Households, Outreach and Settings in GC Volunteer Management

GC Volunteer Management can group spouses, partners and other relatives into households. Two features use those households:

Household outreach: one volunteer email reaches both spouses or partners on the To line, with a greeting that names them together.
Household record: a constituent's profile lists the spouse, partner and other relatives your school has on record.

You turn each feature on separately in Settings › Households. Individuals remain the unit of record either way.

No new data to manage. Both features use the spouse, partner and child relationships already in your data import. The more complete those relationships are, the better households work.

Turn on households

In GC Volunteer Management, go to Settings › Households.
Under Display, turn on Show households on constituent profiles to show the household record.
Under Outreach, turn on Email households together, not individually to send household emails.
Click Save changes.

You can turn on either setting, both, or neither. If you don't have permission to change these settings, the page shows them as read-only.

Household outreach: email both spouses on one email

What it does

With Email households together, not individually turned on, a volunteer emailing an assigned constituent also includes their spouse or partner on the To line. Both people get one email.

This works when your school has usable contact information for both people, and the volunteer is allowed to see the spouse or partner. If either is missing, the email goes to the assigned constituent only.

What changes when you turn it on

The To line: when a volunteer writes an email, the recipient line shows the constituent and their spouse or partner.
The greeting merge token: the First name and spouse name token addresses the couple together.
The outbox: a household send appears as one email to two people.

Address the couple together with the greeting merge token

In the email editor, insert First name and spouse name ($PREFFIRSTNAMEANDSPOUSENAME$) in the greeting

When the email sends, the token fills in with both preferred first names, for example "Dear Taylor and Alex,". If the constituent has no spouse or partner on the email, the token fills in with the constituent's preferred first name only, for example "Dear Taylor,".

The greeting always names the same spouse or partner who is on the To line.

Good to know

Volunteers can't opt out for a single email. While the setting is on, every volunteer email to a household includes the spouse or partner.
One email per couple. If both spouses are in the same list or segment, they get one shared email, not two.
Already-sent emails don't change. Turning the setting on or off affects new emails only.
Scheduled emails keep their recipients. A scheduled email goes to whoever was on the To line when it was scheduled.
With the setting off, every volunteer email goes to one person.

Household record: see the household on a constituent's profile

What it does

With Show households on constituent profiles turned on, a constituent's side panel includes a Relatives section. It lists the spouse, partner and other relatives your school has on record.

What you see in Relatives

Each member's name, class year and email, where available.
Their relationship to the constituent (for example, Spouse), shown on the right. The constituent you're viewing is labeled This profile.
A member count at the top of the section.
A Deceased badge on any member recorded as deceased.
Clickable names: click a relative's name to open their profile.
Show more: the section shows four members at first. Click Show [number] more to see the rest.

The Relatives section appears only when a constituent has at least one relative on record. It shows the household only and doesn't decide who gets an email. The To line decides that, based on the outreach setting.

With the setting off

Relationship data stays stored as-is, and nothing about your current setup changes. The Relatives section doesn't appear on profiles.

Some household features depend on this setting:

Child merge tokens: while households are off, child tokens such as $CHILDLASTNAME$ show as unavailable in the email editor and are blank when the email sends. Emails still send.

Child class year filter: volunteers can filter by a child's class year only while households are on.

Control which household fields volunteers see

In Constituent profile settings, you choose which fields appear on the volunteer profile. Hiding a field from the profile also hides it from volunteer filters, merge tokens and outreach.

Learn more: Controlling Field Visibility and Custom Fields in GC Volunteer Management

Controlling Field Visibility and Custom Fields in GC Volunteer Management

Building Segments in GC Volunteer Management