When we do alerts through the notifier on the NOW apps, we find that frequently there is not enough space in the headline, and the full summary frequently gives enough information that there is little incentive to click through.

What if ... instead, we eliminated the summary field in the alerts and allowed the headlines to wrap? That way users would see the full headline and we wouldn't have to rewrite them for the alerts.

Hello. How long does it typically takes for a banner served through the Blox Marketplace to start appearing once it is set up? I have ads set to display today and found it can take quite a while -- a few hours in the case of a newsletter ad. Anyone to minimize the time it takes to get an up and running?

It would be nice to have an alternate email for some users, selectable by the user, for adding to email notifications/subscriptions in the email reach system.

Example:

• User: Az.
• Email address: AlexZander@example.org
• Alternate email address: 1234567890@txt.provider.net
• 
  

Regular email-reach advertising, notifications, lists, etc to the normal email address. Alert-campaign to alternate email.

Email reach Campaigns:

•   Weather Alert : to alternate email
•   Headlines-Daily: to normal email

We would have to define a custom email address field for the user/subscriber accounts or have an alternate email address added to the general user information block.

This gets around some of the costs of SMS (yes, a revenue stream for Townnews) for the smaller companies that cannot afford, or justify the costs of the current pricing scheme for the full-featured SMS alert system from Townnews.

We currently use a system similar to this, independent of Townnews, to send out local school closings as they are announced.  In February, based on the new SMS options for Townnews, we would have spent over $5,400 for these texts alone.  15 schools, over 1000 subscribers, closing for 18 days, notified the morning of, or evening before.  Then we have Weather alerts.  Over 1000 subscribers for the weather alerts as well, 2-3 times a day for a month, which would run us (averaged) over $1,700 for that month alone.  That is not counting the one time setup fee, or using the shortcode option.  So far in March, we have had quite a bit less in the way of these alerts.  We estimate in April the alerts will be done 1 or 2 for the entire month.  That is not counting the other 'less critical' alters we have available, such as school sports, local breaking news, etc.  For us, the new SMS system is not cost effective.  
 

Wm

Webinar recording now available.

Taking cues from social media, the BLOX Now mobile app eschews conventional news app design in favor of a single, continuously-scrolling stream of community news and events that keeps users engaged. At our June customer webinar, Susan Bell, BLOX Now senior product manager, and Christine Masters, director of product management, introduced the BLOX Now mobile app.

Topics included:

• Increasing user engagement with a hybrid news and information app.

• Feature highlights, including: in-stream video playback, push notifications, and convenient fly-out menus.

• Monetizing your app with Google DFP integration.

• Managing your app, website, and mobile site in one easy workflow.

• . . . and much more.

Are you ready to get started . . . now? Webinar recording now available.

Has there been any thought given to having a time element for how long a block appears on a site?

For example, we have a block on our homepage (as I'm sure everyone does) that displays any stories with the "Breaking" flag attached. However, if we have such a story that we want to draw attention to as breaking news, we only want it to be considered "breaking" for a short period of time, maybe a few hours.

What would be really helpful is if we could have the "breaking news" block appear for a designated period of time instead of having to go back into BLOX or TCMS and removing the "Breaking" flag from the article asset to get the block to go away. It would just take away a little bit of the manual intervention that is currently necessary.

Thanks.

Dave

Here's a funny thing that I just found out in regards to Firebase (Notifier) and Google Maps. Let me know if I'm doing something wrong...

Firebase Spark plan (free) requires no billing account to work.

Google Maps API (free) does require a billing account to work.

What happens to my Firebase project if I add or remove billing accounts for that project in the Google Cloud Console?

If a billing account is added to a project in the Google Cloud Console, the same project will automatically be upgraded to the Firebase Blaze plan if that project is currently on the Spark or Flame plan.
In contrast, if an existing active billing account is removed from a project in the Google Cloud Console, that project will be downgraded to the Firebase Spark plan.

https://firebase.google.com/support/faq/

Any ideas on how to get around this? Right now I had to remove our billing account, so while notifier works, our Maps are coming up blank. I don't want to have to make two separate accounts.

