Let’s Communicate with Youth Workers!
The new missionadventures.net continues to grow. Already our partners are adding new Outreach Destinations and are updating their Profiles. While our old Mission Adventures site was pretty darn awesome, or new site is even more awesomer because it allows more better ways for us to connect with youth workers.
Email with the Spiffy Contact Page™
This little link may look normal, but it’s actually quite magical!
In addition to your Spiffy Profile Page,™ your base has a truly magical way for youth workers to contact you via e-mail. In the image at right you can see a zoomed in shot of the detail on the YWAM San Diego/Baja Profile. I’ve darkened most of the image to highlight the “Send me an email” link. When a youth worker clicks this link, it takes them to a page that looks like this:
So What’s So Magical About That?
Here’s the magic—you don’t have to reveal your precious email address on your Profile Page or anywhere else on the site for that matter. You can have messages from Youth Workers auto-magically sent to your inbox. This may not sound like it’s a big deal, but have you ever gotten a message with a subjects like the ones below. (Obviously, I’ve picked some of the tamer ones!)
- Sale! Percocet+Adderall and Vicodin !!!! (What’s up with all the exclamation points?????)
- You will be the chick magnet (Too late, I already am the chick magnet—just ask my wife!)
- Pastors Are Fatter, Sicker, and More Depressed than Many in Congregation (My personal fave)
Have you ever wondered how these scumbags, errr… wonderful people find your email address? They use little computer programs called ‘spiders’ or ‘robots’ to crawl the intertubes in search of email addresses. So if you were to post yournameatyourbase.org anywhere on the new site, those nasty little botses will find it and begin sending you messages with Subject lines like the ones above and worse—enough said. Thankfully, our new site doesn’t expose your address to the spam-bots. And just so you know, unknown creepy crawlers have viewed our site 207 times… today, and it’s not even noon here.
Here’s How You Take Advantage of the Magic:
It’s easier than you think. On your Profile page, (and on any and all Outreach posts you create), type a phrase like “Send Me An Email.” Then you can follow these instructions from the excellent Squarespace user manual to turn it into a link. When you are in the Create Link dialog box, choose Your Webpages, and you ought to see a link named “Contact <your base name>” choose that and hit “Save and Close” and you’ve done it. Seriously, that’s all there is to it. Sweet, eh?
Yes, As a Matter of Fact, You Can Edit the Text at the Top of the Form.
Here’s some easy instructions from the excellent Squarespace user manual. I recommend you customize it. You could even say something witty. Feel free to use the phrase “Spiffy Contact Form™” or make up your own stuff.
To What Address Does this Spiffy Contact Page Send the Email?
Test it and find out! Send a message using the form and see where the email ends up. Unless you asked me to send it to a different address, I set up that page to go to the address you used to request your login credentials. If you’d like it to go to a different address, that’s easy to do too… but so far I haven’t figured out how to find a way to allow you to edit that. So just send me a message to let me know where you’d like to have the Magical Form send your mail. You can reach me at the usual chanels, or by hitting the ‘Email Me’ button below, or even my very own Magical Contact Form™ —Spiffy, eh?