be created for people with an Extreme level Account Protection Profile.

When everything is set up and looks the way you want, click Next to go to the Mobile Text Editor screen. If your communication will be sent by email only, the wizard will skip this screen. The Mobile Text Editor is similar to the Email Editor. This is where you design how your SMS message will appear.

1 From

Select the SMS phone number from which the text message will be sent. Unless specified in the block’s settings, this list will contain all active SMS phone numbers you have configured.

2 Add Merge Field

Personalization has never been easier. Use the list here to populate your message with the Lava you’ll need to truly customize and personalize content for each recipient.

3 Message Body

This area is where you’ll compose the actual content of your message, including any Lava you might be using for personalization.

4 Attachment

You can use this to upload files that will be sent with the message as an attachment.

5 Send Test / Save

You can also send a test text to yourself by clicking the Send Test button. Click the Save button to save a draft of your text.

6 Live Preview

As you make changes to your Message Body you can see in real time how the message will appear when it’s received.

If you're sending the communication via a Push Notification, then you'll see the Push Notification Editor screen instead of the Email and SMS screens described above.

1 Title

This will be the title of the push notification and will be seen by the person receiving it.

2 Add Merge Field

Just like the Mobile Text Editor page, you can easily personalize the content of the notification by adding Lava merge fields from this drop-down.

3 Notification Content

This is the main content that the person will see. Merge fields will appear here when added, to customize and personalize the content.

4 Open Action

When Link to Mobile Page is selected then you can set which page the person will be taken to, including any query string parameters you might add. If Show Details is selected, you'll be prompted to select a Mobile Application and add additional details in the editor provided. If your app has a push notification detail page defined in it, that page will be opened with the details for the communication. These two features require Rock Mobile and require that Rock Mobile is configured correctly to receive these details.

With the last of the communication methods configured, click Next to go to the Confirmation screen. This is the last stage in the process before we actually send the communication.

1 Communication Details

The information along the left applies to the communication in general. This lets you ensure you’ve selected the correct options in the prior screens.

2 Communication Method Previews

In the example pictured above, the communication may be sent in two different ways. You can click each button to see a preview of the communication in each of the formats we talked about above.

3 Communication Preview

This area will show you what the communication recipient will see. In the example pictured above we also see the number from which the SMS message will be sent, because that is specific to the SMS version of the communication.

4 Save as Draft

Not quite ready yet? That’s okay, you can save this as a draft and come back later. Your communication drafts can be found in the Communication History screen.

5 Send

This is the Moment of Truth. Are you ready to send the communication? If so, click Send.

After clicking Send, the communication is sent to the communication queue.

To immediately view the communication’s analytics, click the View Communication link. See the Viewing Analytics section to learn more.

To turn around and send the same communication to a different list, click the Copy Communication button from the Communication History page. This will take you back to the beginning of the Communication Wizard, keeping the settings and design options of the original communication.

Pretty cool, right? With the Communication Wizard, you’re going to be rocking email and SMS messages in no time.

Sending a Communication Using the Simple Editor

There are a lot of ways to start a new communication. The most popular one is to click the button at the top or bottom of any grid of people. This will take you to the New Communications page and add all of the individuals from the grid to the communication as recipients. This is really powerful when used with Data Views and groups pages. If you prefer you can also start a new communication from People > New Communication and enter your recipients by hand.

Whichever method you use, the Simple Editor can be accessed by clicking the Use Simple Editor button near the top right of the screen.

Once on the Simple Editor page, you’re ready to start crafting your message. We'll walk through each section of this page highlighting some of the features you have at your disposal.

1Selector

Email is the default communication medium, but this can be updated from the communication selector at the top of the page.

2Recipients

The recipient list will be filled with all of the people you previously selected as recipients. You can also add and/or remove names from the list at this point. Don’t forget that if you started with a blank communication, you'll need to enter all of the names manually. You may notice that some names are in red. These names either do not have an email address or have been marked as not wanting emails or bulk emails.

3Bulk Option

Determine if this message should be treated as a bulk email. Bulk emails will have an unsubscribe link added to them and will exclude people who have asked that they not receive bulk emails from your organization. If you can't see this option then the email is being treated as bulk.

