Not every announcement is relevant to every user. Userorbit lets you control who sees each announcement and how they receive it, so you can deliver the right message to the right audience through the right channel.
Understanding audience options
When you create an announcement, you decide two things about distribution: who should see it and where they should see it. These are independent choices that work together.
The "who" determines the audience — all users, a filtered segment, or a hand-picked group. The "where" determines the delivery channel — the in-app widget, email broadcast, public changelog, or a combination of these.
Publishing to all users
By default, announcements are visible to everyone. When you publish without setting any audience filters, the announcement appears in:
- Your public changelog, visible to anyone with the link.
- The in-app widget for all identified users.
- Email broadcasts if you enable the email option (sent to your full user list).
This is the right choice for major updates, company news, or changes that affect your entire user base.
Targeting specific segments
For updates that only matter to a subset of users, you can narrow the audience using segments. Segments are groups of users defined by properties like plan type, signup date, feature usage, or custom attributes you have sent to Userorbit.
To target a segment:
- In the announcement editor sidebar, open the Audience section.
- Click Select segment and choose from your existing segments.
- The announcement will only be delivered to users matching that segment.
Common targeting scenarios:
- Plan-based — Announce a premium feature only to users on paid plans.
- Usage-based — Notify power users about an advanced workflow improvement.
- Region-based — Communicate a region-specific infrastructure change.
- New users — Welcome recently signed-up users with onboarding tips.
Widget-only announcements
Sometimes you want an announcement to appear only inside your product, without sending an email or listing it on the public changelog. This is useful for minor improvements, UI changes, or contextual tips that make sense only when a user is actively using your product.
To create a widget-only announcement:
- Publish the announcement as usual.
- Leave the email broadcast toggle off.
- If you want to exclude it from the public changelog, mark it as widget only in the visibility settings.
Widget-only announcements still respect audience targeting, so you can combine both — for example, showing a tip only to free-plan users inside the app.
Email-only broadcasts
In some cases, you may want to reach users who are not actively in your product. Email broadcasts let you send an announcement directly to inboxes. You can send to your full list or to a targeted segment.
To send an email broadcast:
- Toggle on Email broadcast in the announcement sidebar.
- Select the audience — all users or a specific segment.
- Publish the announcement. The email is sent immediately or at the scheduled time.
Email broadcasts use your announcement title as the email subject line and the body content as the email body, so write with both channels in mind.
Combining channels and audiences
The most effective announcement strategies use multiple channels together. For a major feature launch, you might:
- Publish to the changelog for public visibility and SEO.
- Show it in the widget so active users see it immediately.
- Send an email broadcast to a targeted segment of users most likely to benefit.
Experiment with different combinations to find what drives the best engagement for your audience.