Pages General¶
What Is A Page?¶
Pages in ActionKit generally correspond to web pages, where your users can take an action. ActionKit doesn't offer content page types, only action pages. For most groups, it makes sense to maintain and host the home page of their website outside of ActionKit, linking from there to ActionKit Pages for advocacy, fundraising, events and other member engagement.
You direct users to your Pages to express support for your position, lobby decisionmakers, donate, sign up for events, and more. Pages capture data about those actions and your users.
Pages are also how users get subscribed to your mailing list so you can email them through ActionKit. By default, anyone who takes action is added to the mailing list you associate with the page. To maintain good email deliverability, your page should clearly indicate this, so users aren't surprised when they receive email from you.
You can customize just about everything about your page, from the appearance, to the user form fields, to user specific content. You can host your pages with us, using our mini-CMS to enter your page content, or you can host your page externally, using another CMS.
Pages are broken down into Types to give you quick access to features specific to the page's purpose.
How Do I Add A Page?¶
From the Pages Tab, you can create a page from scratch or starting from a model.
To create a page from scratch, click Add Page, and select the Page Type from the dropdown. To create from a model, click Page From Model and then select the model. The latter only works if you already have a model for the page type you want to create.
You'll land on the Action basics screen.
At the top is a link to the History, which will list all changes made to this page.
There are four steps for creating a page of most types:
- Action basics - Create the page and set basics like the name, tags, and type-specific info like advocacy targets. This is all information required for action processing, regardless of where you're hosting the page.
- Edit content - Select a Templateset to define the page's appearance and customize the user form. Enter content, or if you indicate that you're hosting the page on your own servers, we'll put some filler in for the content.
- After-action info - Define everything that happens after the user submits (again, regardless of where the page is hosted) including the landing page, thank you email, tell-a-friend and social media sharing, and after-action notifications.
- View on site - Proof and test the page. If you selected the checkbox to host your own page, this step is called Preview/get HTML and you'll see a button to download the HTML.
Petition and Letter pages have an additional step for setting up automated signature delivery. Whipcount pages have one additional screen for whipcount results. For events, you must create an Event Campaign, then the steps above are used to create Host and Attendee Pages.
What Are The Page Types?¶
ActionKit walks you through the process of creating Pages based on Type, streamlining the process and incorporating best practices. The Types are:
Petition – Petition Pages are generally used to petition an advocacy target on a specific issue or campaign. Users can add a personal comment but they cannot edit the statement. Petitions support one-click signing.
Letter - Letter Pages are similar to Petition Pages, but the user is encouraged to edit the letter you provide or write their own. Also, one-click signing is only available for petition pages. Letter pages are designed to encourage the user to customize the content, so you want the user to land on the screen with the content.
Call – Call Pages ask the user to call an advocacy target, generally to lobby them on an issue. These pages display the target phone number and ask the user to indicate whom they called and how it went.
Whipcount – Whipcount pages are a version of call pages that allow you to track the positions of a set of targets. A typical whipcount would target a small set of legislators who are either undecided on an issue, or hold key positions in the legislative process. Whipcount pages do not rely on a user's address to determine targets. The user sees the full list of targets, selects one to call, then sees a form with the target's phone number, instructions, and a contact form (unless the user is already recognized). The user calls and records the target's position on your issue. Once enough users have confirmed a target's response (based on your settings on the Whipcount Responses screen under User submitted), that target shows as confirmed so the next user can call a different target.
You can also use whipcount pages to generate thank and spank calls to targets.
Letter to the editor (LTE) – LTE Pages ask users to compose an original letter to the editor of a local, regional, or national newspaper. The user first selects a newspaper from a list, then composes a user, then submits. ActionKit emails the user's letter to the editor for the relevant paper using data from a third party database. A user can only submit once for any given paper from an LTE page.
Survey – Survey Pages provide one or more questions for your users. Use surveys to get input on a specific campaign or to track opinions about your organization over time or for anything where you want input. You can provide your users with selectable answers in any format or provide space for users to enter their own free form responses.
