Help…Me…Please!

Whoa! Wait!

a “help desk” is a service that provides information and support, especially within a company?

It functions as a resource intended to provide the customer or internal user with information and support related to a company’s processes, products and services. The purpose of a help desk is to provide a centralized resource to answer questions, troubleshoot problems and facilitate solutions to known problems.

Did you also know that there is a variety of Central UA email help desks available to you where you can ask questions, request information, schedule processes, and/or provide input related to your daily job tasks and responsibilities? Here is a rundown on our current Central UA help desks. Note: I will not publish the links on this site, however, links to the help desks are found on the Canopy under the Help! Tab.

ADVHelp (Owner: IT in ITEA)
For assistance with IT (computer, network, hardware, software) problems, services, and/or technology-related issues.

ADVRequest (Owner: SEA in ITEA)
For questions related to ADVANCE access and training, programs (e.g. CDIStributor, Gift Acknowledgements, etc.), online giving page requests, surveys/update forms, standard and ad hoc reporting, and general system related questions, enhancements, process consultation, troubleshooting and support. (My all-time favoriteJ💖!)

ADVResearch (Owner: P2D)
For requests for prospect research (e.g. background information, estimated gift capacity review, philanthropic history, etc.), requests for prospect lists (e.g. donor prospects who appear to have specific funding interests or reside in certain geographic areas), and help with anything related to assigned prospects (including all concerns regarding assignments and proposals).

ADVCGI (Owner: CGI)
For information or questions regarding constituent or gift data. Constituent data includes address, email, phone, employment, name change, marriage, divorce, communication preference, alert, affiliation, etc. Gift information includes at any point in the electronic workflow.

ADVSolicitation (Owner: CGI)
If you have a complex solicitation request, solicitation questions, or proposed materials to submit. The Solicitation Approval Request Form is used for submitting new requests.

ADVAdvancementOutreach (Owner: Strategic Engagement)
For questions and concerns regarding email communication reports and list builds. The Communication List Build / Review Request Form can be found on the Canopy under UA Engagement>Communication Resources>Email Strategy & Guidelines>List Request and Approval Form.

If you have trouble remembering what each help desk is responsible for, you can now hover over the name and the description will appear.

REMEMBER…

UA staff – that you have “at will” access to a plethora of resources. The Canopy may even provide some answers to your questions prior to you needing to use the Help! Tab. Take some time and review what it has to offer. You will be impressed!

Non UA staff – that you, too, have limited access and have probably already received the link to the specific resources within the Canopy that support your job responsibilities. If you need further assistance with access to these specific sites, please contact ADVRequest.

So…no need to pull your hair out!

We got you!!

Janet Meine

WELCOME to the New Bright and Shiny!

Since ending our campaign in June, and with a little over 5 months left in this year – 2020 – Systems Education and Analysis thought a new blog ‘look and feel’ might help us feel refreshed and optimistic for what lies ahead for University Advancement. We asked those of you new to University Advancement to follow this blog as part of your initial ADVANCE training. We utilize the blog format as a micro-learning tool to “push” out system related information to you in “smaller bites” so as not to overwhelm you with a ton of information all in one sitting!

So, welcome to the new and improved ADVANCE Innovations blog!!

We look forward to sharing new and exciting system enhancements, system usage tips and tricks, program best practices, and other related ADVANCE information. You can expect up to 10 posts in a given year.

 

 

 

 

Systems Education and Analysis manages the blog; however, we encourage each one of you to become a ”guest author” of a future blog posting. For example, if you or your team is working on a project that involves the ADVANCE system and/or supporting programs and you wish to share the “who, what, when, where, and why” of your project and how it will affect other users, we encourage you to submit a post.

To request becoming a “guest author” for the ADVANCE Innovations blog, please send an email to ADVRequest@colostate.edu.

We look forward to the time when we can reconnect personally with all of you and hope you are getting your training and information needs met during this difficult time.

Take care…

Janet

“DO YOU WANT TO BE ADDED TO THE SEEDED LIST?”

