How do I write an alert?

An alert is an email from your organization to your supporters, usually asking them to act on a bill. Open Alerts in the left navigation and click New Alert. The Compose alert page opens.

Owners and Editors can write alerts. Analysts and Viewers can read them but not write them.

The fastest start: draft from a bill

At the top of the page, click ✨ Draft from a bill. You pick one of your campaign bills and the alert is written for you, with a Take Action button to your action page. See "How do I draft an alert from a bill?" You can then edit everything below.

The three columns

Audience

The top of this column shows how many supporters match, out of everyone who can receive alerts, for example "1,240 of 3,875 supporters". The count updates as you change the audience. People who are inactive, unsubscribed, not opted in or whose address bounced are never counted.

You can narrow the audience by:

• Saved segment: choose Load a segment… to use one you saved on the Supporters page
• Location: + Add a district… (add as many as you like)
• Took action on: + Add a bill… or + Add a campaign… to reach people who already acted on it
• Engagement: High, Medium or Low
• Exclude: leave out anyone who received an alert in the last 24, 48 or 72 hours

Leave everything empty to send to everyone who can receive alerts. Click + Save as segment to save the audience for later.

If you started from Send alert to selected on the Supporters page, the column shows Specific supporters with the number you picked. If you started from a district on the Supporters map or Mobilize district on a legislator's page, that district is already added.

Message

• Subject: keep it to 100 characters or fewer. The counter below the box shows your length.
• Body: the toolbar has Heading, Bold, Italic, Bullet list, Link and Image (paste the image's web address).

Three toolbar buttons add special content:

• Insert variable personalizes the message for each person. See "Personalizing" below.
• Insert Take Action button adds a button that opens one of your action pages. Pages that are not published yet are marked, with a reminder that they are not live and must be published before you send. The button's colors and shape come from Settings > Alert email design.
• Insert bill card adds a small box with a campaign bill's number, title, status and sponsor as they are when you insert it.

Two AI buttons sit under the editor:

• ✨ Refine tone rewrites the body in the tone you choose: urgent, formal, friendly, passionate or concise.
• ✨ Shorten makes the body shorter.

Both replace the body text, so read the result before you send.

Live preview

This shows the email exactly as a supporter will see it, with your header and footer, the sender name and address, and the subject. Use Preview as: to switch between several real supporters in your audience and check how personalization fills in for each.

Personalizing

Insert variable adds a placeholder that is filled in for each recipient when the alert sends. You can use it in the subject too. The choices are:

• First name and last name
• Their state senator and their state representative, with or without a title (the names follow your state, for example Assemblymember or Delegate)
• Their district numbers for each chamber
• City and state

If the platform does not know a value for someone, it uses friendly words instead. For example, a missing first name becomes "there" ("Hi there") and a missing senator becomes "your state senator". In districts with more than one member, every member is named.

Saving and testing

• Save draft saves the alert and takes you back to the Alerts list. Open it again any time and click Edit.
• Send test emails the alert to you, at your staff email address, with "[TEST]" at the start of the subject. Variables are filled in with your name and sample legislators. The unsubscribe link in a test does nothing.

Sending

Owners see Schedule… and Send to followed by the number of recipients. Editors see Submit for review. See "Who approves and sends alerts?"

Demo organizations never send email. Tests, sends and schedules are refused there.

If this does not solve it, email support@conservativestates.app and tell us your organization's name.