Webinar recording now available.

Editorial masterclass for BLOX CMS

At our November customer webinar, Christine Masters, Director of BLOX CMS for TownNews, gave a masterclass to highlight some advanced, and sometimes overlooked, editorial functionality within BLOX CMS.

Topics included:

• Using BLOX Notifier to keep readers in the loop and drive social media traffic.
• Enriching your stories with multimedia content using the drag-and-drop Article Designer.
• Customizing your site with expert block management tricks—from permissions to scheduling, and beyond.
• Writing headlines to improve SEO.
• . . . and much more!

Ready to get started? Watch it now.

Does anyone know how to export the custom fields that we are adding when our users register. I see the data on the Custom tab of the users' accounts, but when I export the users to a csv file the only fields that are exported are

There's nothing in the TN documentation about this. The documentation tells you how to add a custom field to the registration form, but it's not much good if we can't export that information.

I'm trying to link a banner advertisement to initiate a phone call. Normally that would be done by using tel:xxx-xxx-xxxx in an HREF. I try to put it into the Link URL: section, but it converts it to tel://xxx-xxx-xxxx which does not work.

Is there a way to do that?

We keep getting the runaround from FB/Town News but we have no idea how or where to add additional moderators to the Facebook comment plugin on our news website. Anyone have any ideas on how to do this? The person who set up the integration left and we haven't been able to figure out how to actually delete spam comments from news stories. When we asked Facebook, they gave us script that Town News said it doesn't have in the system. 

Right now it keeps telling me  'BLOX CMS admin is currently unavailable' ... Of course, the person I am adding needs admin privileges ... IS this something related to the recent password update and is there an ETA for when this might be fixed?

Hey all, I'm thinking we could really benefit from a few new options with polls. Some details:

1. It'd be really nice to be able to put an end date on a poll. It just seems like a basic functionality, and I know several people up-voted the idea before: https://help.bloxcms.com/knowledge-base/applications/settings/urls/custom_properties/article_5fd6d870-2bdc-11e5-93e5-034d9f275a7e.html

2. Can we have the option to NOT show results (and maybe show a field after someone votes — "Check back Aug. 8 to see the winner."). That'd allow for us to do some really cool stuff that's not currently allowed. You could have votes for an athlete of the week, person of the year, etc. and not risk people not voting because someone is out to a 2-to-1 lead early, etc.

We've got a payment form set up on our site. The marketing team wants weekly spreadsheet emailed with info from that week's submissions. Is that possible?

When using the "Hammer" headline in an article, is there a way to turn off the title?

Anyone have any experience integrating Infolinks as a programmatic provider. Or any opinions on Infolinks as to value, user experience. Am looking into using them to augment our AdSense for remnant ads

At our September customer webinar, Christine Masters, director of BLOX CMS, shared expert tips and tricks for using our industry-leading tools and tech to win on election night ‘20.

Topics included:

• Easily updating tabular data throughout election night.
• Displaying interactive maps and graphs with embeddable widgets.
• Using TownNews Content Exchange articles, images, and videos to supplement your homegrown election coverage.
• Keeping your visitors engaged with push notifications—even when they aren’t on your site.
• Showcasing fast-changing news and data with Update blocks.
• . . . and much more!

Ready to get started? Watch it now.

Wondering if there is a way to tag people/businesses in Facebook posts from the Notifier?

1. What problem(s) does this idea solve? Why do you need this idea implemented? 
We regularly post things for our advertisers and they like it when we tag them in it. With the app now we are having to post individually to Instagram, Facebook, Twitter etc... and the notifier (especially for stories that are under the calendar or classified sections that don't auto-feed into the notifier) Being able to post to all of these outlets in one spot saves a lot of time. But at the moment we cannot tag the people or businesses our stories are about from notifier. 

2. How often would you use this feature? We would use the feature 3-10 times a day.

3. How many people in your organization would use this feature? Three of us that do social media would use the feature. 

There should be reporting options for Upsell Manager. 

Right now, BLOX has stock reports for 

-Orders by category through Ad-Owl

-Transactions and Revenue through Forms 

-Subscription revenue by service 

-CPM reports from Ad Manager

Yet there is not a way to set up or see a report of Upsells. 

Background:

We have a number of upsell packages that users can buy. Some are standard on BLOX, like highlighted "news" releases and "Enhanced" business listings. Others are custom for our audience, like a Calendar option to buy a spot on a daily briefing podcast. Upsells are great for us. They're user-friendly and drive passive, engaging revenue. 

Problem:

There is not an efficient way to appropriately allocate revenue. 

Example: 

A pr firm contributes a press release and buys a $60 upsell to feature it for a day. Our Accounting Manager gets an email notification from BLOX and sees $60 deposited in PayPal. A similar process would happen for every other Upsell. At the end of the week, they have to use some combination of PayPal, Outlook and Upsell Manager in order to allocate the revenue appropriately. 

With reporting options similar to, say, Forms' Top Products, our Accounting Manager could receive a weekly report of Upsell Revenue by Type. Then they could consolidate bookkeeping based on which packages were purchased. 

Problem: 

There is not an efficient way for leads to be identified. 

Example: 

a local physical therapist buys a listing on the daily Health newsletter every Friday for a month. Our Sales Manager would have to recognize the pattern based on the newsletters or irregular email notifications.  

With reporting options similar to, say, Editorial's Published, our Sales Manager could receive a monthly report of (newsletter) Upsells by Business. Then they could assign a rep to call that physical therapist and pitch them a contract that includes the daily Health newsletter. 

Reporting options would also make it much easier to identify and react to trends. Example: We could see that venues have begun opening up if music-related upsells become more frequent. That would tell us to promote the Arts section more or test additional Calendar upsell options. 

Would upsell reporting help anyone else? 

The latest Flex release said: "We are adding a new "admin link" to login screens which will be used by TownNews staff only."
So now, when users go to log in, they see an Admin login link ... thinking maybe that's where the log in to administer their account (change passwords, billing, etc.). When they click they are taken to or blox admin panel, where their login efforts will be unsuccessful. 

Question: How does having the Admin Login link their help users?
If we really needed it... couldn't we hide it somewhere on the site less prominently, or use lotame to only expose it to admins?