The results are available for download as a CSV by clicking the Download Actions link on the Reports Tab.
Event – Events are usually (but not always) used to organize off-line gatherings for advocacy, team-building, public education, etc. To create an event you first create an Event Campaign, which has multiple pages associated with it, including a page where hosts sign up and one where attendees sign up.
Donation – Donation Pages ask your users to contribute, order Products, or support Candidates (through bundled contributions) using a credit card, PayPal, or ACH direct debit.
To accept credit card donations, you must have a payment account set up with a merchant vendor we integrate with. You can accept recurring donations and donations in many currencies.
To accept PayPal donations, we need information about your PayPal Account.
To accept ACH direct debit, you need a merchant account with Braintree and you must sign up for their ACH beta program.
You can also manage donations through ActionKit.
Update Recurring Donation - From pages of this type, users with existing recurring donations can update the amount of their recurring donation or update their credit card number, bank information (for ACH direct debit donations), or billing address. The billing address is prefilled from the last saved billing address for this recurring profile, and changes to the billing address are only available for Braintree, Authorize.net and PayFlowPro accounts. Users cannot update the billing address for PayPal accounts.
The update page also includes a link to the cancel recurring donation page.
If you have more than one merchant account, your page will automatically use the correct one for the user's recurring profile.
The template for changing the layout or appearance of this page is Recurring update.
Cancel Recurring Donation – This Type allows users with an existing recurring donation commitment to log in and cancel the commitment. The user cannot request refunds for past payments from this page.
The template for changing the layout or appearance of this page is Recurring cancel.
Signup – Signup Pages are the most basic Type. You can use them to add users to a mailing list or associate them with a Tag.
Unsubscribe – Unsubscribe Pages allow your users to ask not to be sent future mailings. Once a user is unsubscribed you can't email them from ActionKit.
Users can also ask to be removed from particular mailing lists, however, your page must make it possible to unsubscribe from all mailing lists with one click. If they're following a link from an ActionKit mailing (e.g. they have an AKID), they must be recognized and cannot be asked to enter their email address.
When a recognized user lands on your unsubscribe page, they see a checkbox for each list they belong to, as long as your template set is based on the Original. All the boxes will be checked by default. The user can simply submit to unsubscribe entirely. If the user unchecks all the boxes and then submits, the same thing happens - the user is unsubscribed from all lists. Only if the user leaves some boxes checked do they remain subscribed to any mailing lists.
In your own templatesets and offsite pages, you must maintain this type of approach -- either pre-selecting all the lists or providing a prominent remove-from-all-lists option at the top of the screen. Although you may lose a couple users who would otherwise have checked only some of the lists, this is a minor price to pay for maintaining good deliverability. If a user thinks they unsubscribed entirely, but forgot to check a box and therefore receives an email, they may become angry and complain to their ISP, which is very damaging to your email reputation.
Account Tools – You can also create several account screens where your end users can manage their own profile, including the user update and password screens. You can only create one version of each screen.
Import Pages - This page type doesn't correspond to a user-facing web page. Import Pages are used to add users, actions, or user data to your database from a CSV file. Add these Pages from the Pages Tab or the Users Tab.
What Are The Options For Hosting My Page?¶
You can host your page with ActionKit or on your own server. Either way you can access all the same functionality - your end users will be recognized, error messages returned, data submitted to the database, Confirmation Emails sent, etc.
To host a page yourself, you need to copy some code into the HTML on your server. Select the Host outside ActionKit box on the Edit content screen when you create your page. Then view the source and download the code from the Preview/Get HTML screen.
When you check the box, we prefill some generic content in the text boxes. If you want the correct content to be included in the code you download, just overwrite the filler. Otherwise, skip the text boxes and enter your text in your own CMS.
We also display a URL field. Enter the URL for your page and we'll hook it up to the View link on the Pages Tab.
Read more tips and suggestions in the embedding section.
How Do I Customize My Page's Appearance?¶
Customize the look and feel of your Pages using Templates. Our templating system separates the graphic design work of creating pages with your organization's style from the campaign work of setting goals, crafting your message, and creating content.
