Features Guide
Communication Basics
Communication is an important thing that must happen in a church. Without good communication, it will be very difficult for a church to reach its congregation.
For this reason, Erista provides a Communication module that accommodates various communication needs for the church. Communication channels that can be made through Erista include:
- SMS (coming soon)
What can you achieve through the Erista communication module?
- Sending church news to all congregations via Email
- Sending board meeting invitations to church officials via email
- Create a new Contact Group to group specific people (example: people who registered for baptism in December)
- Set up automatic Birthday Messages via Email
- Set up automatic Birthday Messages via WhatsApp
What do you need?
We recommend that you at least record your name, email address and telephone number in the People data. Each feature in this communication module relies on data including e-mail addresses, telephone numbers, and full names to send messages to the congregation.
How to send a message to the congregation via Email
With Email, you can write messages that are free to send to your congregation. For that, you can follow the following procedure:
On the New Message page, the first thing you need to fill in is who is the recipient of your message. For that, you have 2 options:
- Adding a new contact via Contact Group (a)
- Adding new contacts individually through the People list (b)
Next, you can also set the From. From here is who is the sender of the message. In this case, you can only fill it with one of the Erista users registered in your account.
Then, you can fill in the Email Subject. This will appear as the email subject received by the email recipients.
Next, you can fill in the Body of the message. You can fill the Body section with messages according to your needs.
Finally, after everything is complete, don't forget to press the Send Now button. After you press the Send Now button, Erista will immediately send an email to each of the designated email addresses.
Tips! Insert a picture in an Email message
In the Body section, you can add an image by pressing the image icon available on the toolbar in the Body section.
Set up automatic Birthday Messages via Email
A personalized birthday message for your congregation will be greatly appreciated by your congregation. For this reason, Erista provides an automatic birthday message feature via email that you can change according to the taste of the church:
Make sure you are on the Email tab on the Automated Messages menu
Fill in the Subject field according to your needs
Fill in the Body according to your needs
After changing everything, make sure you hit the Save button
How to include the member's name in an automated message
Add code {{ name }} (complete with spaces) in the subject or body of the message, then the system will change it to the full name of the member.
How to enable Automatic Birthday Messages
To activate the automatic birthday message, make sure the button is in the on position (the switch is on the right). Press the toggle button to enable / disable this feature.
a. Personal Message is a message addressed directly to the birthday congregation. If active, Erista will send a message to everyone whose birthday is on that day at 08.00 AM.
b. Group Leaders is a message addressed to the group leader of the birthday congregation. This message aims to remind the group leader to also congratulate the birthday person.
c. Admin & Pastors is a message addressed to Erista users who have roles as Admin and Pastor. This message also aims to remind church administrators and pastors to congratulate birthdays.
Warning! Automatic Messages is a paid feature that uses a communication quota
If Automatic Messages is active, then your communication quota will be reduced every time a birthday message is sent. This is a feature that can be activated exclusively for both Starter and PRO subscribers.
Set up automatic Birthday Messages via WhatsApp
Apart from automatic birthday messages via email, you can also set automatic birthday messages via WhatsApp, in the following ways:
- Make sure you are on the WhatsApp tab on the Automated Messages menu 2.To enable automatic birthday messages via WhatsApp, make sure the switch is on (the switch is on the right). Press the toggle button to enable / disable this feature.
Is it possible to change the birthday message on WhatsApp?
Due to WhatsApp's strict regulations, for now, Erista only provides one type of WhatsApp birthday message. In the future, Erista will add new options for you to choose from.
Adding a custom Contact Group
Contact Group is a feature created to make it easier for you to send emails to a specific group. However, you can also use Contact Groups to form groups that are not included in the Small Group or Ministry Group categories, for any need.
To create a new Contact Group, follow these steps:
- Make sure you are on the Contact Group menu
- At the top right, press the Add Contact Group button
- Enter the Contact Group name
- Enter members by selecting from the People list available on the form. Don't worry, you can add or remove members later.
- Press the Save button to save your new group.
Default Contact Group from the Erista system
Erista has provided several Contact Groups managed by the system, so you don't need to manage these groups, such as Male/Female, Everyone, Baptized/Not Baptized, etc.