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I have sent out invitations to new members but when they respond to the email as in the instructions noted below, they don't seem to get added.? Am I missing a step somewhere?? The ones that use the link to the website get added just fine.

"To accept the invitation, please reply to this email, or you may accept the invitation on the website.

Thanks for your help!
June

On Sun, Jun 17, 2018 at 11:13 am, <junemansfield@...> wrote:

I have sent out invitations to new members but when they respond to the email as in the instructions noted below, they don't seem to get added.?

Are they actually replying, or forwarding?

The invitation message has a special "reply-to" field that looks something like?[email protected]

If the reply message it later receives is not sent to that address, the invitation will fail.

Hope this helps,
Bruce
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June,

I have sent out invitations to new members but when they respond to
the email as in the instructions noted below, they don't seem to get
added.

"Seem"? - you should be able to tell for certain: look at the Sent Invitations tab of your group's Invite page. Or look in the Member Activity tab of your group's Activity log or the Members list itself to see if they appear.

I just tested replying to an invitation by email and it worked so there doesn't seem to be a general problem with the invitations. Both the From address and the Reply-To field of the invitation are set to the special address described by Bruce, so it should work correctly with just about any email interface's interpretation of "Reply".

If the members who didn't get added to the group are still waiting you could ask them to CC you (at your personal email address) on their reply to the next invitation you send them. That would let you carefully check their reply for whatever error they (or their email interface) might be making.

Or just advise them to use the link instead.

Shal


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I am also having problems with folks getting subscribed.

1)? Can I actually send them a second invitation from the group ... if I already invited them?

2) Also I wrote a "Second invitation" post thinking it would be saved as a different post from the original.? Uh, no.? Can someone either send me the "regular" invitation (which will generate correct subscriber links) or tell me where I can find that here, please?

THANKS!

On Tue, Jun 19, 2018 at 11:04 am, <unamerkle@...> wrote:

I am also having problems with folks getting subscribed.

1)? Can I actually send them a second invitation from the group ... if I already invited them?

Yes.

2) Also I wrote a "Second invitation" post thinking it would be saved as a different post from the original.? Uh, no.? Can someone either send me the "regular" invitation (which will generate correct subscriber links) or tell me where I can find that here, please?

Go to Admin->Invite and examine the "Invitation to be Sent" box. This is what the entire message will look like. Note that the subscription links are already there, created by groups.io. There is no reason to attempt to create them yourself.

You can include a custom message that is inserted in the middle of this, but that's all. See the next box on this screen; whatever you type there will be inserted at the point where it says "The following message was included by [your name]:". By default this area is populated with whatever Member Notice of type "Invite" is currently active, but you can modify it as you wish for each invitation.

This custom message is not only useful, but important to ensure that your invitation looks legitimate and is not just some spammer trying to get a potential subscriber to click on a link.

You can have as many Member Notices of type "Invite" as you want, but only one can be made active at a time.

I hope something in there helps.

Regards,
Bruce?
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The problem with the “Invite” process is that it bypasses any Pending Member Message, which seems to be the only way to put the demand for “First and Last Name” or other qualifying information into the joining process.

One can include a custom message in an “Invite”, but the prospective member is instantly subscribed when they accept, without having to answer the question(s) that may be in such a ‘custom message’.

I want to only have known people as members, so I instruct Moderators to only invite people whose First and Last Name they already know, as well as their email address. We can then enter it as their Display Name, but that is changeable.


Suggestions:
1) Allow a custom message that must be replied to as part of the joining process, whether by Invite, email request <[email protected]>, or the website’s "+ Apply For Membership In This Group"

2) Since Display Name can be altered by the Member, add an Owner and Moderators only viewable and changeable “Real Name” or “Member’s List Name" in Admin: Members - if necessary as 'Member can view only’ in their “Profile” or is it “Group Profile”

On Tue, Jun 19, 2018 at 12:38 pm, Michael Pavan wrote:

The problem with the “Invite” process is that it bypasses any Pending Member Message, which seems to be the only way to put the demand for “First and Last Name” or other qualifying information into the joining process.

One can include a custom message in an “Invite”, but the prospective member is instantly subscribed when they accept, without having to answer the question(s) that may be in such a ‘custom message’.

The logic behind this is as follows...

