When creating or editing a discussion post, you can flag it as an announcement. Doing so causes it to be "pinned" to the top of all discussions in the Category (and even on the Recent Discussions page, if desired).
📝 NOTE: Newer announcements will display above older announcements.
What they look like
As shown below, an announcement is indicated by the Announcement icon below the discussion title.
How they're used
Most communities contain important information they don't want to become overlooked or buried as more and more discussions are posted. Flagging specific discussions as Announcements ensures this doesn't happen.
Typical use-cases include:
- Welcome posts
- Community rules/guidelines
Manage announcements
📝 NOTE: By default, only admins and moderators can flag a discussion as an announcement. However, this permission can be given to any Role. Learn more about this in the Who can make an announcement? section below.
Make an announcement
There are two ways to flag a discussion as an announcement:
- When creating a discussion - Select one of the radio buttons shown below to either limit the announcement to just the Category or also include it on the Recent Discussions page.
- Edit an existing discussion via its (...) menu - Select Announce to display a dialog where you can select the same options shown above.
Remove an announcement
- Click a discussion's (...) menu and select Announce.
- In the dialog, select Don’t announce.
- Click OK to apply the change.
Dismiss announcements
All users can dismiss announcements from their own personal view, but only after they have read it (this action is unique to each user and does not affect what other users see).
While announcements are important, many users may want to dismiss them from view after reading them to make it easier to see other discussion content. To do so:
- Click the discussion's (...) menu and select Dismiss. No confirmation is provided; this action is immediate.
✔️ TIP: Once dismissed, announcements are not gone forever: they can be brought back by clearing your cookies or clearing your browser cache.
Communication is key, but don't overdo it
While announcements and other messages are an easy and effective way to share critical information with your community, you can also just as easily frustrate your members by sharing too much at one time.
- You should regularly review your announcements and keep only the most recent and important ones. Consider the poor user experience of having user content buried by an entire first page of official announcements.
- As your community grows and matures, you should also regularly keep these announcements up to date.
Who can make an announcement?
All Roles with the Default Category Permissions > Discussions > Announce permission.
✔️ TIP: This can also be controlled on a per-category basis by enabling the this category has custom permissions option for a Category.
Check out the following article to learn more about Roles & Permissions, and how to access and manage them.
Advanced settings
- If you would like to change the verbiage from "Announcement" (see below) to something else, contact your CSM or Vanilla support.
- Announcements also have their own CSS class, and can be custom-styled to help them standout or align with your community branding.
Additional resources
Click the link below to access a video expanding on what you learned in this article.
