Reach Now is a versatile communications tool that can help you to manage and improve communication with your community.

Reach Now uses internal messages in your Reach portal and push communications for integrations to the Reach mobile app. It provides three methods of communication that can be used to engage your audience:

1. DM (Direct Messages)
   
2. 
   
   Rooms (Chat Rooms)
   
3. Boards (Noticeboards)
   
   
   

Access Reach Now from your Reach web portal through Communications Menu or the double speech bubble in the top menu bar.  You can access Reach now from the Reach Student Life Management App by scrolling down to the Communications tile on the app's home screen or by selecting the speech bubble in the top right of your app's screen.

Reach Now is an extension module that needs to be enabled for your school's portal and infinity permission settings must be enabled for users to have access to Reach Now.  Contact your school's Reach Administrator to find out if Reach Now is available for you to use.  Reach Administrators can contact support@reach.cloud to inquire about enabling Reach Now on your school's portal.

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1. Direct Messaging (DM)

DM allow staff to have one-on-one conversations in real time with any contact in your Reach portal.

Important features of DM:

●      DM is restricted to staff type users connecting with other contacts in your Reach community

●      Parent-to-parent, student-to-student, parent-to-student, for example are not possible in Reach Now

●      All DM conversations are logged in Reach and can be reported historically.  There are no silent conversations in Reach: Now

●      DM records are maintained on individual user profiles

2. Rooms (Chat Rooms)

Rooms are open communication channels that allow staff users in your community to communicate by viewing and adding content. The room is a positing board where participants can view comments from other participants and add comments themselves.

Important features of Rooms:

●      You can have an unlimited number of rooms

●      Rooms are only open to staff type users in your Reach community - no student/parent communication

●      You can determine who is permitted to join each room to view content

●      You can determine who is permitted to contribute content to each room

●      Room comments are retained in Reach for historic reporting

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  3. NoticeBoards (Boards)

Boards function as announcements. They provide a platform for one-way communications to your community. 

Important features of Boards:

●      You can have an unlimited number of boards

●      Boards can be open to all user types in your Reach community

●      Your audience cannot reply to items that are published in your boards

●      Users subscribe to boards on their Reach login or mobile app

●      Subscribers will receive a notification alert whenever information is published to a board to which they subscribe

●      You can determine who is permitted to see and subscribe to each board