Connect lets you choose which groups you follow and which groups may email or write to you. This article shows how to make those choices, and explains which emails Connect sends and why.
These steps use the word "tap". On a computer, click instead.
In this article
- Follow a group
- Stop following a group
- Choose email and postal mail for each group
- Which emails you receive
- Your Weekly Member Update
- Turn off email with the Unsubscribe link
- Messages you always get
Follow a group
Follow a group to see its news and events in Connect when you aren't a current member of it. You might follow a neighboring local group (the individual unit of your organization, such as a chapter or club), or the district or region above yours.
Following does three things:
- The group's news appears in My Feed.
- The group's events appear in My Calendar.
- The group appears under My Groups in the menu.
You see only the news and events you're allowed to see. To learn why something may be hidden, see Use Your Group's Page. Following does not send you email.
You need to be logged in to follow a group.
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Open the group's page. To find a group, see Find Your Way Around Connect.
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Near the top of the page, find the Follow button.
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Tap Follow. The button changes to Stop Following.
If you don't see this
You don't see Follow when you're logged out. You also don't see it for a group you're a current member of. That page has a Preferences card instead, described in Choose email and postal mail for each group. If neither applies, ask your secretary.
Stop following a group
If you follow a group but aren't a current member of it, use these steps.
On a phone:
- Tap the menu icon (three short lines) at the top of the screen.
- Under My Groups, tap the group.
- Tap Stop Following.
On a computer:
- In the menu on the left, click the group under My Groups.
- Click Stop Following.
The group's news and events leave My Feed and My Calendar, and the group leaves My Groups. You can follow it again at any time.
If you are a current member of the group, there is no Stop Following button. Turn off the Follow switch instead, as described in Choose email and postal mail for each group. The group's news and events then leave My Feed and My Calendar. The group stays in your menu, and you still get its emails while Allow Email is on.
Choose email and postal mail for each group
Each group you belong to or follow has its own set of switches. You can change them one group at a time.
| Switch | What it does |
|---|---|
| Follow | Shows the group's news in My Feed and its events in My Calendar. |
| Allow Email | Lets the group email you. See Which emails you receive. |
| Allow Postal Mail | Lets the group include you when it prints mailing labels for postal mail. |
Your list includes your local group. It can also include groups above it, such as a district, region or parent group, and any group you follow. A group appears only if it has a page in Connect. For groups you belong to, all three switches start on.
You can change Allow Email and Allow Postal Mail only for groups you're a current member of. For a group you only follow, those two switches are grayed out.
Each change saves as soon as you tap a switch. There is no Save button. A short message, "Contact preferences for" followed by the group's name and "have been saved", confirms it. Turning a switch off does not change your membership, and you can turn it back on at any time.
To change your switches:
On a phone:
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Tap the menu icon (three short lines) at the top of the screen.
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Under My links, tap My Profile.
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Scroll down to My Group Preferences.
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Tap a group's name to open its switches.
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Tap a switch to turn it on or off.
On a computer:
- In the menu on the left, click My Profile.
- Scroll down to My Group Preferences.
- Find the group's row. Its switches are in the same row.
- Click a switch to turn it on or off.
If your computer window is narrow, the card looks like the phone list. Click a group's name to open its switches.
If you are a current member of a group, its own page also has a Preferences card with the same three switches. Scroll down the group's page to find it.
If you don't see this
If a group you belong to is missing from My Group Preferences, or you can't change Allow Email for it, ask your secretary. They can check that your membership is current.
Which emails you receive
News emails, event emails and emails from your officers all follow one rule. A group emails you only when you are a current member of it, Allow Email is on for that group, and Connect has an email address for you.
News post emails
The subject is the title of the post. The email shows the start of the post and a View the whole news post button. Your group's organizers choose whether to email a post when they publish it, so not every post arrives by email. Editing a post later does not send it again.
Event emails
The subject begins with Invitation:, Reminder:, Canceled: or Back On:, followed by the event's name. Your group's organizers send these themselves. A reminder goes to everyone who hasn't answered Can't Go, not only to people who are going. If you answered Can't Go, you don't get event emails for that event. To learn more about events, see Events: See, RSVP, and Pay.
Emails from your officers
Officers can email their members directly. These emails skip you when Allow Email is off, unless the officer sends the message as a service message. See Messages you always get.
Changing what you receive
News, event and officer emails end with the words "Want to change what you receive?" and a link, Log in to manage your preferences. The link opens Connect. It does not change anything by itself. Log in, then follow the steps in Choose email and postal mail for each group.
Your Weekly Member Update
Your Weekly Member Update is an email Connect sends on its own. It doesn't come from one group's organizers. You don't need a Connect account to get it.
It has up to three parts. Each part appears only when it applies to you.
| Part | What it shows |
|---|---|
| Dues Information | Dues you owe, with a Pay My Dues or View My Dues button for each local group. The email says it is not an official dues notice. Your local group's secretary decides whether dues appear here. |
| Your RSVPs | Events in the next four weeks that you're going to, each with an Update your RSVP link. |
| Upcoming Events | The next event for each of your groups, with a count of how many more that group is hosting. A See All Upcoming Events button follows. |
When your local group takes online payments, the button is Pay My Dues. To learn how to pay, see Pay Your Dues or Make a Donation. If you don't have an account yet, the email also has a Sign Up Today button. To create one, see Create Your Groupable Account.
Connect sends the email at most once a week. You can't choose the day, and other members of your local group may get theirs on a different day.
You receive it only when all of these are true:
- You are a current member of at least one group that has Allow Email turned on for you.
- That group's secretary has not turned the weekly update off for the group.
- Connect has an email address for you. To check yours, look at the Contact Info card on My Profile. To change it, see Your Profile and Privacy.
- There is something to show: dues, or an event in the next four weeks.
If you don't see this
If all of those are true and you still don't get it, check your spam folder. Then ask your secretary.
Turn off email with the Unsubscribe link
The weekly update ends with the words "Don't like these emails?" and an Unsubscribe link. It is the only Connect email with this link. The link opens the Email Subscriptions page. You don't need to log in. The link works for three months after the email is sent. A newer email has a newer link.
- Open Your Weekly Member Update email.
- Scroll to the bottom and tap Unsubscribe.
- On the Email Subscriptions page, find the group you want to hear less from.
- On a phone, tap the group's name to open it. On a computer with a wide screen, the groups are rows in a table.
- Turn off Allow Email. On a computer, the switch is in the Allow Email column.
If you aren't logged in, the page shows a partly hidden version of your email address so you can check it's yours.
This is the same Allow Email switch as on My Profile. Turning it off for a group stops that group's news, event and officer emails. The weekly update stops when Allow Email is off for all your groups. Messages you always get still reach you.
If the page says "This link has expired", Connect opens its home page instead. Log in and use the steps in Choose email and postal mail for each group. If Connect says "We can't find a valid email address on file", ask your secretary to check the email address on your record.
Messages you always get
Turning off Allow Email or Allow Postal Mail does not stop service messages. The Preferences card on a group's page says: "Disabling communications does not apply to transactional communications, such as dues notices, account management, and organizational status notices."
In plain words, these are messages about your membership or your account, not general news. A dues notice or a receipt from your secretary is one example. An officer can also send a message to members as a service message, and it reaches you even when your switches are off.
You can recognize these emails by the line at the bottom: "This is a service message from" your organization "about your account. You're receiving it because it relates to your membership."
If a message you want to stop is a service message, contact your secretary.