If you’re utilizing ADVANCE for any communication purposes, you’ve likely heard some form of this question before. More times than not, responses to this question consist of looks of bewilderment – “The what list?”

What exactly is the “seeded” list and what does it do?

The seeded list is simply a list of internal users who have requested to be included on all communications of a certain format (email or mail), type (newsletters, solicitations, invitations) and/or group (college/unit or CSU). Those on the seeded list are seamlessly included on these communication pieces without any additional action taken on behalf of the creator of that message.

Why would anyone want to receive every email or mailing?

“Seed” lists are pretty common in the direct marketing world. One clear benefit is ensuring necessary parties are “in the loop” on all upcoming communications without having to constantly worry about including the right people on the right type of messages. By indicating what YOU would like to receive, this process guarantees you’re aware of activity relative to your role, such as upcoming events, college-specific initiatives, or general news-related updates.  It is also an indirect way of monitoring what your area (or an area that directly impacts your role) is sending throughout the year.  This can help minimize catching others up or having to send out additional copies of communications when referencing them down the line.

Do I need to be on the seeded list to receive my emails?

No. CDIStributor automatically sends a copy of every email to the owner of that email.

Are there any negatives to being on the seeded list?

While it may seem beneficial to see all the communications activity within ADVANCE, there are some potential reasons why this may not be a suitable option for you.

Some things to consider:

• Irrelevant or non-applicable content: Alumni and friends often receive communication pieces based on their affiliation or engagement with the University. We often include merge fields to tailor these messages to reference data specific to the recipient. Since seeded list recipients don’t always have the same affiliation or engagement, that data may not be available to feed the merge fields. This may cause your specific message to present blank or misleading fields where data is not applicable.
• Overrides special handling (mail only): If you are on the seeded list but also have personal special handling on record for that same type of communication, your special handling settings will be disregarded and you will receive this communication, however this pertains to mail only. If you have email suppression’s on record and are on a competing seeded list, you will be removed from the email list. For this reason, it’s always good to confirm your personal special handling rules to confirm there are no conflicts.
• Busy inbox:

…millions of emails were sent via CDIStributor each year? If you’re already having trouble keeping up with your inbox, please consider the impact of receiving additional emails as a seeded list participant.

• Qualification: When receiving additional communications, it’s not always evident what you actually qualify for versus what you receive through the seeded list and there have been many instances where seeded list participants have forgotten that they were on the seeded list. For example, are you actually being invited to a certain event, or is this because of the seeded list (i.e. “Why did I receive this invitation for former CSU athletes when I never participated in CSU sports? The system must be broken?” You may need to reference the mailing log (seeded individuals do not show in email metrics) or reach out to the communicator if there is any confusion.

If there are any concerns about the above considerations, it may be better to reach out to project coordinators or communicators to ask to be included on specific communication pieces.

What seeded lists options do we offer?

We have a variety of seeded list options spanning various colleges/units, as well as some overall options for CSU level communications. Please contact ADV Request if you have specific questions and we can help find the most appropriate list(s) for your needs.

Can I exclude the seeded list from my communication?

Yes!  You can control this setting on your Ad-Hoc report (for mail or email lists) or through CDIStributor. This allows either the person creating the Ad-Hoc to control this option, but may also be decided by the author/content creator at the time the email shell is being created.

• To exclude via your Ad-Hoc report, go to your report Settings → More Settings → Settings – General → Excluded ‘Seeded List’ (select Yes)
  • Note: If you exclude via Ad-Hoc, this setting will freeze in your CDIStributor email builder.
• To exclude via CDIStributor, uncheck the “Include Seeded List” checkbox and click ‘Save’.

How do I know when to exclude the seeded list?

You generally do not have to worry much about excluding the seeded list, as these individuals asked to be included on communications of this type. However, there may be some scenarios that warrant exclusion:

• Multiple Segments
  • Email: If you have multiple email segments with roughly the same message, you can consider excluding the seeded list on all but one of these. However, those on the seeded list may be interested in seeing all versions, so please use your discretion when making this decision.
  • Mail: If you have multiple mail segments being sent, this will generate an additional mail piece for each person on the seeded list. As you can imagine, a mailing with 6 segments would generate a considerable amount of excess mail for each seeded individual. Consider including the seeded list on your largest segment to avoid sending additional mail pieces.
• Reminders or action-oriented messages: If a mail or email initiative also has reminders built in (common with invitations or opt-in pages), you can consider suppressing the seeded list from your 2^nd or 3^rd reminders, or if no new information is being presented.

