To create a new Instant Notification, go to Settings > Data Services > Instant Notifications, then press the green button titled "New Instant Notification" at the top-right corner of the screen.


Notification Details

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Name & Description

These fields are descriptive fields only seen in the admin dashboard. Choose solid, descriptive names so it's easier to track individuals notifications over time.


Enabled

You can optionally set a notification as disabled for when you want to save the notification in GivingFire without triggering it.


Type

Choose your type of notification here - this controls what GivingFire will do when this notification is triggered.

  • Webhook/HTTP POST: We will post details about the event to the provided URL. For example, you can use this to send notifications to Zapier. GivingFire will POST a JSON string of the triggered record according to our v1 JSON API. 
  • Email: We will post details about the event to a specific email. You can customize the message using the template.
  • SMS/text message: We will post details about the event to a specific phone number. You can customize the message using the template.

If the Instant Notification is sent by text or by email, you should customize the specific message we send. You're able to include custom fields to display useful information on each message - click the "Insert dynamic data to messages sent" link to view a list of available custom fields. Different fields are available for different triggers, and the system will replace the custom fields with actual data. For example, the message "{{first_name}} {{last_name}} has just given for the first time! Send them a thank-you note at {{email}}." will be sent as "John Doe has just given for the first time! Send them a thank-you note at john@example.com."



Trigger Event

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The trigger event is the action on GivingFire that prompts the notification. There are four categories of triggers, and each category can be selected based on whether the record is new (ex., a donor giving for the first time) or updated (ex., a donor updating their address). The four types of data categories for webhooks are:


  • Donor: the user records for people who have given to your organization, both online and offline.
  • Donation: the gift details set up by the donor. This is different than transaction records - a donation indicates what the donor intends to give, and the transaction is the actual financial exchange that takes place. For example, if a donor sets up a recurring monthly donation, then that represents a single donation, while the individual monthly gifts are the transactions that make up the parent donation. For this reason, we suggest using Donation for recurring-based notifications (when a new recurring transaction is set up or modified) and using Transaction for most everything else.
  • Transaction: The actual financial exchange. This is the best option for tracking individual transactions for financial purposes.
  • Pledge: The annually-tracked donation promises made by individual donors


Triggers can be further customized by our Query Builder for additional control. For example, the above screenshot will trigger a notification for "Any new recurring donation to the Benevolence Fund" instead of the default "Any new donation". Customization options vary by trigger event. 


AND/OR options give you the ability to combine two or more conditional triggers. For example, let's say you've added "Fund in Benevolence Fund" and "Fund in Missions Fund" as the two conditions under a Create Donation trigger. If AND is selected, both conditions must be true to send a message: a donation must give to both the Benevolence and Mission funds to trigger the webhook. If OR is selected, either fund (or both) would work to trigger the webhook.


Conditional groups can be further combine conditional statements. For example, you could create two groups of two conditionals each: a New Donation webhook that triggers if the donation is in the Benevolence Fund AND at least $1000, OR if the donation is in the Missions Fund AND at least $500. That's two groups of AND conditions, separated by an OR. Even more customizations are possible - take a look at the system and try a few test triggers to see what you come up with!