Feature Suggestion: Maybe this exists already and I've just not been able to find it, but would it be possible to track analytics for each article asset, so we can see page views for each article, not just the most popular ones? Thank you!

I followed the instructions listed here to set up Firebase and connect it to BLOX. But when I send the test push notification, nothing happens. The error in the log says "The caller does not have permission."

I deleted my keys and redid everything from the start, and same thing. Don't know where I should look or what I need to do to get it to work. Anyone have a similar problem, or any ideas on how to fix it?

I know you can set the default workflow on an individual basis, but is there a way (or is it planned if not) to have the option to set all users default workflow, or even set the default workflow upon user creation?

I'm considering removing Flickr from the social accounts area on the User Profile page. It has changed a lot, been sold to SmugMug, getting rid of 1 TB of free storage, etc. We have very little use of it currently in user accounts.

Is it important to anyone - maybe photographers? - who would still want it?

Join us on March 14th @ 10:30 AM CDT

Introducing BLOX Notifier: A new way to manage social and push notifications

At our March customer webinar, Christine Masters, director of product management at TownNews, will introduce BLOX Notifier—an all-new BLOX CMS application that makes keeping users informed with Facebook, Twitter, BLOX Now App, email, and desktop notifications quicker and easier than ever.

Topics will include:

• An overview of the new BLOX Notifier application
• Using BLOX Notifier to create, schedule, and distribute messages and notifications
• Streamlining your publishing workflow with automated trigger rulesets
• . . . and much more!

Ready to get started? Join us on March 14th at 10:30 AM CDT.

Sign up today.

Want to take in the webinar on your own time? Register now and we’ll send you a link to the webinar recording once it’s ready.

We've had some issues with folks being unable to see the close button in the interstitial promo blocks. The problem is it's impossible to see on the block if it's black in front of an image, or if it's white against a default white background. It can be changed manually via css, but this would need to be changed anytime the layout of a promo block is changed. By adding the "light/dark" option to the close button text in the block options it would make it a quick adjustment that could be done via the admin panel. 

 1) What problem(s) does this idea solve? Why do you need this idea implemented? Provide as many problems or use cases as possible. Makes it easier for users to see the button and not got frustrated by being unable to close promo interstitial. Would make it easy for administrators to correct small design oversights. . 

 2) How often would you use this feature? All the time

3) How many people in your organization would use this feature? Every site manager and web staff -- appx 12-20. 

One of my colleagues brought this to my attention. I have played around with it, and it seems like a proper bug with the auto-save feature.

User 1: Makes edits to asset, window closes without proper save/close (due to needing to leave/shutdown, crash or whatever.) User 1 doesn't return to asset.

User 2: Makes further edits to asset, even publishes.

User 1: Returns to asset manager. Auto-save restore dialogue pops up. User 1 restores asset. Asset now reverts back to User 1 edits, overwriting everything User 2 did. Text and edits revert, flags and other settings are also reverted, such as the do not publish flag being set again. Even if User 1 selects "cancel," the asset is overwritten.

Has anyone else encountered this? What do you do to get around it? I don't see an option to turn off auto-save (for a short-term fix.) Maybe there should be a warning that there is a newer version available? Options could be:

There is a new version available!

• Discard
• Restore (Overwrite)
• Restore (New Asset)

I manage multiple sites and have multiple tabs open every day on two monitors. 

With the new interface, browser tab titles are longer and often hide the site they belong to (since the sitename is listed at the end of the browser tab title). 

If "Editorial" could be abbreviated to "Ed.", as well as taking out the space before and after the "/", would definitely help clear up some real estate on the browser tab titles. 

Design = Des. 
Community=Comm.
Marketplace=Mkt. 
Statistics = Stats.

If this annoys you, too, please click the vote button below to try to get this changed sooner instead of later. 

Thanks!