I want to see everything – how do I get added to the seeded list?

Just email ADV Request and we’ll be happy to discuss your options and add you!

Linda Paule

On the bounce…

we rely on CDIStributor to send millions of emails each year? Last fiscal year alone, over 63,000 emails bounced, meaning the email message could not be delivered. Sometimes it’s simple – the email address doesn’t exist, commonly due to a typo or closed account (as with our students once they graduate). Other times, it may be a temporary issue. So how do we, as an organization, determine the reason for the bounce, and thus decide when this email truly is no longer contactable?

We have determined a point system to help rate the severity of the bounce, thus informing us at what point the email address should be inactivated in our system.  The point allotment is as follows:

• Hard Bounce (3 points): A hard bounce occurs when the message has been rejected because the email address does not exist or is invalid.
• Medium Bounce (2 points): A medium bounce occurs when the mail server cannot be found. This can be a temporary issue with the recipient’s mail server, but sometimes may be the result of a domain that is no longer in existence.
• Soft Bounce (1 point): A soft bounce indicates the email address is valid and reached the mail server, but was unable to reach the email recipient. Common reasons for a soft email bounce include a full mailbox or an inactivated/disabled account.

To minimize the possibility of a temporary issue, only one bounce per week will be added to the point total. Once the email has 5 bounce points, the email is inactivated in Advance. Based on the point system and point threshold for inactivation, it’s helpful to understand that all emails will be attempted at least twice before being marked as inactive.

When an email is inactivated, the system will automatically “promote” the most recently added alternate email address (if available) to become the entity’s preferred email address.

We do not track our bounce points on the profile, but awareness of the underlying process is beneficial as you continue to communicate via CDIStributor.

For questions about email bounces, please contact ADV Request.

Linda Paule

Online Registration Coming Soon!

  that Advance/CDIStiller courses are moving to online registration in MyLearning?  Well hang on… just not quite yet.

So – help us, help you!

To help the Innovative Technology and Education (ITE) team to keep the ball moving towards our launch date (which is soon), you can help us by continuing to submit your Advance access and training requests by the same process as you have used previously – through the Advance Access & Training Request form (located in My Reference of Advance).

Doing so will help our team to be prepared for any learner that registers for training so that they have all of the necessary rights in Advance on the day of their training as granting access takes time and should be done prior to the start of a training.  This will ensure that learners can follow along and have the best learning experience and use of their time as possible.

This is important to know! Once MyLearning registration rolls out for Advance training, we will still require an Advance Access and Training Request form as the first step to registration versus going straight to MyLearning so that we are notified of a registered learner. We want to be prepared and aware for any learner that comes through our door for training and avoid a surprise on the day of training.

As always – if there are any questions about this request, please don’t hesitate to contact ADV Request.

Kate Coskrey

On the Average…

ADVANCE is a powerful tool we use to generate data to analyze our various constituencies, but how are we able to leverage that data to determine averages on a particular data point?

For example, what is the average age of our alumni members? What is the average Engagement Index of recent attendees to an event?  What is the average age of our Computer Science alumni?

…you can use your Statistical Analysis format to help get the answers to these questions? All you need is your Ad-Hoc report and a blank Excel document.

Let’s walk through an example.  Imagine you were recently asked to pull the average Engagement Index (EI) of graduates from a particular department, but this Ad-Hoc report yields a total of over 5,000 alumni! The Statistical Analysis format has the “CSU – Engagement Index” data point, but this simply shows us the number of alumni for each score. So how can we calculate the average based on the way this data is presented?