If someone asks to join your group, you know nothing about them, only that they want to join, and perhaps their email address. At that point you can use the "Pending Subscription" message to ask them questions, or whatever you think you need to validate them.

If you're sending an invitation, presumably you already have this information in hand. Otherwise, you wouldn't be inviting them.

That said, a "new subscriber" questionnaire is often-requested feature, and has been on the "to do" list for a long time. The proper place for such requests is in the beta group; there is an ongoing thread to this effect at ?. No one in groups.io management monitors this forum...we are just a bunch of group owners trying to help each other.

Hope this helps,
Bruce?
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On Tue, Jun 19, 2018 at 12:38 pm, Michael Pavan wrote:

2) Since Display Name can be altered by the Member, add an Owner and Moderators only viewable and changeable “Real Name” or “Member’s List Name" in Admin: Members - if necessary as 'Member can view only’ in their “Profile” or is it “Group Profile”

Any information you want to keep separately about a member can be kept in the Notes for them on their membership page.

Duane
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On Jun 19, 2018, at 4:36 PM, Duane <txpigeon@...> wrote:

On Tue, Jun 19, 2018 at 12:38 pm, Michael Pavan wrote:
2) Since Display Name can be altered by the Member, add an Owner and Moderators only viewable and changeable “Real Name” or “Member’s List Name" in Admin: Members - if necessary as 'Member can view only’ in their “Profile” or is it “Group Profile”
Any information you want to keep separately about a member can be kept in the Notes for them on their membership page.

OK, I didn’t notice Notes before - that works, but it’s a lot of awkward clicking about.

It would be much better if it was a field in the Member’s membership page that was only viewable or shown to Moderators ‘allowed to access the member list'.

On Jun 19, 2018, at 4:27 PM, Bruce Bowman <bruce.bowman@...> wrote:

On Tue, Jun 19, 2018 at 12:38 pm, Michael Pavan wrote:
The problem with the “Invite” process is that it bypasses any Pending Member Message, which seems to be the only way to put the demand for “First and Last Name” or other qualifying information into the joining process.

One can include a custom message in an “Invite”, but the prospective member is instantly subscribed when they accept, without having to answer the question(s) that may be in such a ‘custom message’.
The logic behind this is as follows...

If someone asks to join your group, you know nothing about them, only that they want to join, and perhaps their email address. At that point you can use the "Pending Subscription" message to ask them questions, or whatever you think you need to validate them.

If you're sending an invitation, presumably you already have this information in hand. Otherwise, you wouldn't be inviting them.

Not necessarily:

You might only have the email address and forgotten or didn’t know their full name, or a member recommended that “what's his name” with that email address would be a good member or would like to join.

Also I found over 18 years of ownership of up to 10 email Lists and not making sure to get and record full names when people joined, that over time I couldn’t remember which email address belonged to which person.

What about when or if I’m ready to give Ownership over to someone else?

If/when an email account gets hacked and if I know who it belongs to, I might be able to contact them by different means.

Sometimes members say "I never see any messages", and I know I’ve approved 3 or 4 subscriptions for them, but neither they or I remember which address(es) are theirs - that might be hard to believe, but

I have 10 active email addresses that I receive all through Apple’s Mail applications, I know what all of them are now, but I don’t remember what the inactive ones are, plus as I get older there are many things that are harder and harder to remember.

I’ve had children or spouses of deceased members request that I stop messages that continue and upset the remaining spouse - the spouse doesn’t know how to communicate digitally and/or the child doesn't live close enough to ascertain what the deceased's email address is.

That said, a "new subscriber" questionnaire is often-requested feature, and has been on the "to do" list for a long time. The proper place for such requests is in the beta group; there is an ongoing thread to this effect at .

A mandatory "new subscriber” questionnaire would be excellent. I current caution Moderator from approving subscription requests before the qualifying information is given in response to the Pending Member messages. I also discourage use of Invite feature unless the qualifying information is already known (as you suggest), but the Invite feature could be more useful if it could be used to collect and/or verify qualifying information.

It would be even better if qualifying information requests could include fill-in fields that would automatically enter the information in the appropriate place in the Member’s membership page.

No one in groups.io management monitors this forum...we are just a bunch of group owners trying to help each other.

I understand.