Templates define everything about the appearance of your pages from your page layout and colors, to the fields displayed in your user forms and the image for your thermometers. Each Page you create in ActionKit combines input from multiple Templates.
A Templateset is just a group of all the available Templates; each ActionKit Page combines input from multiple Templates.
To set a Page's appearance you just select the appropriate Templateset from the dropdown on the Edit Content screen.
How Do I Create Pages In Other Languages?¶
There are a few things you need to do to create a Page in a non-English language, and if you'd like, to hook it to other translations.
You need to have added your language.
Then when you create your Page, select the language on the Action basics screen. All users who take action on this page will have their language preference set to the selected language. If you'd like existing users' language setting to remain as it is, select "--------" from the drop down.
Also, your Page will use the default Templateset for the language (although you can select another one instead).
If this is a translation of another Page, you can associate it with the other versions by selecting a Multilingual Campaign. All Pages that share the same multilingual campaign are treated as one Page for reporting and by the thermometer if you've selected a goal.
Pages with a Multilingual Campaign display links at the top right of the Page so users can toggle to the language they prefer.
Note
For Donation Pages, the multilingual campaign feature allows you to group Pages with different currencies, but the language picker won't be shown unless the Pages actually have different languages, and public-facing thermometers will only include donations in one currency.
Enter your content in the appropriate language on the Edit content screen and the text of the Confirmation and TAF Emails on the After action info screen. ActionKit will pre-select the default Email Wrapper for the language for your Confirmation Email.
Can I Customize The Stats That Show On This Screen?¶
Yes. You can do this by editing a report:
- Page mini-dashboard - This report generates the stats displayed on the Pages Tab. Under the available actions for each page (e.g. "Edit Copy View Hide"), you'll see a count of action takers, if you're using the default report. You can copy and edit this report to show a count of new users, total donated, action sources or whatever page-related info is most useful for your organization. You can even provide links to more detailed reports here. You may want to consider using different content per page type: `Using Custom Template Tags`_.
What Are Multilingual Campaigns?¶
Multilingual Campaigns allow you to associate multiple Pages with each other for tracking and reporting. If you've selected a Goal, the thermometer for Pages that share the same Multilingual Campaign shows the combined results.
Also, your end users will see links at the top right of the page so they can toggle to their preferred Language.
You can add a Multilingual Campaign from the Pages Tab or from the Multilingual Options section on the Action basics screen when you're creating a page.
Create a Multilingual Campaign for each Page that you plan to translate. Then select the Campaign and the Language when you create each translation.
On the Pages Tab, if you click the grey Multilingual Campaigns link, you'll see summary information for each Campaign including the count of action takers and a list of the Pages showing each Language.
What Are Models?¶
You can mark a page as a Model, as you can a mailing, and use it as the basis for future Pages of the same type.
Models can be used to save standard text you include in the Confirmation Email or the tell-a-friend message for Petition Pages, or to save your most commonly used Donation page settings, or as a shortcut for creating C3 versus C4 Donation Pages with the appropriate page wrapper, merchant vendor account, Email Wrapper and From Line.
When you copy a Model, all the settings remain the same, except the copy is not marked as a Model.
Designate your Model by checking the Is model box on the Action basics screen under More options.
Click on the light gray Models link at the top of the page list on your Pages tab to see a list. Or use the filter options on the Browse all screen.
Model pages do not work differently than other pages. Users can still submit on a Model page, if you make the URL public.
Note
Only users with the Pages - plus Model Pages permission and superusers can create and edit model pages. The checkbox to designate a page as a model will not show up for other users.
How Does Hide Work? Can I Delete A Page?¶
Most data in ActionKit cannot be easily deleted, but can be hidden. Some objects that can't be deleted from the admin can be deleted using the API.
Objects you hide don't show up in a search or object list. For example, if you hide a mailing it won't show up on the browse all mailings screen or in the list of mailings you can include or exclude when you're selecting recipients for a new mailing.
When an object is hidden it is also disabled. For example, if you hide a page, users will not be able to submit on that page. Be careful not to hide objects that are currently in use.
