Broadcast to Students & Guardians

Communicate with students and guardians using email, SMS, and inbox.

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Written by Client Solutions Center
Updated over a week ago

Table of Content


The Broadcast function allows you to easily send out messages to your students and their guardians through their Cialfo Inbox, Email or SMS.

Finding Broadcast

To begin, head to "More" at the side menu and click on Broadcast.

Upon accessing Broadcast, you will find 3 sections:

  1. Drafts - These are Broadcasts you haven't sent yet. If you aren't ready to send a broadcast, this is where you can find the Broadcasts you have started drafting.

  2. Scheduled & Sending - Broadcasts that you've scheduled to be sent in the future as well as Broadcasts that are still in the process of being sent are found here.

  3. Completed - all successfully sent Broadcasts will be found here.


How to Create a new Broadcast

(1) Create Broadcast

Click the 'Create Broadcast' button found on the top left corner and a sidebar will appear. Here you can draft a message and customize how your message will be sent, who it will be sent to and when it will be sent.

Import Broadcast - If you or another counselor have created a Broadcast previously, you can easily select it here to use as a template! This will include the filters you've chosen to send to your targeted audience.

You can choose between 3 types of messages to send out - Cialfo Inbox, Email and SMS. Each method has its own specifications:

  1. Inbox messages - Delivered directly to the student's inbox in Cialfo. Do note that Inbox does not allow for attachments.

  2. Email - Contains a separate field for Subject & Title and the Message.
    It supports Rich Text Format and uploading of attachments. Do note that messages will go directly to the recipients' registered email in their profile.

  3. SMS - Allows a message to be sent only if there is a registered mobile number in the recipients' account. Do note that messages are in plain text with a limit of 160 characters for both the subject and message.

(2) Choose your Recipients

After drafting a message, scroll down to choose the audience you want to send your Broadcast to. Please note that depending on which audience you select under the "Send To" portion, some options may be limited.

Note: if you'd like to receive the Broadcast you're sending out, or send the Broadcast to the student's counselors, be sure to check the tick box called "Include recipient's Counselors".

Once you select your targeted audience, choose the relevant filters to further focus your recipients. For example, you want to send the Broadcast to students only from Graduation year 2020. You can select the "Graduation Year" filter and your message will be sent only to those students.

Alternatively, if you would like to manually add recipients that are not part of the filter or group you selected, you can click the 'Add Recipient' option and input their email address from there.

(3) Send your Broadcasts

The final step is to either send the Broadcast right away or schedule it for a later date.

  1. Sending now - Selecting the 'Send Broadcast Now' option will send the broadcast immediately once you hit send.

  2. Scheduling a broadcast

Selecting 'Schedule Broadcast' will open up a date & time and a time zone selector. The date and time you choose will be according to the time zone you selected.

Once this is done, click 'Preview Broadcast' at the top right corner to proceed.

Previewing and Sending your Broadcast

Before sending a Broadcast, preview it first to check if all the details are correct and you have chosen the audience appropriately.

Remove recipient from sending list

If you spot a recipient that you would want to exclude from the sending list, you can tick the box next to 'Block'.
Enabling the 'View Blocked' checkbox will let you see recipients that you have blocked, allowing you to unblock them.

Editing the broadcast

If you see a mistake and would like to edit, click on the 'Edit Broadcast' button located near the top right. This will bring you back to the previous page.

Saving it as a draft

Clicking the 'Copy' button at the top right corner will immediately create a copy of the current broadcast. This will allow you to save it as a draft for your next use if you wish. Note that the Subject/Title of your Broadcast will have "(copy)" at the end.

Archive broadcast

If you believe this message is no longer needed, you can click the 'Archived' button to hide the broadcast from view.

All done and dusted?

Once you have double-checked all the details, you're ready to send!

Simply click on the 'Send Broadcast' button and you're done.

Delivery Tracking

You can also track whether or not your audience has read your Broadcast on the homepage of Broadcast.

Select the Broadcast under the 'Completed/ section and it will show you whether your audience has received, read, or clicked a link from within your broadcast.

You will also be able to see which counselor has sent which Broadcast! This makes it easy for you to track who's sent which Broadcast and which recipients have received it.

Removing Broadcasts

If you no longer think your Broadcast is relevant, or you want to cancel the sending of a scheduled Broadcast, you can always archive it!

  1. Select the Broadcast you want to Archive

  2. Find the "Archived" button at the top right corner and click it

If you want to find the Broadcasts you have archived, you may select the "View Archived Button" found next to Create Broadcast:

Note: You can archive a Broadcast that you have scheduled to be sent in the future.

Once you have sent out a Broadcast, you cannot stop the sending, so please be double-check before pressing 'Send'.

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