BigTent Blog | Product updates and news for groups

Enhancement: More event start & end time options!

Great news! We’ve added additional time options to events. You can now set your events to start or end in 5 minute increments.

This is particularly helpful for school groups, who frequently meet 5 or 10 minutes after the hour or half-hour. Learn more about creating group events here.

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Member Tip: How to find your group’s forum email address

To find your group’s forum email address just follow these quick steps:

1. Sign in to BigTent: www.bigtent.com

2. Go to my groups > [your group] > forums and click on “Email a topic.”

3. Your group’s forum email address will display in the pop-up window. Add the address to your email contacts.

Now that you have the forum email, just send your message to that address and it will post to your group’s forum. Just remember to send the message from the email that you use to sign in to BigTent.

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How-to Video: Sending attachments on BigTent

Learn how to send attachments on BigTent in this quick tutorial video. Just click on the image below to watch:

We love to hear from you so please let us know if you have any questions or feedback by leaving us a comment!

Best,
The BigTent Team

Admin Tip: How to find event payment details

If you’ve used the event payment feature then you may have wondered where to find the event transaction details. Read on to find out where to look:

1. Go to manage > manage accounting > transactions.

* You’ll land on the overview tab, where you can view the total event fees you’ve collected in the time period selected.

2. Click the on “event fees” tab and then click on the name of the event to view its transaction details. If you don’t see your event then use the date range to query the date of the event.

3. Click on an order number to view the details of that particular transaction.

That’s it! Please let us know if you have any questions by leaving us a comment.

Cheers,
The BigTent Team

We’re excited to introduce to you our next group highlight, Laguna Beach Parents Club!

We recently spoke with Board of Directors member, Jill Espinola, about her group and how they have been using BigTent. Here are some great answers that Jill shared with us:

Q: Can you tell us about your group and how they started?

A: The LBPC was started in November of 2005 with around 50 family members. We now have 275 active families and hope to reach 325 this year.  The Club founders wanted to create a group open to all families, including same-gender couples, single-parent families, expectant parents, foster parents or other care takers responsible for children — anyone who found themselves in a parenting role would be welcome.

Q. Why did your group choose to use BigTent?

A. We needed to automate as much of our administrative processes as possible.  BigTent’s member database, reporting, payment processing and automatic renewals did this for us.  We also needed a better way to calendar and RSVP to our events.  Lastly, we needed flexibility in how our members received communications from us.  BigTent’s ability for members to control their email preferences was ideal.

Q. What is your favorite feature on BigTent?

A. My role with our Club is an administrative one.  So, I’d have to say, one of my favorite features is the member database.  Before BigTent, we maintained our club roster by hand using a spreadsheet.  It was painful to keep all of our member information up to date.  Now, everything is automated and our members are held responsible for keeping their own information current.  Love it!

Q. What goals does the LBPC have for its future?

A. We hope to expand our membership significantly in the next few years.  With the beach as our backyard and a distinguished public education system, more and more families are flocking to Laguna.  It is a wonderful place to raise children.  Our Club is working to become an integral part of the Laguna Beach community.  We continue to work with city leadership to increase the number of family focused activities and to make our city safe, welcoming and fun for children of all ages.

Q. When your not busy with your group, what are you up to?

A: We are at the beach of course!  Living in sunny southern California allows us to be outside year round!  My family loves exploring our miles of hiking trails, spending time at the park and enjoying time with friends!

Thank you to Jill and the Laguna Beach Parents Club for sharing their story with us!

Cheers,
The BigTent Team

P.S. Do you have a great group on BigTent? Tell us about it by emailing rosa @ bigtent.com

Have you recently moved and need to just update your street address with your BigTent group? If so, changing your address is simple, just follow these steps :

• Go to my bigtent > settings > contact info.

• Go to the “Addresses” section and click “Add a new address.”

• Once you’ve added a new address, click “set primary” in the box of the address you’d like to make your primary address.

• You can choose to remove your old address from your account.

One thing to note is that in order to change any part of your address you’ll need to add your address again and delete your old one.

Please let us know if you have any questions by leaving us a comment!

Cheers,
The BigTent Team

We’re excited to bring you our first installment in a new series where we highlight our inspiring and diverse BigTent groups. Our first feature is a new group to BigTent, Highlands Mommies.

