On the other side of the technology circle, it’s really interesting to meet schools who are looking at (or are already) doing away with the old concept of print and email for newsletters, preferring to ditch that old model for one that encompasses blogging. Blogs are great for schools in so many ways; they allow the author to express themselves just as they might in a newsletter, but more importantly the blog allows readers to respond with comments. These are, clearly, an area that schools have to manage – no one likes to have unsavoury comments visible on their blog page – and as such levels of moderation need to be integrated into the policy of blog management. So, is there a halfway house?
Is it possible for a newsletter to be created and sent as an email? We don’t mean as an attachment, I mean as something the recipient can read directly in their email applicatio, on their tablet, mobile or laptop computer?
Well, we have been looking at ways for schools to do that. We wanted to find a means where a school user could create clean, school branded newsletters which can easily be sent as ‘e-shots’- emails with the full newsletter included, with images, weblinks, text and tabulated information to help convey the information needed.
We also wanted to figure out if it would be possible to send specific newsletter submissions to all parents, or to predefined groups of parents – after all, a parent with a child in Year 6 might not be very interested in the school trip information for Year 3 pupils.
We also needed to find a way to offer this as a truly cost effective option to schools. Schools currently using online services to send newsletters will be paying for them and the opportunity to reduce ongoing costs for that simple service seemed a bit of a logical thing to do.
Welcome to free E-Newsletters
So, now, we have such an offering. Our Joomla! based websites can have their own base-line e-newsletter application installed at no charge. Within that application, newsletters can be created, wrapped in branding that depicts the school, and with just a few clicks that newsletter can be sent to one or more lists of recipients. The website is responsible for sending the emails and will collect a basic level of statistics about the mails sent out and the successful deliveries.
The Tapiochre School Website newsletter suite is packed with useful features:
- Sends newsletters to just one or to several lists at the click of a button
- Allows website visitors to register to recieve copies of the newsletter (if you want them to) and automatic subscription of new users to one or more list upon registration (if you allow them to do that)
- Includes one 'school branded' tempate (default) and 4 additional templates for you to play with
- Email queue management to keep the flow of emails under control
- Optional Enhanced Statistics to see how many and who receives and reads the email newsletter, bounced emails and links clicked
- Can track the subscriber's IP
- Easily import your users from SIMs or CMIS as a simple three column CSV format spreadsheet
- Include links back to the school to offer content (blogs, galleries, calendars) easily, within your newsletter
- Unlimited lists containing subscribers
- Unlimited subscribers in the whole system for no additional charge
- Unlimited newsletters, all of which are stored for resubmission if needed, all created like a blog article within the system
- Display of e-newsletters within one of the website's pages so those who don't subscribe can still read them online.
- Support for social Tags (Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn)
- Allows recipients to unsubscribe (legal requirement)
- Sends emails as HTML so that they look attractive on the recipient's device.
More and more schools are now adopting this as an ideal way to reduce some of the administrative burden associated with printed newsletters and are reaping the rewards of better communication with parents and stakeholders while driving cost down at the same time.
If this idea sounds interesting to you for your school, give us a call now!