You'll be asked to confirm that you really want to hide some objects, like pages, as a safeguard against accidentally hiding something that is in use.
You can unhide an object by going to the list for the object type. From the Mailings or Pages Tab, click "Shown hidden" to see the hidden objects. Select the "show" link for the mailings or pages you want to unhide.
What Are All The Available Page Tools On The Right Side Of The Screen?¶
A/B Tests¶
You can perform A/B tests on your ActionKit pages so you can conduct real-world experiments by seeing how changes will perform based on user behavior. Each test contains two or more variations, which override selected attributes of the page, like its title or sharing text. A variation can also leave the page unchanged, so you can compare the original version of the page against one or more alternates.
For example, you could write two different titles for a petition page and split the users who visit that page into two groups which would see different versions of the page, then measure which group was more likely to take action in order to determine which title was more effective.
When a test is active, users who visit a page are “enrolled” with one variation or another, and see that version of the page. Enrollments are sticky between requests, so if a user reloads a page, or clicks away and then returns, they’ll see the same variation again.
If you’re using AK’s new sharing tracking tools, enrollments are also sticky across share links, so if a test is active when a user creates a share link, and then another user clicks on that link, they will see the same variation as the user who created it.
When a test is active, each page view, action, and share link has records attached which show the variations the user was enrolled in at the time. This data enables a calculation of which variations led to more actions.
Appearance¶
Templatesets¶
Customize the look and feel of your Pages using Templates. Our templating system separates the graphic design work of creating pages with your organization's style from the campaign work of setting goals, crafting your message, and creating content.
Templates define everything about the appearance of your pages from your page layout and colors, to the fields displayed in your user forms and the image for your thermometers. Each Page you create in ActionKit combines input from multiple Templates.
A Templateset is just a group of all the available Templates; each ActionKit Page combines input from multiple Templates.
To set a Page's appearance you just select the appropriate Templateset from the dropdown on the Edit Content screen.
You can access a list of all your existing templatesets by clicking Appearance and then Customize Page in the sidebar on the right of the Pages Tab.
Click on a column header to sort the list by that header. Click a second header to sort first by that header, and second by the previously selected header.
You Create A New Templateset by copying one of the existing templates.
You can designate a default set for each language. The default is pre-selected on the Edit Content screen when you create a new Page and select the relevant language on the Action Basics screen.
Set the default by clicking in the default circle on the row for your templateset. This removes the default setting from the current default set for the language and sets the selected set to the default. You must confirm that you want to do this.
Templateset Fields¶
Templateset fields are a type of custom field, like custom page fields or user fields. They're associated with the templateset and allow you to make templateset-specific customizations.
For example, if your site used a few different templatesets which were mostly similar but used different colors, you could define a custom templateset field for heading color, and reference it from within your template code. You could then copy the templateset and choose a different color without making any changes to the code.
Templateset fields you've created are available on the Settings screen for each templateset.
Note
If you don't see a Custom Templateset Fields section on this screen, no custom templateset fields have been created for your organization.
To add custom templateset fields, select Custom Templateset Fields under Appearance on the sidebar on the right on the Pages Tab and click Add allowed templateset field. Enter the name and other settings for your templateset field and then save.
To use the field in your templateset, go to the Settings screen for your templateset to set the values for the templateset fields. And then include {{ templateset.custom_fields.YOUR_FIELD_NAME_HERE }}
in your templates to use the field.
Manage Library¶
The library provides integrated storage through an Amazon S3 account you set up for media like images and videos. Follow the link to view a list of images, search, edit, or upload a new image.
The file name must only includes letters, numbers, and _ (no spaces or other characters). Upload your image and you’ll be given a url to use to access the image.
Toggle open the Options section while you're uploading an image to set the directory, change the filename or set the content-type. If your images don't seem to be displaying properly, check that the content type is correct.
Click the "Edit" link for an image to change the filename or directory after it has already been saved. Note that you may break links to the old URL so you will see a warning before you save.
If your library isn't working, confirm that the correct Amazon account information is entered on your Amazon S3 Config screen.
