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Creating Learner Notifications

  1. Jump to
  2. Use Case Information
  3. Creating a Notification
  4. Adding Emails to a Notification
  5. Substitutions
  6. Schedule Time Frame

 

Learner Notifications allow an admin to associate a series of time-based emails with a particular content type.

Use Case Information

Emails can be set to trigger on specific dates or on a specified number of days after a learner performs an action such as starting a piece of content, or passing an assessment within a course. Email notifications will have clean look with custom (client-branded) headers and footers, CTA buttons, and text.

Notifications are separated into 3 different types: Content/Learning Path(s), vILT/Webinars, and In Person Events. The types are differentiated by content as well as email features. vILT/Webinars and In Person Events have added email features including default emails and content specific substitutions.

When configured you can:

  • Confirm enrollment
  • Remind users about an event
  • Thank users for attending
  • Promote content
  • Encourage users to fill out surveys

Learner Notifications are a premium feature and behind a feature flag.

Navigate to Control Panel in your instance to request to have this feature enabled on your site.

Creating a Learner Notification

The first step is to create a learner notification based on the content type you want to target.

  1. From your homepage, select Communications.
  2. From the left menu, select Learner Notifications and then Create Learner Notification.
  3. From the drop-down, select the learner notification type.
  4. In the Title field, enter a title for your notification.
  5. Select Content (Individual Session), Content Grouping (Group of Sessions), Learning Path(s).
  6. Enter the name of the content in the Content search field.
  7. Or click “All Content” if Content Grouping is not selected.
  8. Click Save.

LearnerNotifications_AddNotification_AdminView_GIF.gif

Note

Learner Notifications are only sent to enrolled learners. In the case of Panorama learners, notifications will not be sent to learners who have not clicked into the content to enroll in it.

Next, you will add emails to the notification that will get sent out based on action triggers. See the next section for how to add emails to notifications.

Adding Emails to Learner Notifications

Once the notification is created, emails can then be added to the notification. Emails are sent to enrolled learners based on triggers and can exclude learners that have already performed certain actions or met specific criteria.

  1. Click Add Email.
  2. Select the trigger (action required to send this email) from the drop-down. For example, you can choose to send immediately after enrollment or to send on a specific date.
    • Depending on the trigger chosen, complete the relevant fields that appear below. Be sure to fill in the Subject and Body as you would like for them to appear in the email.
  3. You may optionally select a condition from the Exclude Conditions drop-down to skip sending emails to learners that have already performed an action or meet the selected criteria (e.g. already completed the content).
  4. To preview this email in your inbox, click Send Test Email to send a test to your currently signed-in email address.

    Note

    We recommend logging in with a learner account and performing the action to trigger the notification.

  5. Add Button and Button URL are for adding a call-to-action to the bottom of your email, so that you can send traffic to a specific site.
  6. Click Save.
LearnerNotifications_AddEmail_AdminView_GIF.gif

Note

For Client courses (using the Panorama feature), courses provisioned via subscription, or courses included in Learning Paths, enrollment occurs when the learner has logged-in and clicked to view the content at least once. For all other content, enrollment occurs right when the learner gets access to that content.

Tip

When you create a VILT or ILT notification, Thought Industries generates three customizable email templates by default (registration confirmation email, a reminder email, and a thank you/post-event email). If a VILT or ILT has multiple meeting times, you can choose to have the aforementioned email templates sent for each meeting time.

The toggle “Applies to all meeting times of the event?” can be used to send an email per date of a multi-date event.

If you select Yes for this toggle, then the emails will be sent based on the meeting dates– not just the first meeting date, but for every meeting date in the event. For example, if you have 5 meeting times in an event, learners will get five emails (one email per meeting time).