Highlands Mommies was recently in the news for their courageous efforts to face crime in their Denver, Colorado community.

It all started when members began reporting in the forums that their homes had been burglarized. The reports of burglaries became so frequent that group leaders raised this issue to members and asked how they could organize to make their community safer. To find out what they did, watch this short video clip of group leaders Elina Martinez and Laverne Hay, on a Colorado morning show:

We spoke with the Highlands Mommies group leaders to learn more about how they use BigTent, and their group’s hopes for the future:

Q: How do you use BigTent to organize your group?

A: We use the subgroups a lot! For us, that is where most of the activity happens. We’ve created subgroups based on shared interest or needs. This eliminates the problem of the main forum getting filled with questions/comments that only a small group would find useful.

Q: What is your favorite BigTent feature and why?

A: We love the News feature, and the fact that hot topics are kept front and center on the Buzz page. We also adore the forums. At our old site we would not have any way to keep the conversation all in one place, so it can be referenced later.

Q: What changes have you seen since you organized the Town Hall meeting?

A: We’ve had local newspapers write articles echoing what was said at the Town Hall and from the officers. All this resulted in more citizen calls to our officers reporting suspicious activity, which enabled our officers to move faster, find suspects in question and run their information through their database (in many cases they had outstanding warrants and were arrested). Our group is also starting to get recognized for its strength and diversity.

Q: What goals does your group have for the future?

A: We have several big initiatives this year: (1) Work with our law enforcement to make our community safer (2) Work with the schools within our boundaries to help them in any way they need help (3) Attract more members who can help us grow our amazing community.

Q: Is there anything else you would like to share with us?

A: Overall, we love the move to BigTent, our members have had 95% positive reviews so thank you!

Pictured above are Highlands Mommies Group Leaders Elina Martinez, Laverne Hay & Elizabeth Martinez (L to R).

Thank you to Highlands Mommies for sharing their amazing story with us! Be on the look out for more BigTent group highlights!

Cheers,
The BigTent Team

P.S. Do you have a great group on BigTent? Tell us about it by emailing rosa @ bigtent.com.

You can easily send a private message on BigTent to a fellow group member by following these quick steps:

1. Go to my bigtent > tentmail.
2. Click the “Write TentMail” link and scroll to the bottom of the page.

3. In the “To” field type the name or email of the member you want to message. An auto suggest list will appear with members who match your entry. Select your recipient from the list.
4. Enter a subject, write your message and click “Send.” That’s it!

To send a TentMail to more than one member, place a comma after each recipient in the “To” field.

Please let us know if you have any question about TentMail, or any BigTent feature for that matter, by leaving us a comment!

Cheers,
The BigTent Team

Did you know there is a group 1000 members strong that is full of BigTent group leaders who are there to support and learn from each other?

Well there is, and you should join it today! It’s called BigTent Group Administrators (BTGA) and you can register for FREE from here:

https://www.bigtent.com/groups/btga

Now, a little background: BTGA is a BigTent group run for BigTent group leaders moderated by BigTent group leaders. It’s a vibrant group where all are welcome to ask questions and give advice on topics ranging from:

- How-to question about the site
- Feature work arounds
- Ideas on increasing member participation
- Best practices on running volunteer powered groups

Let us know how you’ve benefited from BTGA by leaving us a comment. We’ll send the most compelling commenter a Starbucks gift card!

Cheers,
The BigTent Team

Group payment reminder – Jan. 31 deadline

If you process payments through BigTent please remember to add your group’s bank info on the manage > manage accounting > settings page so we can direct deposit your funds come February.

You must enter your bank info by Jan. 31, otherwise we can’t wire your payments until you submit that info, and even then we can’t send it until the next disbursement, which is March.

So long story short, don’t slack on this! Enter your bank info today!

Learn more about why we switched to direct deposit here.

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New advertisement location

As you’ve probably noticed, we moved the banner ad that was sometimes placed under your group, to the very top of BigTent pages.

We made this move so there is a clear delineation between your group content and the advertisements on our site. We hope this change helps your members concentrate on your important group content. Thank you to everyone who submitted feedback about this!

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Member tip: How to change your email settings

Watch this quick video to learn how to change your BigTent email options in a few simple steps:

We love to hear from you so please let us know if you have any questions or feedback by leaving us a comment!

Cheers,
The BigTent Team