Thanks,
Michael

Hope this helps,
Bruce

Michael,

I also discourage use of Invite feature unless the qualifying
information is already known (as you suggest), but the Invite feature
could be more useful if it could be used to collect and/or verify
qualifying information.

I disagree. Membership upon acceptance is the very essence of an Invitation. It is what it means.

If you want to send the person an application to join the group you can send them an email message containing the +subscribe address, or a link to the home page with instructions to click the Request button at the bottom.

It would be even better if qualifying information requests could
include fill-in fields that would automatically enter the information
in the appropriate place in the Member’s membership page.

On that we can almost agree. Though I don't know that the filled in fields belong on the Membership page itself (rather than the Notes page). See also:
/g/GroupManagersForum/message/9327

Shal


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Shal,

I also discourage use of Invite feature unless the qualifying
information is already known (as you suggest), but the Invite feature
could be more useful if it could be used to collect and/or verify
qualifying information.

I disagree. Membership upon acceptance is the very essence of an Invitation. It is what it means.

I might want to Invite you, but only know you as Shal with an email address. Yes Shal may not be a common name, but we still would want to put a full name with the email address.
Again, that’s why I discourage the use of the incomplete Invite process and do as you suggest next:

If you want to send the person an application to join the group you can send them an email message containing the +subscribe address, or a link to the home page with instructions to click the Request button at the bottom.

Yes, that’s what we do - it’s just more cumbersome than a more thoughtful, better featured Invite process should be.

It would be even better if qualifying information requests could
include fill-in fields that would automatically enter the information
in the appropriate place in the Member’s membership page.

On that we can almost agree. Though I don't know that the filled in fields belong on the Membership page itself (rather than the Notes page). See also:
/g/GroupManagersForum/message/9327

The problem with clicking on Notes from the Member’s membership page is the need to click on “Notes”, (enter your note), click “Update”, you have to hit ‘go back’ twice to get to the Member’s membership page, and ‘go back’ one more time to get to Admin: Members. If the 'viewable by Moderators only Notes' were part of the Member’s membership page in stead of a button, you would just have to click “Save” and you’re at Admin: Members - you put the information together where it belongs and eliminate one click and three ‘go backs’ per Note per member.

Yes, Groups.io is better than and more featured than YahooGroups, however there is definitely still room for improvement…

Michael

Michael,

I don?t know if I fully understand your request. But if you don?t mind I tell you how I handle this issue (as I understood it) for our group. I am the owner of a group dealing with mostly animal health matters. My moderators and I spend a whole lot of our free time helping pet-owners in very complex and specialized issues. We provide scientific information for them and help them interpret their pet?s medical findings and support them in a broad variety of questions.

From the very beginning (my yahoo group was founded in 2006) we didn?t let anyone in who didn?t give their personal data (which is full name, place, telephone and a very explicate statement about why they wanted to join our group). We did this in oder to make sure we weren?t flooded by people trying to sell pet food and other pet things or grab members? email addresses for other commercial reasons.

So in yahoo times I had a prepared questionnaire that went out to them and had to be sent back to me, where all this information was demanded before they could join. Prospective members also had and have to accept our guidelines by clicking a little box within that questionnaire. The questionnaire contains my email-address and must be sent back to me personally. As soon as I get it back, this person will be admitted in case everything is o.k..

And instead of saving this delicate private information somewhere inside the group?s archives, it stays with me and is saved on my personal server. Not only because Yahoo is known for selling personal data, but also for privacy policy reasons personal data shouldn?t be saved on such a platform as far as I am concerned. In all those 12 years of the group?s existence this has worked perfectly.

In my new group.io it works the same way. Here I use the same questionnaire and send it out via the "pending subscription" function. The real work was designing this questionnaire and reengineering it occasionally.

I hope this can be a little help to you.....

Victoria

Some of my groups are unrestricted for Dance and Performance announcements - anyone may join (anonymously if they wish). These groups are virtually all announcements by Moderators, with any Member posts moderated.

Most of my groups are for amateur musicians who get together to play (often in various private homes), share sheet music (stored in the Files section), and for Dances and Performances - a different email List and related website for each group of musicians. These are restricted groups that welcome anybody, but we want to know who you are, so the only qualifications are:
1) Come and Play with us first.
2) Then Join with your Full Name.
Perhaps my cautions are too ‘Old School’, but it makes members feel comfortable and has worked well for 18 years.