4Template

If you would like to use a previously created email template, you can select it here. For more information on creating templates see the Email Template Survival Guide. This page can be set with a default template. Out-of-the-box this will show your organization’s header and footer with the sender's signature.

5From

Fill in the email address that you would like the email to be sent from. By default, your contact information will be input, but you can change this as needed.

6Reply to Email

You might want replies to go to a different address than the one you're sending from. For example, when you send emails from the organization's leader, you may want the replies to go to an administrative assistant.

7Attachments

You can add any number of attachments you want to the email. Why limit a good thing?

8Subject

Next, enter the subject of your email. A well-written subject can greatly increase the response rate of the email. Here are a few tips: provide context for the content of the message and a hint about the organization sending it. Remember to focus on catching the eye of the reader. You can use Lava merge fields in your subject line so by all means, be creative.

9The Message

Now the fun part: your message. While you can enter any generic message in this box, consider personalizing your message using merge fields. The message editor has a button {} for selecting a merge field to add. Personalization is one of Rock's main strengths so be sure to use it to its fullest.

10Delay Send

If you'd like you can delay the sending of your message to a date and time in the future. What a timesaver!

11Test

Before sending the email it's wise to send a test. Using the Test button will send the contents of the email to the currently logged in user. The first recipient will be used to process any merge fields in the email.

12Draft

Finally, you can send the communication or save it as a draft to be completed later. This draft will be available to complete from People > Communication History. Take the time to get it right!

Sending Mass Push Notifications

You'll find the Mass Push Notification page under People > Communications > Mass Push Notification. If you've used tools like the Communication Wizard to send push notifications, then this page will look familiar to you.

1 Title

This will be the title of the push notification and will be seen by the person receiving it.

2 Add Merge Field

You can easily personalize the content of the notification by adding Lava merge fields from this drop-down.

3 Notification Content

This is the main content that the person will see. Merge fields will appear here when added, to customize and personalize the content.

4 Open Action

When Link to Mobile Page is selected then you can set which page the person will be taken to, including any query string parameters you might add. If Show Details is selected, you'll be prompted to select a Mobile Application and add additional details in the editor provided.

By default, this block will send a notification to every device that has had an interaction recorded in your system within the past year. Administrators can edit the block settings to change the number of days that the device must have had an interaction for it to be considered active.

Approving Emails

By default, emails that are sent to 300 or more recipients will require approval. This number can be changed by configuring the block settings of the Communication Entry block (for the simple editor) or the Communication Entry Wizard block (for the wizard).

When an email requires approval, its status will be set to Pending Approval and members of the RSR - Communication Approvers group will receive an email. Note that this is the only group that will receive the approval emails.

A communication will not be sent until it's approved by a person with approval access. By default, these are the RSR - Communication Administration and RSR - Communication Approvers roles. Before a communication is approved these roles have the ability to edit the communication to ensure it meets the standards of your organization.

Any individual with approval access can view a complete list of communications waiting for approval from the Communication History page. The filters on the Communications List block allow approvers to view communications from anyone in Rock, with additional filters for status.

Additional security roles can be added to approve communications by adjusting the block security of the Communication Entry Wizard and Communication Entry blocks. Simply add the new role to the Approve permission of these blocks.

Approver Notification Emails

By default, the System Communication for approval emails is Communication Approval Email. Just like other communications, you can customize the content of your approval notifications to suit your needs.

If you need to take it a step further, you can use an entirely different System Communication for these approvals. Simply go to Admin Tools > Communications > Communication Settings and select the System Communication you want to use instead.

Communication List Subscribe Block

Rock ships with the Communication List Subscribe block ready for you to use on your external website under Connect > Subscribe. This block will display the communication lists a person is subscribed to or can be subscribed to. Pictured below is an example of this block on the external website.

In this example, the block shows the three communication lists that ship with Rock under the Public category: Parents of Children, Parents of Youth and Sports Ministry. Additional lists unique to your organization would be displayed here as well if the person is subscribed or is able to subscribe to them.

You can further configure the Communication List Subscribe block in the block settings. This is one area where Communication List Categories come into play. You can specify a category in the block settings if you want the Communication List Subscribe block to target only a particular segment of the communication lists. By default, this is set to display lists in the Public category.

1 Communication List Categories

Whichever categories you select here will affect the functionality of the Communication List Subscribe block. For example, you could select Staff Only to display lists only available to staff members. If you don't select a category, Rock will display all of the lists the person is authorized to view.

