Question:
There is a lot of interest in one of my volunteer opportunities so I want it to “go live” at a certain time so that volunteers know when to expect it and can sign up on a first-come, first-served basis. Is there a way I can do this?
Answer:
Any time you are creating an opportunity in CERVIS, you can set a Scheduled Posting Date for the system to automatically make the opportunity appear publicly on your event listing page at the specified date and time. This allows you to create the opportunity whenever it is convenient for you and then have the system manage when it is displayed to your volunteers.
To use this functionality, create the opportunity in its entirety like normal. This requires setting the Publish Online to ‘Yes - Open’ and entering your desired scheduled posting date so that it's all ready when it is time for it to go live, and the system will take it from there.
Follow the steps below to create an opportunity with a Scheduled Posting Date:
- Login to your CERVIS account.
- Click on the Add New Opportunity link under the "Opportunity Management" section of the Main Dashboard.
- Fill in all of the pertinent information for your opportunity, which would include a minimum of the required fields that are denoted by an asterisk.
- Click on the Advanced Options section to expand the section.
- Locate the Scheduled Posting Date field and set it to the exact date and time that you would like your opportunity to be posted.
- Note that however you have the Publish Online setting configured within the opportunity, is how it will be posted. For example, if you have it set to ‘Yes - Coming Soon’, the system will display it on your event listing page on the posted date as “Coming Soon” and volunteers will not be able to register until you manually change it to ‘Yes - Open’. For this reason, you should always set the Publish Online option to ‘Yes - Open’ when using this feature.
- Click the Create Opportunity button to save your changes and create your opportunity.
Time Slot Note: This setting applies to the entire opportunity and cannot affect individual time slots. You can choose to use the Automatically Hide Open Slots Until option to have the system roll-out time slots as each new calendar month arrives.
An additional option for the Scheduled Posting Date feature is found in the System Configuration under the Opportunity Management Settings section. The global setting Display Opportunities with an Upcoming Scheduled Posting Date, allows you to select for all upcoming Opportunities with a future Scheduled Posting date to either be ‘Hidden’ or posted as 'Coming Soon.
- Choosing 'Coming Soon' will publicly display all opportunities as such until the scheduled posting date is reached, and then they will be automatically opened (assuming the Publish Online field is set as 'Yes- Open').
Choosing 'Hidden' will not display opportunities until the scheduled posting date is reached, and then they will be automatically published (assuming the Publish Online field is set as 'Yes- Open').