Account Tools¶
These are screens your end users can access to manage their own profile. You can have only one of each of these screens:
- login
- set/reset password
- view account profile
- edit account profile
Click Account Tools on the Pages Tab to see a list of URLs.
Your default Templateset defines the appearance of these screens. You can change your default Templateset here, but note that the Templateset you select will become your default set for all Pages.
Each screen type has templates that you can edit to change its appearance. The templates are as follows:
- login.html, the login screen
- logout.html, the logout screen
- password.html, where users request a password reset email
- reset_password_email.html, the email with the link to reset a password
- reset.html, where users set or reset their password
- user_view.html, the "My Account" page (accessible at yourinstance.actionkit.com/me/)
- user_update.html, the "Edit My Account" page
Like other templates, you can edit all of these through the "Customize Page" link on the Pages Tab.
Though you aren't likely to need it often, it is possible to create account tools links that will use a templateset of your choice. Just add ?page=page_name
to the link: for example, https://mysite.actionkit.com/login/?page=petition1 uses the templateset from https://mysite.actionkit.com/sign/petition1/.
Targets¶
Legislative Targets¶
The U.S. House and Senate are automatically available as targets for Petition, Letter, Call or Whipcount page. Each state's house and senate are also available, but have to be activated following the steps for Adding a new target group below before they will display in the Target Groups box. You can create a group from a subset of any legislative body (e.g. a particular committee) by following the same steps.
To activate state legislatures or to create a new target group from a subset of state or federal legislators (like Blue Dog Dems or House Democrats), you must first add them:
1 Click Legislative in the Targets section under Related tools on the Pages Tab.
2 Select Add Legislative Target Group.
3 Name the group. Pick something that will be obvious to others on your staff.
4 Select a type from the drop down (you can only select one per group, so if you want to target US Senators and US House Reps you need to create two groups).
5 Select one or more states for state legislative targets or to narrow federal legislative targets by state. For example, select U.S. Senate then enter "CA" to target Senators Boxer and Feinstein. If you don't enter a state, you'll get all legislators in the body you selected in every state (e.g., every state senator in all 50 states).
6 Narrow your target list further by party or individual if desired.
To limit to or exclude specific people click in the relevant box and select names or type to search by name or seat. You can also select records in bulk by copy-and-pasting in a group of district codes ("AZ_03 MI_13 CA_12") or a comma-separated list of names ("Conyers, Grijalva, Pelosi").
You'll see a running count of targets in the group at the bottom of the screen.
After you save your group, the name will be a selection in the Target groups box for all Petition, Letter, Call and Whipcount Pages.
Note
If you want to target any state legislative bodies, you must first activate each one following the steps above. Each state body you activate will then be available as a target group for all staff.
Custom Targets¶
You can also create and select custom target groups. Custom targets can be anyone: Governors, school board members, CEOs, whoever you want. A custom target group can consist of one target or many.
Custom target groups can have the following jurisdictions:
- City and state
- City and country
- County and state
- State
- Country
By default, All users is selected, which means all actions on the Page are directed to all targets in the group.
Groups with a jurisdiction work like legislative targets where the target only receives actions from their constituents. Specifically:
- You can use snippets to show your users information about their target.
- Only users who we know live in the states or countries specified can take action on a Call Page (you can provide a fallback URL for others). Recognized users see the correct target automatically.
- Signature deliveries only include constituents.
- You can use the target constituents checkbox as a shortcut to limit a Mailing to users in the states or countries specified.
To start, select Add Custom Target Group on the Pages tab or click Custom in the Targets section on the Action basics screen of your Page.
Enter a name that’s descriptive (e.g. "Chamber of Commerce" for the group or "Chamber President" for an individual).
Select a jurisdiction if that's relevant. If you select a jurisdiction you must specify the targets jurisdiction (e.g. if you select state, we need to know the target's state).
Then add your target or targets by:
- Entering the relevant contact information in the boxes. To add additional targets to this group click the blue Add another special target link.
