Inbox - FS Guide

• All inbound mail is routed to the inbox and will appear in one of three categories: Individual, Campaign, and Digital.

  • Individual Mail: Emails sent to you directly from a constituent via an online webform (most commonly the contact form). In the individual inbox, messages are grouped by the individual sender on the left, so you may see that one constituent has sent in multiple messages (those individual inbounds are on the right). 

  • Campaign Mail: Emails compiled by an advocacy vendor from constituents and processed by the House’s Communicating with Congress (CWC) service, which then sends them to your inbox. The campaign inbox is organized by specific campaign, so for each campaign on the left, you are likely to find several individual messages from different constituents on the right. This helps you log campaign messages faster and to one place.

  • Digital Mail: Physical mail scanned by the House’s digitizing service and forwarded to your Fireside inbox. Messages are grouped singularly (one entry per message, no matter the sender).

• When logging mail, develop a system for your office and ensure all staff follow it. “Respond with,” “Form Letter,” and “Staffer” are all required fields for logging, but you can and should use the other fields provided.

  • Other fields available are “Batch” (folders to organize mail by topic and/or response method), “Issues” (to tag and group mail for reporting and audience building), and “Notes” (for internal documentation purposes only).

    • We strongly recommend using the same naming convention across Form Letter, Batch, and Issues where possible. I.e., if you have a form letter on “116 HR 1 We the People Pro,” also name your batch similarly, perhaps “116 HR 1 We the People Pro” and issue codes similarly, ex. “116 HR 1 Pro”

    • Whether you have one staffer logging mail or several, all staffers should follow the same procedures

  • Selections on staffer, form letter, or batch can be modified later if updates are needed.

  • Use the pin checkboxes to the right of each message or campaign to log different - yet similar - submissions together.

• You can sort your inbox using the caret icon next to “Date Created.” This enables you to find similar mail items in different ways to help you log your mail faster.

• When logging campaign mail, you may see the option to “Log All” which, if selected, will then ask if you want to log that specific campaign the same way moving forward. Choosing this option will create an automation, which will then auto-route future campaign mail of the same type (as identified by a unique, hidden campaign ID number) the same way you just logged it, no matter if the mail arrives a few hours later or in a few months.

• You’ll see that every message in the inbox will have a green person icon appear on the top right corner. Clicking on the icon will open a profile panel that includes a brief snapshot of the constituent’s inbounds, outbounds and affiliations.