Understanding Email Templates

Summer Reader gives you the ability to create custom email messages for your patrons. These can be set on a System-Wide or Program-Specific level. You can access these template menus from the System Maintenance page.

Remember, that in order to send email you have to first configure email settings.

To create email templates, first decide if you want to create one that applies to all programs in your system or just to one specific program. Chose the appropriate menu.

Begin by choosing a name for the template.

Then fill in the subject and body of the email. If you use ^ ^ tags, be sure to use the tag codes from the list on the right hand side of the page. Using these codes between ^ ^ marks, enables the system to send a custom email. For example, entering this into the templates field:

Dear ^LIBRARY CONTACT^,

^LIBRARY^ is pleased to announce that you've won a prize for your participation in ^PROGRAM NAME^.

would appear like this in the email that goes out to patrons:

Dear John Smith,

Smithville Public Library is pleased to announce that you've won a price for your participation in Summer Kind of Fun.

The custom tags pull from information in the system and populate it uniquely for each patron and program. Custom tags are specific to the email template in question. Not all tags work with all emails.

Be sure to save all entries.

To edit an existing template, locate that template from the list of templates below. Click the

icon.

To send emails using the Email Template, go to Custom Reports. You can find this on the Reports page.

1. Select Custom Reports. Refer to the Custom Report article if necessary.
2. Select the Program Status and Program Name you want to email from
3. Select Enable Email (Yes)
4. Apply the filters you wish to employ to get the patrons you want to find.
5. Click Run Report
6. In the report, locate the Email button in the middle of the header.
7. At the top of the Send Email Screen that pops up, select a Template to apply.
8. Make any changes you wish and attach any files required.

Click send.