2 Show Medium Preference

For instance, the person could choose SMS or Email as their preferred medium.

3 Filter Groups By Campus Context

Communication lists associated with a campus can be filtered using campus context.

4 Always Include Subscribed Lists

If the campus context would normally filter out a list the person is subscribed to, this setting keeps it in place.

Remember, the "Public" category ships with Rock, but you can create as many categories as you want. Whichever categories you select here will affect the functionality of the Communication List Subscribe block. For example, you could select Staff Only to display lists only available to staff members. If you don't select a category, Rock will display all of the lists the person is authorized to view.

Now let's look at how a person interacts with the Communication List Subscribe block to set their communication preferences.

Setting Subscription Preferences

There are two ways a person can access and set their communication preferences: by logging in and navigating to a subscribe page, or by clicking the unsubscribe link that takes them to an email preferences page. Let's look at the subscribe page option first.

Setting Preferences in a Subscribe Page

When a person logs in, the Communication List Subscribe block is made available for them to set their communication preferences. If that block is placed on a Subscribe page, as shown in the earlier screenshot, they can select which lists they want to subscribe to, and choose which format they want the messages they receive to be in. To subscribe to a list, simply check the box beside the list's name. To unsubscribe, uncheck the box. To set a delivery preference, simply click which you want to receive: email or SMS. Super easy, right?

Communication Wizard and Delivery Preference

The Communication Wizard uses the preferences set using the Communication List Subscribe block. So, when sending a communication using the wizard, if you choose the Recipient Preference option in the Communication Delivery screen, the wizard will check which preferences a person has set and send the communication accordingly.

The Communication List Subscribe block works the same way for the internal pages of your organization's site as well. You can create subscribe pages available only to staff members or others where they can set their communication preferences. For example, you can set up an employee resources page with an email preferences zone containing the Communication List Subscribe block.

Setting Preferences from an Unsubscribe Link

The other way a person can access and set their communication preferences is by clicking on an unsubscribe link in an email or SMS message.

The Email Preference Entry block on this page allows you to customize the wording for each of the options on the page. If you want to add more reasons for the "I am no longer involved" option, you can do that under
Admin Tools > General Settings > Defined Types > Inactive Record Reason.
The block also allows you to suppress any reasons that might be awkward in this context (e.g., Deceased, No Activity).

See the Unsubscribing section above, in the Configuring Email chapter for more information on this page and the unsubscribe process.

A Note About the Email Preference Page

If a person is logged in when they view the Email Preference page, any communication lists they're subscribed to will be displayed beneath the "Only unsubscribe me from the following lists" item, allowing the person to select which list(s) to unsubscribe from.

Person Communication History

A history of communications that have been sent to an individual can be viewed on the Person Profile page, under the History tab. This is where you'll come to find out which communications a person has received, and to view the details of those communications.

1 Communication Medium

From this block you can view push notifications, emails or SMS messages the person has been sent.

2 Message Summary

Here you can see the subject (for emails) and title (for SMS/push) of the communication. You can also see who sent the communication. Clicking More will provide further details about each communication.

3 Recipients

This column shows a count of how many recipients received the communication.

4 Date and Status

The date the communication was sent is shown for reference. You can also see the Status of each communication:

• Cancelled
• Delivered
• Failed
• Interacted
• Pending
• Sending

Communication History

You can view a history of the communications you've sent under People > Communication History. The list of communications can be filtered based on a variety of data elements, like type, status, content, etc.

Viewing Analytics

When you click a communication from the Communication History list, Rock displays a page showing the status of the message along with any analytics that are available. This is where using one of the email service integrations like Mailgun can provide a ton of value.

With services like Mailgun you can see how many people have opened your message and even which links they've clicked. This gives you a much broader understanding of how well your message was received and what calls to action were engaged. To learn more about Mailgun, see the Integrations chapter below.

1 Status States

Analytics are shown for each state that a message could be in. The number and types of states is dependent on the transport that you used. The states pictured above include:

• Pending - The communication has been saved or queued but hasn't been sent yet.
• Delivered - The communication has been sent to the appropriate destination server. For email communications this does not mean that it necessarily reached the person's inbox, just that it made it to the recipient's email server.
• Failed - The communication did not reach the recipient. This could be from a bad email address or a hard bounce.
• Cancelled - This state is used when a communication has been cancelled by the sender.