To calculate the average:

1. Retrieve your report as a Statistical Analysis with “CSU – Engagement Index” selected.
2. Open a blank Excel worksheet.
3. Copy and paste your Statistical Analysis “CSU – Engagement Index” table into Excel and delete the column with percentages in Column C (we will re-purpose this column).
   • Column A will show all the various EI scores for all qualified alumni.
   • Column B will show the number of alumni per score.
4. Now, let’s calculate Column C. In cell C1, multiply A1*B1.

*Try this formula:  =SUM(A1*B1)

5. You can now carry this formula down the remainder of Column C using the cross icon in the lower right corner of that cell:

  (To learn more about this function, click here or search the web for “How to  copy a formula down a column”)

6. You should now have values in column C for all EI scores.
7. Calculate the SUM of Columns B and C (column B is going to be the total number of entities on your report).
8. To determine the average, divide the total of Column C by the total of Column B.

You can now easily see the average Engagement Index for our department graduates is 325.

We can track their EI score at this point in time and use it for comparison purposes in the future to determine exactly how our recent outreach initiatives may have impacted their engagement with CSU.

You easily can apply this process for determining the average age of a population as well.

Linda Paule – Systems Education & Analysis

Alumni Non-Graduates

We are so accustomed to communicating with our alumni, but how do we continue to engage those who may have taken a break from school or discontinued their attendance at CSU?

…these are our alumni “non-grads,” a population we’ve always had the ability to interact with on a broad level, but now have more specific data points in place to allow more targeted reporting of this population in CDIStiller.

You can include alumni non-grads at varying degrees of detail:

• Record type: This includes all alumni non-grads, regardless of where, when or what level they were last enrolled.
• Non-Grad Detail: This variable menu will allow you to report on varying levels of intended degree information, similar to what we have for our graduates (division, major, level, degree type, etc.). The majority of variable options are similar to those in the alumni Degree variable menu, with the exception of:
  • Terminal Date: The end date of an entity’s attendance. Most helpful if used with a range of dates.

Please keep in mind – you must use the Non-Grad Detail specific variables to accurately target this audience, as the general Degree table is limited to alumni only.

If you have any questions or need any assistance using this variable in your reports, please contact ADVRequest@colostate.edu.

Linda Paule

Time for some gift-focused reporting facts and functions!

With the kickoff of 2019 comes an uptick in fundraising initiatives. Whether you’re tracking your success of past years or building an engaged audience for the future, the following tips on giving-related reporting variables may provide clarity surrounding giving criteria to assist in carrying out your plan. These can be applied to either entity or giving based reports depending on your needs.

TRACKING PAST SUCCESS

…you can track your past solicitation project successes through your appeal code? While you can see this automatically calculated for you using tools such as the Mailing Log (for email appeals), you can also pull this information through a giving analysis. To build your Ad-Hoc report, you can select “Giving” from your Grouped Variables menu and enter your appeal code into the Giving – Appeal (Giving) variable. Remember to keep your alpha character capitalized!

REMINDER: Do not confuse this with the Appeal – Appeal Code variable, as this doesn’t look at who gave to an appeal, but rather who was tagged as having received that solicitation piece.

ONGOING PLEDGES

…ongoing pledges have a $0 dollar amount until they are fulfilled?  Keep in mind an ongoing payroll deduction also qualifies as an ongoing pledge. So if you’re trying to view ongoing or payroll deduction donors who may have not made a payment yet, plug “0” into your giving amount field and include pledges to ensure these donors make the list.

(Tip: If you don’t identify a dollar amount in your giving amount fields, it will automatically look for an amount of $.01+)

OTHER PRIVATE SUPPORT (OPS) TRANSACTIONS

…this category previously only captured Office of Sponsored Programs grants, contracts and agreements, but has been re-purposed to also track non-charitable Athletics seating transactions as well. If you’re including these transaction amounts when considering comprehensive giving totals, you’ll need to include these transactions in your reporting. You can tailor which of these are allowed in your reporting via the Giving – Transaction Type variable.

PREVIOUS FISCAL YEAR (TO DATE)

…this indicates a date range in the previous fiscal year up to today’s date in the previous fiscal year. For example, if I were to pull previous fiscal year (to date) on January 30, 2019, it would consider giving between 7/1/2017 – 1/30/2018.  This will not pull giving from the beginning of the last fiscal year through today’s date – that date range would need to be keyed in manually.

