Preparing a Distribution List¶
In order to send your newsletter, you need first to configure a list of recipients. The interesting point is that once you configured a given list of recipients, and gave it a name (e.g., «Members of my club»), the list will be available for use the next time you want to send a newsletter and you will not have to configure it again.
The list of recipients is sometimes referred to as a «distribution list» and has the exact same meaning.
LionsBase comes preconfigured with two commonly used distribution lists for each club:
Members: which targets active members of the club
Committee: which targets members of the current committee, without taking care of the special functions
To create a distribution list:
Open module Direct Mail > Recipients Lists.
Select your Newsletter folder.
Click on the link «Create a new recipient list?»:
To take advantage of LionsBase’s dynamic distribution lists, make sure to choose type «User function». Then fill-in a title for your list and select a built-in distribution list from the registered providers:
Arbitrary Recipients Lists¶
If the preconfigured distribution lists do not fulfill your needs, you may define your own ones very easily. Hereafter we describe the process of preparing a distribution list targeting member functions, for instance president of a zone or the webmaster at any level (see the roles in the management website for further information):
After choosing to generate a list for «functions», you have to choose the level of the function you target:
And then the actual functions you wish to target:
The available functions are those that are defined for the multiple district.
When you get your list of emails, on the last step of the wizard, at the end you will see a special configuration line:
This is the configuration line you should use with a distribution list of type «User function» and the provider «[LionsBase] Advanced List», by copying and pasting it into the text area «Additional parameters». That’s it! Congratulations!
Furthermore, distribution lists may be defined with a static list of email addresses which is especially useful for targeting non-Lions members.
Finally, distributions lists may result as aggregate of other distribution lists. A typical example is an «extended committee» distribution list where a few external persons are targeted as well or if you want to aggregate two (or more) advanced lists, e.g., to target «club presidents» and «club vice-presidents» within two given districts.
Up-to-date Information¶
The real benefit of the LionsBase distribution lists over the definition of static list of email addresses is that the LionsBase distribution lists are fully dynamic and computed each time they are used. This allows a «Members» or a «Committee» distribution list to always reflect the current state within LionsBase and ensures that a message sent to e.g., all presidents at a given point of time will not end up in the mailbox of a past president.