2 Analytic Graph

This graph shows the number of opens, clicks and unopened messages over time. As emails are opened you should expect the number of unopened messages to go down while the number of clicks (hopefully!) goes up.

3 Actions

The Actions section gives you lots of information at a glance, making it easy to monitor overall activity.

4 Clients

Services like Mailgun can identify which email clients are being used by recipients to view your email.

5 Popular Links

In addition to knowing the number of clicks, progress bars at the bottom of the page let you know which links are being clicked and how frequently.

Viewing Message Details

This page shows you details related to the communication itself. Reviewing things like the subject of an email or the phone number used to send a text message can be helpful both for sent messages and for future communications that are pending.

1 Created By

The name of the person who created the communication, and when it was created, will be displayed here.

2 Approved By

After a communication has been approved you can see who approved it and when the approval took place.

3 Change Communication View

Right now we're looking at the Email version of the message, but you can toggle over to SMS to see the SMS version of the communication. This will only appear if the communication was crafted to send both Emails and SMS text messages.

4 Communication Details

Here you'll see the "From" value that's being used, as well as the subject of the email.

5 Message Content

If the communication originated from a list block, such as those associated with data views or small groups, clicking this link will take you to that page.

6 Copy Communication

Using the Copy Communication link will create a new communication with the exact settings used for this communication. The recipient list will be the same. If the initial communication was sent from a dynamic list of people (like a Data View) it will not re-run the list.

If the communication was launched from a grid, you may also see Originated from this Page which will take you to the page containing the grid of people from which the communication was initiated. If the communication is a draft (i.e., not yet sent) you'll also see the option to Cancel Send.

Viewing Activity

This area lists activities for the communication. Depending on the transport used, you can see every time the message was opened by a recipient and every link inside the communication that was clicked.

1 Date

The date and time on which the activity occurred are displayed for reference.

2 Person

The person who took the action is provided as a link that takes you to their Person Profile page.

3 Activity

The specific action (e.g., Opened, Click) that the person performed is shown here. You can sort the list by activity to group actions together.

4 Details

Details related to the activity are displayed here. If the person clicked a link, the link’s URL will also be displayed.

Viewing Recipient Details

Details about the individuals who received the email can be viewed here. This is great for accessing and analyzing easily customizable sets of information about communication recipients.

1 Person Properties

Select one or more person properties and click the Update button to have those properties displayed in the grid. You can then sort the communication recipients according to the selected properties.

2 Person Attributes

Like the person properties, you can select one or more attributes to display in the grid. From allergies to t-shirt sizes, you can add as many as you need.

3 Filter Options

Dive into the details and take control of recipient data! Here you can filter by delivery status, the communication medium, or whether the person opened it. Or, focus on individuals or families by filtering by name. Organizations with multiple campuses can also filter by campus.

4 Recipient Detail Information

This area will show the person’s name and general information related to the communication itself. As described above, columns can be added according to any properties and/or attributes you’ve selected.

System Communication Preview

As noted in the screenshot above, you can click the icon to view a preview of the system communication. However, this is not the typical preview you might be used to seeing when editing the system communication. This is a special preview that's interactive, allowing you to choose a person and a date to populate merge fields. This helps you see what the communication will look like with certain merge fields filled in.

1 Message Date

Here you can select a date, showing you what it would look like if the communication was sent on that date. In order for this to appear you need to have a merge field of SendDateTime somewhere in the communication template, and a Send Day of the Week must be selected in the block settings.

2 Target Person

This defaults to the current person but can be changed to any person. Changing this will populate any Person merge fields in the communication, showing you what it would look like if it were sent to that person.

3 Desktop/Mobile

Here you can toggle between the Desktop and Mobile views of the communication.

4 Send Test

You can click this to send a quick test to an email address that you provide.

Email: Mailgun

We've already touched on just how great we think Mailgun is, but let's dig deeper into the benefits of their service.

