Inviting group members

Before you invite your group members

Review best practices for setting up your group:

It's helpful to understand the experience of your members. We suggest you invite a friend, family member, or even yourself before you invite your members to give you a better sense of how your members will experience Joinable.

Invitation or self-joining?

Some Joinable groups are designed to be private, meaning only the people you have invited can participate. In other cases you may want to allow members to join from an invitation link or QR code (printed or displayed on the phone). These are pseudo-public groups, since they can be joined as long as the link is active.

Self-joining

To enable self-joining:

  • Open group settings - group name > “Settings”

  • Click Permissions

  • Switch on "Allow members to join without admin approval"

Once self-joining is enabled, you can find the link and QR code by clicking "People " followed by the top right "+ Invite" button.

Join by QR code and invitation links

When opening a self-join link or scanning a QR code, the member will be prompted to enter their name and email or phone number. Once they add this information they will join the group.

Inviting group members

To add members, select "People", then "+ Invite". You have two options for adding members, invite by email or phone number.

Add members manually

To input members manually, simply include their email address or mobile phone number and optionally add the first and last name. To include multiple participants, select "Add another member".

Batch import members (currently only works with emails)

If you have an existing mailing list or spreadsheet containing emails, select the "Batch Import" option and you can copy/paste either a comma or space separated list. After you import you will be able to review and modify the list before you send.

If your list is in an email app such as Gmail, you can copy the contents of the email list, paste it in the text field and click "Continue". If properly formed, first and last names will also be populated (e.g., First Last <name@gmail.com>,). Additional tools for batch importing are coming soon!

Pending Members

Once you've entered all your members, click "Next". You have the option to "Send the welcome message now" — if disabled, members are added to a pending queue (you can easily send the welcome later). When members are pending, they are not yet part of the group and will receive no messages.

When you're ready to invite your members, you can either use the default welcome message or write your own. Select "Add Members" and your members become active. Any messages sent to your group will now be received by your new members

Inviting pending members

Members who have not received the welcome message will appear at the top of the member list. To move them to an active status, select "Send welcome message" at the top of the Members list. This will open a window with the default welcome message, which you may choose to modify or replace. "Send Message" to deliver their welcome.

New member announcement

When adding a person, you can choose to notify the whole group that a new member has joined. To select this "Announce member to group", use the toggle beneath the "Welcome message".

Invited member experience

When you send an invitation via email, SMS or a QR Code/link, this is what will happen:

Invite by email:

  1. The member will receive your welcome email and they don't need to do anything more to begin receiving messages from your group. They are prompted to "Visit your group" and "Update your settings."
  2. A little later they'll receive an email from Joinable that welcomes them, shares the value of Joinable and offers help if they need it — similar to the Welcome to Joinable page in these docs

Invite by SMS/text message:

  1. The member will receive a message informing them that they have been added to your group. They will not see the welcome message itself, but instead be given a link to "View your welcome message". In order to view this, they can click on the link, at which point they will receive a prompt to download the app (this is not compulsory).
  2. When visiting Joinable, they will be taken through the onboarding process and be required to add an email address.

Invite by postcard

Invite a neighbor you don't know well with a postcard! We'll mail a personalized invitation postcard for free. To send, select "People ", "+ Invite", then scroll to the end of the pop up box and choose "Send Postcards".

Your neighbor will receive a postcard in the mail, explaining what Joinable is, with a QR code and detailed instructions on how to join. Just make sure you have your group set to allow members to self-join.

Leave a group

To remove yourself from a group, click on the “Settings” button beneath your group name, then “Sharing settings”. Scroll down to the bottom of the screen and select “Leave this group”. This action cannot be undone.

Troubleshooting invitations

If your member hasn't received their invitation to join the group, ask them to check their spam and promotions folders. It's also worth double checking you have the correct email address and/or phone number.