GIVING PURPOSE

…you can tailor your giving reports to only look at funds of a specific purpose? This may be useful when trying to isolate the type of giving or donor based on the types of funds they support. For example, you may want to see a list of donors that support scholarship related funds. You can do this by selecting Student Fin Aid/Endowed and/or Student Fin Aid/Operating from the Giving – Purpose field.

RECEIPT DATE VS. PROCESSED DATE

…we track two dates per transaction? The receipt date is the date your gift was received by the Foundation while the processed date is the date it was officially processed and posted in Advance. Generally, you can proceed with receipt date, however, for more time sensitive things dependent upon the date of processing (such as Acknowledgments or tracking transactions as they are posted in the system), processed date may be a more useful data point.

Whether you’re trying these ideas out for the first time or just want a second pair of eyes on your reports to confirm your approach was correct, we at ADV Request are here to help!  To set up a quick training session or for more information, please contact adv_request@mail.colostate.edu.

Author: Linda Paule

I Never Knew That! Or…Did I?

…that a large reason we forget information is because in our everyday lives, we focus on understanding the world, not remembering it. What threatens our efforts as educators is that on average, about 80% of the information received in any given day is forgotten. YIKES!

Let us break it down for you…

We learn

• 10% What we READ
• 20% What we HEAR
• 30% What we SEE
• 50% What we SEE and HEAR
• 70% What we DISCUSSED with OTHERS
• 80% What we EXPERIENCED PERSONALLY
• 95% What we TEACH TO SOMEONE ELSE

 

Then, throw in various individual learning styles and learning becomes much more complex. Customer Support and Training (CST) would like to use this opportunity to give you a short (well…ok…long list) of DON’T FORGET items as they relate to ADVANCE and supporting programs. A CHEAT SHEET if you will.

 

Don’t forget….

• to include ‘Lost’ record statuses when building your email reports. While we may not have a physical address for these individuals, we may have their email address on record;
• that setting a report to run daily does not prevent your report from archiving if you are not viewing the output of that report within your archive period;
• to pass along or add to the system valuable contact information for your relationships with people within organizations and corporations – this affects things like mail file salutations and mailing labels. Without an organizational contact on file, these will be generically addressed to “Friend of Colorado State University” and often wind up in the wrong hands (or no hands at all);
• to add Preferred Names for our loyal donors if you know they like to be referred to as something other than their formal first name;
• to check the ADV Scheduler before planning your communication around a certain date – it may already be taken;
• to check for overlap across email segments;
• to spot-check your list after creating, whether you built it or someone else did. It’s always good to affirm the audience in your results is the audience you were targeting. The statistical analysis report is a great tool for this!
• to request an appeal code when planning any type of solicitation;
• to check the success of your email initiatives by utilizing the Mailing Log;
• to plan ahead on your reporting needs;
• that CST is happy to review your reports for accuracy;
• to watch (and watch again) training videos – the adult short-term memory can only remember about 7 items! The more your practice, the more you retain!
• that “Send as Soon as Approved” is only for emergency situations and to always give Betty Grace three business days;
• to partner with Alumni Relations to avoid duplicated communication efforts;
• to check CSU’s common style errors. One would think being an institute of higher education we’d follow APA, Chicago, or MLA – but we’re unique, and we have our very own CSU style. Get to know it!
• to always Email ADV Request before emailing kylan, Janet, Linda or Shay directly! We promise we will get to you as soon as possible, and emailing the queue will ensure the most appropriate person can answer your question in the quickest timeframe;
• to schedule training more than 1 week in advance – we are now on a blocked schedule and are booking out 2 weeks in advance.

We understand that just by reading these you are looking at a 10% retention.  However, if you practice, discuss with others, and help teach your colleagues, you can learn up to 95% of this material. CST is happy to help you to raise that percentage in any way we can by utilizing additional methods. After all…DON’T FORGET that we are here for you!

And we thought just remembering passwords was difficult!!