Mailgun is an email delivery service that provides several advanced features. Mailgun is operated by the popular web hosting company Rackspace and is used by numerous online businesses like Stripe, GitHub, Lyft, Slack and many many more. We think you'll find that using a service like Mailgun is more than worth the small cost. The main benefits of Mailgun are:

• Improved deliverability of your emails through advanced reputation features like SPF records, domain-keys and reputation monitoring. If all of this sounds Greek to you, don’t worry, they handle all of the technical details. You just need to know that they know what they're doing so you don't have to. Whew!
• Email analytics that help you keep track of trends. Through Mailgun, Rock can show you how many of your emails made it to their destination and, even more importantly, how many were opened, and internal links clicked. All of this happens for you behind the scenes so you can just sit back and view the reports.
• Not all email addresses work. Mailgun can notify you about incorrect email addresses so you can follow up. These bounced emails will be reported, and the person’s profile will be flagged to show the incorrect address.
• Mailgun also offers to inline your emails for you as you send.

On Behalf Of

Following the instructions on Mailgun’s site may lead to a scenario where your emails are sent “on behalf of” your domain. In short, this happens when the domain of the Sender field and the domain used in the From field are different. For instance, the Sender field would be something like mg.rocksolidchurchdemo.com while the From field would be rocksolidchurchdemo.com.

In order to resolve this, the domains should match. The domain that you're sending emails from needs to be added to your Mailgun account and verified. In the above example, the domain rocksolidchurchdemo.com would need to be configured in Mailgun, and your DNS records (all except MX) would need to be updated accordingly. When you're finished, your domain overview in Mailgun will look similar to the example pictured below.

1 SPF Record

You probably already have an SPF Record; in which case you should just add include: mailgun.org to your existing record rather than creating a new one.

2 DKIM Record

You'll create a new TXT record in your existing domain that matches what Mailgun shows here.

3 MX Records

If you're using your actual email domain, you should not modify these records. Note that in this screenshot the MX records are unconfirmed, which is expected for this approach.

4 CNAME Record

Mailgun will use the CNAME record to inform Rock of opens and clicks. You'll need to create a new record like Mailgun shows.

Lastly, make sure the new domain is added to your Mailgun Communication Transport configuration under Admin Tools > Communications > Communication Transports > Mailgun HTTP per the instructions in the prior section above. With the new domain set up and ready to go, your emails will no longer have the "on behalf of" notation. If you had an old domain that you were using (like mg.yourserver.com) it's no longer needed in Mailgun.

SMS: Twilio

Twilio is the leading SMS provider. Period. They not only provide the best service, but they are also one of the least expensive options available. Again, we don’t have a relationship with this organization, but we do know a good thing when we see it! Below are instructions on setting up this service for Rock.

1. From the Twilio website click the sign-up link, then provide your account information. You'll then need to verify that you have a pulse by typing in a verification code they text to you. Finally, select a phone number to tie to your account and proceed to your account information.
2. On your account page note your Account SID and Auth Token. You'll need this for Step 5 below.
3. In order to receive replies from your SMS messages you'll need to provide a 'callback' (aka webhook) address for your SMS number. This tells Twilio how to tell Rock when this event occurs. You can set this by clicking 'Numbers' from the main menu, selecting the SMS number you wish to configure, then adding the URL format below to the 'Messaging Request URL'.

   https://-yourserver-/Webhooks/Twilio.ashx

   SMS Pipeline

   To set your number up for the SMS pipeline, use the 'Messaging Request URL'
   https://-YourServer-/Webhooks/TwilioSMS.ashx?SmsPipelineId=-YourPipelineId-

   

   Make It Accessible

   It's important that this address be accessible from the Internet so Twilio can access it.

4. Before you can actually use Twilio for real communications, you'll need to upgrade from the free trial.
5. From Rock navigate to
   Admin Tools > Communications > Communication Transports > Twilio.
   Enter in your Account SID and Auth Token and activate the transport. Click Save when done.
6. Next set the Twilio transport as the default transport for the SMS medium under
   Admin Tools > Communications > Communication Mediums > SMS.
7. Finally, add your Twilio phone number under
   Admin Tools > Communications > System Phone Numbers.
   You can add as many Twilio numbers here as you wish. Be sure that the phone number is in the Phone Number field and that it is in the format of “+15555555555” (or similar for international numbers). If you select an Assigned to Person, be sure the individual you select has a valid SMS phone number on their record.

That's it! Now you’re set to send SMS messages from the Rock communications features.