- Uploading a CSV of custom targets. The first line of the file should be a header row containing the column names. Column names can include: title, first, last, phone, fax, email, gender (for pronouns), state, country; of these, first or last is required.
Note
One target can be in many target groups. To more easily track all actions directed to one target over time, create a group with only the target and select that target for multiple pages instead of adding the target to multiple target groups.
We ask for the target's gender so you can use "snippets" in your bulk mailing to select the preferred pronoun for each target. For example, if you target state governors, the emails could say, "She supported this" for the female governors; "He supported this" for the male governors; and "They supported this" when gender is left null in the upload file, for any governors that prefer the prounoun They.
Once you add a custom target group, it will be available in the Target groups box on the Action basics screen during page creation.
Delivery Jobs¶
Delivery Jobs have several uses. You can create a PDF for in-person delivery or press events. Delivery jobs are the first step in setting up a bulk delivery-- a mailing to a petition or letter page's advocacy targets with a link to a secure site where the targets can download signatures as a PDF or CSV file. A delivery job is created automatically to track downloads for batch delivery.
The steps for creating a PDF are outlined here.
Language¶
Languages¶
Add or edit language-related information using this button.
Name the Language (use something obvious like "Spanish"). Languages are saved in the core_language table.
You'll see a list of translations to make. These are the standard error messages that a user will see if they don't enter a required field or they enter something invalid, like a 4-digit zip code.
If you add custom messages to your Templatesets you can translate them here as well.
Read more about using Languages in association with Pages, Mailings and users.
Multilingual Campaigns¶
Multilingual Campaigns allow you to associate multiple Pages with each other for tracking and reporting. If you've selected a Goal, the thermometer for Pages that share the same Multilingual Campaign shows the combined results.
Also, your end users will see links at the top right of the page so they can toggle to their preferred Language.
You can add a Multilingual Campaign from the Pages Tab or from the Multilingual Options section on the Action basics screen when you're creating a page.
Create a Multilingual Campaign for each Page that you plan to translate. Then select the Campaign and the Language when you create each translation.
On the Pages Tab, if you click the grey Multilingual Campaigns link, you'll see summary information for each Campaign including the count of action takers and a list of the Pages showing each Language.
Donations¶
Products¶
ActionKit provides basic support for product sales and give aways. Products can be premiums, merchandise for sale, or something less tangible (for example, 'adopting' an endangered tiger).
Products are used with donation pages. If you have set up any products, you'll be able to select them in the More options section on the Action Basics screen when you create your page.
The default layout offers users options to select a product and to make an additional donation. You can change the layout, offer products with no option for an additional donation, or allow users to donate without selecting a product on a page with products by editing the donate.html template.
Our product system is not designed to function as a storefront. If you need shipping and tax calculations and fulfillment tracking, we recommend using an external storefront and integrating the data using our API.
Candidates¶
Use this option to add candidates for use on bundling Donation Pages.
Add one or more candidates from the Candidates button under Donations on the Pages Tab. If you've uploaded a photo for the candidate to your library, you can enter the URL to include it on your Page.
When you create your Donation Page select the candidate(s) to include on the Action basics screen. Read more about creating bundling pages in the description of the candidate selection box for Donation Pages.
Suggested Ask Rules¶
Suggested ask rules are used when you want to tailor the ask amounts on the donation page and in the mailing to the user's past giving. You can use the suggested ask functionality to specify a default amount and to modify the list of amounts based on their donation history.
We give you the option to base the ask rule on the donor's highest previous gift, second highest gift, or average gift size. You specify breakpoints for each donation tier so that you can create a slate of potential donation amounts that makes sense.
The suggested ask can be used on donation pages and in mailings.
Read more about uses and implementation.
Account Tools¶
These are screens your end users can access to manage their own profile. You can have only one of each of these screens:
- login
- set/reset password
- view account profile
- edit account profile
Click Account Tools on the Pages Tab to see a list of URLs.
Your default Templateset defines the appearance of these screens. You can change your default Templateset here, but note that the Templateset you select will become your default set for all Pages.
