Here are some of the new feature enhancements and other important updates you may have missed. To receive the govDelivery New Releases Roundup directly to your email when it is released, sign up here.
Apple Updates
As part of Apple’s recent software upgrades focusing on email preferences and privacy, Apple released a feature this past September called Mail Privacy Protection which offers Apple Mail app users the option to load remote content privately and not disclose their IP addresses. This means that an email will be marked as open regardless of whether the email was opened or not, resulting in inflated total open rates due to a proportion of recipients being Apple users who have upgraded to this software and enabled this feature. This change impacts all email comms platforms, not just govDelivery, so we expect to see an industry re-baselining around open rates as a metric. Rest assured that click rates aren't going anywhere and your messages to your subscribers continue to have a positive impact on the communities you serve. Stay up-to-date with the Granicus blog, and join the conversation on govCommunity.
Increase Engagement with Call-to-Action Buttons
If you want to increase engagement and click-throughs by four times, Buttons are a great way for subscribers to easily interact with your bulletins. By providing a custom button, it can help direct subscribers in finding more information on another webpage, or downloading additional content. Style each button to best fit your email and grab your reader's attention. This feature is available in advanced bulletins and can be added into new or existing Flexible Templates. We also have a feature review demo to see this new feature in action.
Protecting your subscriber lists from malicious subscribers
Bots are an industry-wide problem and one we take seriously at Granicus. Earlier this year, we added the addition of a CAPTCHA solution to help block bots from signing up to govDelivery signup forms in the Quick Subscribe signup flow. This solution is invisible to most subscribers and only displays a verification puzzle if some level of risk is detected. Double opt-in also remains an option to turn on for your account to prevent malicious subscribers (please contact Support to do so). Although CAPTCHA and double opt-in remain the two industry standards to tackle bots, they are part of numerous lines of defense we have implemented to protect the quality of your subscriber lists at Granicus. As bots continue to grow more sophisticated, be assured we are constantly renewing our efforts and working hard to combat them.
Attract new subscribers on social media with Signup Builder
We have made improvements to Signup Builder to help you grow your subscriber base on social media. When posting a link on social media to a signup form built in Signup Builder, the signup banner will now display as a preview image and the account name and first heading in signup will display. This allows admins to easily promote their topics on social media and attract new subscribers.
Get organized with an Internal Bulletin Name
We added the addition of internal name field to drafts, scheduled, and sent tabs to help admins better organize their bulletins. This is beneficial if you frequently draft bulletins with similar subject lines or if bulletins with the same subject lines are sent to different audiences. You can assign an Internal Name to any Advanced Bulletin, Standard Bulletin, or Bulletin from Code, which is only visible to govDelivery admins. By default, this feature is switched to off, so if you would like to have this feature enabled, please contact Support.
Tips and Tricks:
Contextual Support always at hand
Have the answers to your govDelivery questions at your fingertips with our Support button. Anchored at the top right of each of the govDelivery pages is a Support button which will bring you to the specific Support page for that topic.
As always, please refer to our Support site at support.granicus.com if you have any questions. You can check out user guides, FAQs, and troubleshooting tips, or open a case if you need assistance.
Kind regards,
The Granicus Product Release Team