Email: Google Apps

This technically isn't an integration as much as tips for configuring SMTP Relaying for Google Apps. The basic steps are covered in this link from Google https://support.google.com/a/answer/2956491?hl=en. A couple of tips are below.

• The link above notes you will find the relaying settings under the 'Apps' menu setting. That setting appears to have been moved. Instead search for 'SMTP Relay' in the admin search.
• We've found success with the following Google Relay options.
  1. Allowed Senders: Any Addresses
  2. Authentication: Require SMTP Authentication
  3. Encryption: Require TLS encryption
• On the Rock side use the following SMTP settings.
  1. Sever: smtp-relay.gmail.com
  2. Port: 587
  3. Username: The admin account username
  4. Password: The admin account password
  5. Use SSL: Yes

Email: SendGrid

SendGrid is another supported Transport you can use in Rock. Like the other options described above, be sure to evaluate each service before deciding which is the best fit for your organization’s needs.

Most of the configuration you’ll need to do will be with SendGrid. You can learn more and get started for free by visiting https://sendgrid.com/. After you’re set up with SendGrid, you’ll need to provide the following in Rock:

• Base URL: The default URL https://api.sendgrid.com should work in most cases. You can change this if needed based on your setup in SendGrid.
• API Key: SendGrid will provide this when you’re set up with their service. This is required for Rock and SendGrid to communicate.

Like other Communication Transports, you can also choose whether SendGrid should track email opens, clicks and unsubscribes. Note that Rock only supports HTTP/S (and not SMTP) for SendGrid.

Setting up SendGrid

The first step will be getting your API Key. Log in to your SendGrid account and navigate to Settings > API Keys. Click the button for Create API Key.

We recommend giving Restricted Access permission. Also, make sure Mail Send is assigned full access as pictured below.

Be sure to copy the API key when it is presented to you. SendGrid warns that you won’t see it again, and that's true. If you lose the key, you’ll have to create a new one.

Once you’ve got your API key, you’ll need to add it to Rock. Inside Rock, navigate to Admin Tools > Communications > Communication Transport > SendGrid HTTP and add the Base URL and your API Key as pictured below.

Next, you’ll need to update the Communication Medium configuration in Rock. Navigate to Admin Tools > Communications > Communication Mediums and access the Email entry. Change the Transport Container to the SendGrid HTTP transport configured in the prior step.

With the above configuration in place, head back over to SendGrid to set up the Event Webhook. You can access this in SendGrid under Settings > Mail Settings > Event Settings. Click the pencil icon for the Event Webhook row to access its settings.

The Event Webhook settings in SendGrid will look like those pictured below. The HTTP Post URL will be formatted as shown, with your Rock URL followed by Webhooks/TwilioSendGrid.ashx. Twilio owns SendGrid, so don’t be concerned about the Twilio part of the webhook.

Note that Processed and Deferred currently have no functionality in Rock and can be left disabled. Be sure that the Event Webhook Status is set to Enabled before saving.

To track opens and clicks, you’ll want to enable those Tracking options in SendGrid. Under Settings click on Tracking to enable these options by clicking the pencil icon. The example below shows what the page will look like after open and click tracking have been enabled.

Lastly, add your information to the Sender Authentication settings. This helps with deliverability. An example of the setup is pictured below, but if you’re not sure what you need there’s a helpful link at the top of page.

Don’t be discouraged if your emails aren’t popping into inboxes right away. There are a variety of factors that can cause delays ranging from a few minutes to several hours. You can click on the Activity menu item in SendGrid to search for emails you’ve sent and view details on what may be holding them up. Be patient, because sometimes there’s a delay between sending an email and seeing it in the Activity list.

Email Spam Reporting

When you send an email, the recipient can report the email as spam. When this happens, Mailgun and SendGrid can report it back to Rock through their APIs. Rock will then find the person and inactivate their email address in the system and add a note to their record. The note indicates that the email address was deactivated due to a spam complaint and includes the date of the complaint.

In order for this to happen, in Mailgun you would need to set up a webhook of type Spam Complaints. In SendGrid you'll want to update the Event Webhook to include "Spam Reports" under Engagement Data.

Check out the Unsubscribing section of the Configuring Email chapter above to see how Rock can help your emails avoid being reported as spam.