Each screen type has templates that you can edit to change its appearance. The templates are as follows:
- login.html, the login screen
- logout.html, the logout screen
- password.html, where users request a password reset email
- reset_password_email.html, the email with the link to reset a password
- reset.html, where users set or reset their password
- user_view.html, the "My Account" page (accessible at yourinstance.actionkit.com/me/)
- user_update.html, the "Edit My Account" page
Like other templates, you can edit all of these through the "Customize Page" link on the Pages Tab.
Though you aren't likely to need it often, it is possible to create account tools links that will use a templateset of your choice. Just add ?page=page_name
to the link: for example, https://mysite.actionkit.com/login/?page=petition1 uses the templateset from https://mysite.actionkit.com/sign/petition1/.
Fraud Filters¶
Fraudsters will sometimes use Donation Pages to test whether stolen credit cards are functional or not. These carding attempts can incur transaction and chargeback fees for your organization.
Clients who use PayFlow Pro, Authorize.net or Braintree as their payment gateway can set global- and per-page fraud limits.
The fraud scores are generated using the MaxMind minFraud service. We incur a small charge for each fraud score calculated, but do not pass that charge along to you.
MaxMind looks at a lot of factors: whether the user's IP address is that of a known fraudster, whether the country of the card issuer matches the user's current location, HTTP request headers that can help tell automated scripts from real users, and more.
The filters can reject some real donations although the benefit of avoiding fraud may outweigh any donations lost, especially if you're having a problem with fraud.
The filtering process logs details to the core_donationattemptlog table, where you can review exactly how many attempts were rejected and the details of the rejections.
By default, ActionKit blocks donations from IPs in 5 high risk countries: Brazil, Estonia, Ghana, Nigeria, and Vietnam. If any of those are high value for your organization, we can remove those countries on a per-client basis. Note that this comes with an increased risk of carding attempts, which can incur transaction and chargeback fees.
Read more if you want to enable fraud filters for your instance.
Other¶
Tags¶
Tags are categories that you can associate with a Page or Mailing. They may represent issue areas or campaigns (e.g. food_safety or Paris_climate_talks_campaign).
You can use Tags to group Pages or Mailings. Tags are displayed on the Dashboard and the Browse all listing, and you can filter by Tag, so for example, you can quickly view the list of all the Tages you have created for a particular campaign.
Tags can also be used to group users for mailing targeting and analysis. Users who take action on a Page are associated with that Page's Tag(s).
Every user who takes action on the Page is associated with the Page's current Tags. There is no way to associate only some of those who took action on a Page with a Tag (for example, you can't tag only donors giving over $X on a page).
Note
Users are only associated with a Page's current Tags, not with the Tags from the time the user took action. If you remove a Tag from a Page, any users who've already taken action on the Page will not retain any association with the Tag you removed.
Read more about managing Tags including how to add Tags and reorder your Tag list.
Custom Page Fields¶
Custom page fields are a powerful and flexible tool that allows you to add a section of content or code to an individual page.
For example, if you want to ask users to tweet about an action they've taken, you could add a page field called "twitter" and include a suggested message specific to the page. If you have a Protect Parrots petition your sample message might be "Parrots are smart. I just signed to save them here: action_URL"
Page fields you've created are available on the Action basics screen for each page.
Note
If you don't see a Page fields section on this screen, no custom page fields have been created for your organization.
Use this syntax to include page fields in your templatesets or to reference them when creating a page: {{ page.custom_fields.YOUR_FIELD_NAME_HERE }}
. Or, if your custom page field contains template tags or filters that need to be interpreted, then use this syntax instead: {% include_tmpl page.custom_fields.YOUR_FIELD_NAME_HERE %}
.
AJAX Signup Widget¶
From Pages > Other > Embed AJAX Signup you can embed a simple action form on your site. For example, you could add a sign up form to your website wrapper or a simple survey to your home page. This widget doesn't provide all the functionality of a full-fledged Page (users aren't recognized, no thanks page and tell-a-friend, no thermometer, etc.) but you can edit the basic form, include custom fields, and customize the thank you message. The widget only works for petition, letter, survey, and signup pages.
