Support Forum

Post via email customization needed

CC chris.crabtree
chris.crabtree
Member

I need this customization in v5.

 

The forums should work as normal via the browser, AND if as a user I receive an email containing a new post to a thread or forum I am subscribed to, I should be able to reply via email and have my reply show up on the forum as if I had posted it via the browser in the normal fashion.

 

Accordingly, other users subscribed to the same thread or forum would see my post as if I had posted via the browser, and subsequently may respond to that email, and so on.

 

I’m not currently a SimplePress user, so I hope my terminology is clear. I would love to launch my new forum on SP5 with this post-by-email functionality if I can get it done.

 

Happy to discuss further so we can get to a mutual understanding and a decent estimate of what it will cost me. Or, if there are good reasons why this is really difficult, I would appreciate some guidance there as well. I am an experienced software developer myself so we can have an informed discussion, but don’t care to delve into SP coding too deeply at this point.

 

Thanks!

39 Answers

New Answer

MP Mr Papa
Mr Papa
Member

we would love to see such a plugin too. Its on our list to do, but not ETA…

hopefully, someone will contact you about doing it now…

BR Brandon
Brandon
Member

stevenb2980 said

This is something that we would dearly love to be able to have for our SP forum too. Just waiting for 5.0 to be officially released before using it on our live website but would love to know if anyone out there has the ability to create a plugin for this. Have no experience in software development otherwise I would attempt to create something like this myself.

Anybody out there willing to give it a try?

There are probably a lot of people that could create such a plugin but maybe not so much a demand to do so. If someone is subscribed to a topic most would rather they get the email and then come to the website. Since most sites are wanting more pageviews why would they create something that gives them less?

YS Yellow Swordfish
Yellow Swordfish
Member

Very useful to have for mobile use of course…

CC chris.crabtree
chris.crabtree
Member

Brandon C said

There are probably a lot of people that could create such a plugin but maybe not so much a demand to do so. If someone is subscribed to a topic most would rather they get the email and then come to the website. Since most sites are wanting more pageviews why would they create something that gives them less?

 

I acknowledge for a lot of sites trying to build pageviews, it would make no sense. But the site I’m working on is a paid membership site, so we want the members to access the forums in the ways that are most convenient for them.

 

The member interactions are more valuable to us than the pageviews, in this case.

 

For many of our members, this two-way email communication to the forums is easily the single best mode for them, and for a few different reasons:

  • Convenient mobile access on any e-mail enabled phone, as Yellow Swordfish alluded to.
  • Many members’ workplaces block web browsing to sites that aren’t strictly work-related, so email is the only way they could participate. For some reason our member profile tends to work in positions where this seems more common than I would generally expect.
  • Even for those who are not otherwise blocked, we feel like members will tend to stay more engaged with the site with this model because they can simply hit Reply to a message and offer their thoughts instead of having to go to the site, possibly login, possibly get distracted along the way. Just like conversions: fewer steps means they are more likely to do it. Hard to beat seeing a message and Replying for fewest number of steps. 🙂

Anyway, I would still love to entertain some freelancers on the idea. Otherwise, I’m going to have to do it myself and my list is already too long!

thanks!
 

YS Yellow Swordfish
Yellow Swordfish
Member

Join the ‘people with long lists club’ smile We’re founder members!

I don’t even think this is that hard to achieve

MP Mr Papa
Mr Papa
Member

Nothing has been communicated to us… sorry… 

AS ashishmalik
ashishmalik
Member

Hi…we really need this for a couple of our clients and Chris, as you mentioned, having the members interact is more important than the pageviews on the website….the same is true for our clients……..

 

How can we expedite this feature?

YS Yellow Swordfish
Yellow Swordfish
Member

Is anyone willing to construct an SP plugin – which would be the quickest way of course….?

MP Mr Papa
Mr Papa
Member

Its high on my list to do…  But first priority for us is getting the codex populated with some more info…  but hope to work it fairly soon…

CC chris.crabtree
chris.crabtree
Member

Wow, great news!

Look forward to checking it out. Thanks!
 

MP Mr Papa
Mr Papa
Member

actually, Andy started playing with it before me!  priority right now is getting 5.0.5 out this weekend…  and populating the codex with some more api info…   but its high on the list as I said…

initial plugin will probably support replying to admin notifications and subscription notifications via email…