Use Case Example

You might have an event with pre/post learning enabled, so the content access date is occurs before the event (e.g. July 1). If your event was held on July 10, you might want the email reminder to be sent on July 10 (when the event is happening), not July 1 (when learners were first able to access the content). To accomplish this, the “Applies to all meeting…” setting needs to be toggled to Yes. However, it’s important to note that if it's a multi-day event with five separate meetings (e.g. July 10, 11, 12, 13, 14), learners will get this email for each of those dates.

If you select No for this toggle, then the email will be triggered based on the content start date (access start date).

For VILT and ILT notifications, the “Applies to all meeting times of the event?” toggle appears only when one of the four available content start/end date triggers is selected in the setup interface.

LN_Admin_Adding_Emails1.png

AppliesToAllMeetingToggle_AdminView.jpg

How to Incorporate Substitutions Within Emails

Substitutions in the form of tags can be added to the subject and body of the notification email. When used, the substitutions, or tags will be replaced with values from the user or content before sending. Substitutions can be modified like other text using the WYSIWYG modification icons.

Substitutions For All Notification Types:

  • Content Title {{contentTitle}}: The title of the content the learner is being notified about.
  • Start Date {{contentStart}}: The date the learner started the content. (Note, this is not when the content starts.)
  • Start Time {{time}}: The time the learner started the content. (Note, this is not when the content starts.)
  • Content Description {{contentDescription}}: The description of the content.
  • Learner’s Name {{firstName}}: The learner’s first name only.
  • Learner References 1-10 {{ref1-10}}: The value of the reference in the Learner’s profile.

Substitutions For VILT Notifications Only:

  • Session Title {{sessionTitle}}: The course title of an individual session.
  • Content Dates & Times {{contentDatesAndTimes}}: A formatted list of meeting dates and times.
  • Attendee Dial In Number {{audioInfo}}: The value from the “Attendee Dial In” field in the vILT’s settings.
  • Google Calendar Link {{addToGoogleCalendar}}: A link to add the event to Google Calendar. Clicking this link will prompt the learner’s calendar application to open. The calendar event links learners to the URL of the content item within Thought Industries. On event day, learners click on the link in their calendar, are prompted to log into your site, and then are redirected to the webinar provider.
  • Microsoft Outlook Calendar Link {{addToMicrosoftOutlookCalendar}}: A link to add the event to Outlook Calendar. Clicking this link will prompt the learner’s calendar application to open. The calendar event links learners to the URL of the content item within Thought Industries. On event day, learners click on the link in their calendar, are prompted to log into your site, and then are redirected to the webinar provider.
  • Calendar Link {{addToCalendarLink}} or {{downloadCalendarIcs}}: A link to download a standard ICS file and add the event to iCal, or other compatible calendars. Clicking this link will prompt the learner to log in and then a standard ICS file will download. By default, the calendar event links learners directly to the webinar provider's event (e.g., directly to Zoom, WebEx, etc.). On event day, learners click on the link in their calendar and are taken directly to the webinar provider (no need to log in).

    Tip

    ICS links {{addToCalendarLink}} and {{downloadCalendarIcs}} behave differently than Google and Outlook links. There is a feature flag to change the default behavior for ICS links so that it requires the learner to log in to your site first (matching the learner experience for Google and Outlook links). If this feature flag is enabled, on event day, when learners click on the link in their calendar, they will be prompted to log into your site and then redirected to the webinar provider.


    Please reach out to Support if you would like this enabled on your instance.

  • ICS attachment {{icsAttachment}}: This substitution value can be added anywhere in the body of the learner notification. This substitution value is only available for triggers that are based on learner enrollment actions: send days after a learner performs an action and send immediately after enrollment. When this substitution value is included in a learner notification email, nothing will appear in the actual email body that is sent to the learner; instead, a standard ICS file will be attached to the email. All standard/modern email providers will be able to interpret this file and present learners with a clear call to action to add the event to their calendar. Note that the exact appearance of the calendar event varies slightly depending on how each email provider chooses to interpret the event information. Most notably, calendar events may look different in Outlook than in other email providers.