Users who submit through the widget are added to your mailing list the same way as other action-takers. You must make it clear to users they're signing up for updates, and link to your privacy policy.
Notifications¶
Notifications are emails to someone aside from the action taker, prompted by actions on the Page.
You can use these for a variety of purposes including:
- sending an email to the honoree about gifts made in their honor,
- alerting field organizers to each new event created in an event campaign,
- notifying a campaign director every 1,000 new actions on a page,
- emailing your development staff for each new recurring commitment.
Create your notifications and then select the ones you want to associate with each page on the After action info screen. Each action can prompt multiple notification emails.
Notification emails will only send if there are values for the subject line, to emails, from email, and mailing body. So you can use conditional content to control whether the notification requirements have been met.
Warning
Blank mailing bodies may still have <p>
tags and comment code that process as content. To block sending, use {% requires_value foo %}
in the body, or use a conditional in the subject, to email, or from email.
We provide a few sample notifications that you can use or customize:
- In honor of: This example shows how you'd prompt a notification email to the honoree after each gift in his/her honor. First you need to add an action field with the label 'action_in_honor_of_email' to the Donation Page template you'll be using. Then you can use the to line in the example -- {{ action.custom_fields.in_honor_of_email }}. The example also shows some conditional content you might include in the notification email by adding additional custom action fields to your template.
- Tell staff about monthly donation: In this example, the subject includes the criteria to prompt the sending of the email. Whichever staff you select from the list or enter in the "to" line will receive this notification after each new monthly donation is created. The body includes some conditional content.
- Notify every 1000: In this example, the send criteria is in the body and the subject includes conditional content.
Here are some other examples that aren't included in your instance but that you might add:
- Notify someone when a donation is greater than $250:
Subject: {% if action.order.total > 249 %}New $250+ Donation!{% endif %}
* Notify event hosts of new attendees:
To: {% for host in action.event.hosts %}{{ host.email }}{% if not forloop.last %},{% endif %}{% endfor %}
Subject: Subject {{ user.first_name }} has RSVPed for your event
Read about adding notifications.
LTE Signature¶
When your user submits an LTE, ActionKit appends their contact information and emails the letter to the newspaper chosen.
Using the default user signature template, the user information, or signature, looks like this:
First Last
Number Street
City, ST Zip
(XXX) XXX-XXXX
You can change the format by creating a new user signature template and selecting it from the drop down in the User signature section on the Action basics screen. You add a new template by clicking the :green: + or under Other on the Pages Tab.
The default user signature template looks like this:
{% if user.first_name %}{{ user.first_name }} {% endif %}
{{ user.last_name|default_if_none:'' }} {{ user.address1|default_if_none:'' }} {% if user.city %}{{ user.city }}, {% endif %}
{% if user.state %}{{ user.state }} {% endif %}
{{ user.zip|default_if_none:'' }} {{ user.phone|default_if_none:''|format_phone }}
Snippets can be used in signature templates. They are not clickable so you need to cut and paste the snippet into the template. Use snippets to include information like occupation in the signature by creating a custom user field for occupation
and adding the field to the user form in the LTE template. Then add {{ user.custom_fields.occupation }}
at the bottom of the signature template.
Spam Check Log¶
The spam check log shows you actions that meet spam check criteria and could be an important tool in managing your sender reputation.
Spammers look for ways to get their content and links onto a webpage, even if the displayed content is not rendered as HTML. The ultimate targets are search engine indexers or users unaware enough to click the links.
They may attempt to use your pages for this, particularly if you display recent comments on an action page. Comment spam presents a real risk to your email reputation.
Spammers submit non-deliverable emails at real (and usually) large domains, for example gmail.com and yahoo.com. The emails will bounce the first time you send a mailing to them, but there is a potential reputation cost to trying to email a large number of bad addresses.
You may want to enable our spam checking system if you develop problems with comment spam.
The system provides several filters that you can use to catch spammers and settings for unsubscribing them and suppressing their actions.
You can review the actions that fit the spam check criteria (whether or not you have the system enabled) by looking at the spam check log.