Welcome to Circles, a newly launched feature on Gloo that is designed to help Churches, Networks, and Denominations connect, learn, and share insights with one another. It provides churches with the ability to see how they compare with others in different aspects of their ministry- locally, regionally, or even nationally.
Circles are the infrastructure that allows Churches to connect with each other and see how they compare in key areas within the Gloo app. They are a way to join a community and gain access to anonymous, aggregated data across organizations which makes your Gloo dashboards even more powerful and insightful. By joining or creating a Circle, you’ll gain access to valuable benchmarks and insights across key church metrics, notably through the State of the Church - Church Pulse Assessment, and understand where YOU rank relatively. This allows you to track your church’s progress and make informed decisions about growth and ministry. Let's get started with making your first Circle!
Creating Your Circle
Navigate over to your left side menu, and click Measure.
2. Under the Circle menu, click My Circles.
3. Click the Create a Circle button to begin!
Note: Currently, Organizations can only create 1 Circle as a Circle Admin, but can join multiple as a Circle Member if you receive invitations!
4. Now that you've made it to your Circles, you can begin creating! Add the name and description of your Circle. For example, maybe if you are a Denomination, and you want to invite all of your Churches to a designated Denomination Circle! Or perhaps you'd like your Circle to include other churches or organizations that you've engaged with to provide support for the community, you may want to name your Circle Outreach!
5. Once you're happy with your Circle's name and description, click Create Circle.
Note: The Church Health option must be toggled on to create a Circle, otherwise, the option to create it will be greyed out! Luckily, that option is already turned on for you!
Inviting Organizations To Your Circle
Your Circle is created and ready to be shared with other organizations, so now you'll need to invite them to join. Let's invite them to our Outreach Circle!
Once you create your Circle, your Circle link and Invitation Template will automatically display! You'll find that you have two ways to invite others to your Circle. You could either copy your Circle link OR copy the invitation template. It's completely up to you!
Pro tip: The invitation template includes instructions for BOTH users already on Gloo and users who are new to Gloo, so feel free to remove whichever instructions based on where the invite is headed!
2. If at any point you log out or leave your Circle feature, you can always find your invite link directly on your Circle!
3. To locate your invited organizations, simply head to your side menu under Measure, and click Organizations. There, you'll be able to find Organizations who have accepted your Circle invite under the "accepted" status!
Importing Organizations Through CSV
Uploading a list of your desired organizations to invite to your Circle is a fantastic way to stay organized and keep track of your invites. This will save you time and make the process of adding organizations much simpler!
Head to your Organizations by clicking your Measure tab on the left, and clicking Organizations under Circles.
2. Click Upload Orgs in the top right corner.
3. Download the CSV template and click 'continue'.
4. In the CSV file, click and drag downward the highlighted arrow to create more rows for multiple organizations. Add all necessary information to the file!
5. Save your file as a CSV file by using “Export to” or “Save As” a .csv file.
6. Once your CSV is saved, browse your computer and select the corresponding file. Make sure to check the option that you certify that the CSV contains no personal information, and click 'continue'.
7. Verify that the listed rows are correct, as well as fix any corrections that the system flagged, and click 'continue'.
8. You should be good to go once you've completed those steps! Click 'close', and you'll be able to view all imported organizations with a "claimed" status in your Organizations Table!
Map
As soon as organizations begin accepting your Circle invitations, you'll be able to a utilize our Map feature! This will allow you to easily visualize the distance and location of your Circle. Plus, you'll be able to keep track of the status of your invitees.
Accepting a Circle Invite
Did you receive an invitation link to join an existing Circle on Gloo? Here's how to accept it!
Joining a Circle while Already Using Gloo
Copy and paste the Circle link you received into a browser.
2. Click "Accept" to join the Circle.
Joining a Circle as a New User to Gloo
Copy and paste the Circle link you received into a browser.
Tip: Need a bit of help getting your account set up? Click HERE for a step by step guide on getting started with Gloo!
2. Follow the on screen instructions to set up your account. Once that is completed, you'll already be apart of the Circle!
We hope you'll find our new Circles feature to be another great asset to your church, community, and members. If you have any questions or concerns for us about this feature or any other features we've launched, feel free to let us know at support@gloo.us.