    Tip

    If you want to include additional content details in your ICS files, there is a feature flag that allows you do so. When enabled, the content description that appears on the content detail page will also be included in the ICS file for VILTs so that learners see the description in calendar event. Please reach out to Support if you would like this enabled on your instance.

  • Link to Join Webinar {{joinLink}}: A link from the webinar provider to join the webinar. This is specific to the learner and meeting, so each email will contain a different link.
  • Session ID {{sessionID}}: The session ID of an individual session.

Substitutions For ILT Notifications Only:

  • Attendee Info {{attendeeInfo}}: The value from the “Attendee Info” field found in ILT settings.
  • Event Link {{eventLink}}: Link to the Thought Industries event page.
  • Event Location {{location}}: Formatted location address, room number, etc. from the ILT settings.
  • Google Calendar Link {{addToGoogleCalendar}}: A link to add the event to Google Calendar. Clicking this link will prompt the learner’s calendar application to open.
  • Microsoft Outlook Calendar Link {{addToMicrosoftOutlookCalendar}}: A link to add the event to Outlook Calendar. Clicking this link will prompt the learner’s calendar application to open.
  • Calendar Link {{addToCalendarLink}} or {{downloadCalendarIcs}}: A link to download a standard ICS file and add the event to iCal, or other compatible calendars. Clicking this link will prompt the learner to log in and then a standard ICS file will download.
  • ICS attachment {{icsAttachment}}: This substitution value can be added anywhere in the body of the learner notification. This substitution value is only available for triggers that are based on learner enrollment actions: send days after a learner performs an action and send immediately after enrollment. When this substitution value is included in a learner notification email, nothing will appear in the actual email body that is sent to the learner; instead, a standard ICS file will be attached to the email. All standard/modern email providers will be able to interpret this file and present learners with a clear call to action to add the event to their calendar. Note that the exact appearance of the calendar event varies slightly depending on how each email provider chooses to interpret the event information. Most notably, calendar events may look different in Outlook than in other email providers.

    Tip

    If you want to include additional content details in your ICS files, there is a feature flag that allows you do so. When enabled, the content description that appears on the content detail page will also be included in the ICS file for ILTs so that learners see the description in calendar event. Please reach out to Support if you would like this enabled on your instance.

  • Session ID {{sessionID}}: The session ID of an individual session.

Tip

If you are using Assigned Programs, note that:

  • Learner Notifications can be at the learning path level for Assigned Programs.
  • A {{dueDate}} substitution is also available to add in the body of the email.
  • You can use a trigger called send days before content due date.
  • You can use a trigger called send days after content due date.

Schedule Time Frame

The time frame for certain triggers may vary:

  • Learner Performs an Action: The job to send emails based on learner actions will run a number of days after the action was performed.
  • Number of days before/after the content start/end date: The job to send emails based on content start/end date will run within ~3hrs of 12am (in your platform's timezone) on that specific date.
  • On a specific date: The job to send emails on a specific date will run ~3hrs of 12am (in your platform's timezone) on that specific date.
  • Immediately after enrollment: Immediately

Examples of How to Schedule Notifications Based on When Learners Should Receive Them

I want learners to receive emails ______ the due date of April 1 at 11:59PM EST.

Learners receive the email on ________.

 I enter ____ in the Days container of Learner Notifications.
10 days before March 22 11 days before the content due date
5 days before March 27 6 days before the content due date
2 days before March 30 3 days before the content due date
1 day before March 31 2 days before the content due date
Day of/same day April 1 1 day before the content due date
1 day after April 2 0 days before the content due date OR 0 days after the content due date
2 days after April 3 1 day after the content due date
5 days after April 6 4 days after the content due date
10 days after April 11 9 days after the content due date

 

Note

The table above applies to instance in the US only (not the EU).

Tip

Learners will receive notifications upon re-enrollment as long as it has been at least 30 days since their previous enrollment. Our notification system includes logic that prevents the same emails from being re-sent to the same learner for the same course within 30 days.

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