These restricted groups post who's holding a session when (with a phone number to call if you don't know where the host's home is), detailed reports of what has been played, set lists for performances, pictures, other music opportunities, and sometimes the history of a tune, song, composer, musician or band is discussed.

The idea is that we are friendly people with no need to hide behind a false name, and who don’t want to be SPAMMED - unless someone’s email account is hacked, having only known members accomplishes this. Occasionally someone may get off topic (not group or music-related), but a note to them and Moderation curbs that.

I used to not want Full Names to go along with email addresses (to keep them from Yahoo), but with 10 Lists I can’t remember which email address belongs to which member. It seems like an option so many would want to make this more convenient to accomplish, and could simplify Groups.io membership pages. I’d love to have a message (instructions) I can write and a few designatable fill-in fields included in the Invite and Join processes. It would certain help with those people who usually manage to be able to respond to an email, but not initiate one...

It sounds to me like you should use a database.? You could either enter each person's information or have them add their own.? If you add it, you could even hide the entire DB from other members.

Based on your description, I wouldn't send an invitation unless I already had the information needed.? Then it would work fine as is.

Duane
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Michael,

Yes, that’s what we do - it’s just more cumbersome than a more
thoughtful, better featured Invite process should be.

From my point of view Invite works exactly as it should. I don't want people that I invite to end up in the Pending list - I've already vetted them and I want them to be members.

So you want something else. You want to invite someone to request membership. As opposed to inviting them to be a member directly.

One possibility would be to have it be an option on the Invite page - Invite to request membership as opposed to Invite to join. My concern is that if we break the traditional semantics of Invite in this way it may lead to a lot of confusion.

I wish I could think of a better name for the function you want. Offer. Solicit. Request. Ask. "We ask that you request membership" - that's not too bad. Encourage. Propose. Suggest. Urge. Lure.

Actually, it kind of goes with the Promote function, maybe that's it.

Instead of promotion by display on a web site, you're looking to send messages promoting your group. Replying to the promotion would make the addressee a Pending member, and send them the Pending SUbscription notice.

Shal


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Shal wrote:

Yes, that’s what we do - it’s just more cumbersome than a more
thoughtful, better featured Invite process should be.

From my point of view Invite works exactly as it should. I don't want people that I invite to end up in the Pending list - I've already vetted them and I want them to be members.

So you want something else. You want to invite someone to request membership. As opposed to inviting them to be a member directly.

One possibility would be to have it be an option on the Invite page - Invite to request membership as opposed to Invite to join. My concern is that if we break the traditional semantics of Invite in this way it may lead to a lot of confusion.

I wish I could think of a better name for the function you want. Offer. Solicit. Request. Ask. "We ask that you request membership" - that's not too bad. Encourage. Propose. Suggest. Urge. Lure.

I might call it: Qualified Invitation

Actually, it kind of goes with the Promote function, maybe that's it.

Instead of promotion by display on a web site, you're looking to send messages promoting your group. Replying to the promotion would make the addressee a Pending member, and send them the Pending SUbscription notice.

This would work. Good idea to fill the current gap.

I am thinking it might be a completely different problem. I was helping my Mom yesterday with something unrelated which made me realize this.

If you are a sophisticated user you have an email client. So a "sendmail" link opens that client with the email address already filled in and you are ready to type your email, or in the case of an invite to just hit send.

But .. if you are less sophisticated, you don't even know what an email client is. You log in to gmail , UVerse, At&T, comcast, hotmail? or Yahoo and read your mail. Mail is a web experience, not an experience with a client program or app.

So when they encounter the sendMail link, nothing happens. I think Chrome has add-ons that will summon Yahoo or gmail,? but assuming this is an unsophisticated user, they have whatever browser came with their computer.

When Mom clicked on a SendMail link, her computer fired up Windows Live mail which is depricated and it was asking her to enter account information -- completely unintuitive for an unsophisticated user. When I click on a sendMail link on my new laptop,? Windows 10 mail (trusted store app!)? launches too inviting me to create an account, but I'm experienced so I just have to change my default email client to the desktop Outlook which is what I have installed. Not sure why Windows didn't do that for me, but that's Microsoft for you!

At work our department's Chromebook launches gmail when I click on a sendMail link. So maybe it's as simple as software not knowing what to do on a particular platform when a user clicks.


--Debee
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