The Email Settings page controls the emails KennelBooker sends to your customers (pet parents): who they come from, where replies go, which emails send themselves, what gets attached, the reminder email before check-in, and the wording of every email (your email templates). Text messages (SMS) are set up on a separate page, Settings > SMS Settings; see the last section of this article.
Where to find Email Settings
Click Settings in the main menu, then Email Settings in the settings menu on the left. The page has six sections, with quick links at the top: Who emails come from, Automatic emails, Attachments, Reminders, Review requests and Templates. Their headings on the page are Who your emails come from, Emails that send themselves, Documents attached to emails, Reminders before check-in, Review requests and Email templates.
Nothing on the Email Settings page takes effect until you click Save all email settings. One save covers every section. Uploading a document and editing a template are the exceptions: they save on their own.
Staff need the Settings permission to open Email Settings. You give it in Settings > Staff Accounts, under What they can access. Without it they see "You do not have access to view or edit settings."
Email Settings: who your emails come from
From name: the name your customers see beside the email in their inbox, for example "Kate @ Kate's Kennels". Any commas are removed. If you leave it empty, KennelBooker uses the account owner's first name and your business name, for example "Kate from Kate's Kennels".
Reply-to address: where a customer's reply goes while your emails are sent from the standard KennelBooker address ([email protected]). Use an address you actually read. This field can't be empty, and the page won't save if the address isn't a valid email address (the box turns red).
From address: the address your emails are sent from. It starts as [email protected] and is locked; you change it with the Request Change button (see the next section). Changing the From address is only available on paid accounts. Once your emails come from your own address, replies go straight to that address.
Bcc a copy to: sends a blind copy of every email that goes to a customer to the address you enter. The customer can't see that you were copied. Leave it empty for no copies. Once a Bcc address is saved it can't be changed on the page; contact KennelBooker support to change it.
Cc the customer's second address: where a customer record has a second email address, that address is copied in too.
How to send your emails from your own email address
On a paid account, you can send your KennelBooker emails from an address at your own domain, such as [email protected]. Free mailboxes such as Gmail, Hotmail, Outlook, Yahoo, iCloud or me.com can't be used, because those providers don't allow other services to send on their behalf. KennelBooker sends email through a company called Postmark, so the address has to be confirmed with Postmark first.
Go to Settings > Email Settings.
Beside From address, click Request Change.
Read the notice, tick I agree and understand the above restrictions, type the address into Requested Email Address and click Request Change.
Postmark sends a verification email to that address. Open it and click the confirmation link.
Go back to Settings > Email Settings and click Verify Request (under Verification, next to the From address).
If Postmark has your confirmation you'll see "Verified. Your booking confirmations and reminders will now be sent from" followed by your address, and the From address changes.
Until you click Verify Request and it succeeds, your emails keep coming from your current From address.
Email Settings: emails that send themselves
With these switches off, the email still exists and staff send it by hand. With a switch on, KennelBooker sends it at the moment described.
Acknowledge online bookings: as soon as a customer books online, they get an email saying you have their request and are checking it. This is not a confirmation and doesn't promise them a place.
Send the confirmation when a booking is confirmed: goes out as soon as you confirm a booking (or as soon as it confirms itself, if you allow that). This is the email that tells the customer their place is booked.
Attach a PDF invoice to the confirmation for: one switch per service you offer (and Sales if you use the shop). Leave them all off to send the confirmation with no invoice attached.
Send a receipt at check-out: emails the customer their receipt when you check the booking out. Under it, you can choose to send the Unpaid Bookings email instead of the receipt when the booking hasn't been paid. That email asks for payment rather than thanking the customer for it, and you can edit its wording in the templates.
Attach a PDF invoice to cancellation emails: useful where a cancellation still leaves a fee to pay.
Add vaccination wording to grooming bookings (and the same for your custom service, if you offer one): adds a note about vaccination requirements to those booking emails.
How to send a confirmation email by hand
If Send the confirmation when a booking is confirmed is off, staff send the confirmation email themselves. After you add a booking, the booking created screen shows Select Template, Email Subject and Email Body. Pick the template you want, change the subject or the wording for this one customer if you need to, then click Send Confirmation Email. Changes you make here only affect this email, not the template.
Email Settings: documents attached to emails
You can attach your own files (terms and conditions, a what-to-bring list, a price list) to the emails you choose. These are separate from the PDF invoices.
In Documents attached to emails, type a Document name. This is the file name the customer sees.
Choose For which bookings: all bookings or one service.
Choose On which emails: All, Acknowledgement Emails, Confirmation Emails, Receipt Emails, Registration Email, Payment Reminder Emails, Password Reset Emails or Digital Waiver Email.
Click Choose file and upload and pick the file. It uploads as soon as you choose it, and you'll see "Document added".
Documents must be PDF, DOC, DOCX, XLS, XLSX or TXT files, up to 5MB. To stop attaching a document, click Delete beside it in the list.
Email Settings: reminder emails before check-in
The reminder email goes out a few days before a booking starts, reminding the customer it's coming up and what to bring. Reminder emails are sent around lunchtime (about 1pm) on the day they're due.
In Reminders before check-in, switch on Send reminder emails. This is the master switch: with it off, none of the service settings below apply.
For each service, switch on Send a reminder and enter the Days before check-in it should go out.
For daycare, dog walks and drop-ins you can also tick Only remind about the first day of a multi-day booking. For daycare there's also an option to remind about linked bookings (a daycare attached to a stay or a groom).
Click Save all email settings.
Only the services you offer are listed. The wording of the reminder comes from your Reminder Email template. You can have one reminder template for all services or a separate one for each service.
Email Settings: review requests
Review requests are an email KennelBooker can send by itself a few days after a booking is checked out, asking the customer to review your business on Google or Facebook. They are switched off until you turn them on in the Review requests section of Settings > Email Settings.
In Google review link, paste your Google review link. To get it, open your Google Business Profile, choose Ask for reviews (sometimes Get more reviews) and copy the link it gives you.
If you want a Facebook button as well, paste your Facebook page address with /reviews on the end into Facebook review link. Links must start with https://, have no spaces and be no longer than 500 characters.
In Days after checkout, choose how long after checkout the email goes. The default is 3 and you can choose 0 to 60.
In Ask the same customer again after (days), choose how long to wait before asking a customer who never clicked a review button. The default is 180 and you can choose 0 to 3650.
Turn on Send review requests and click Save all email settings.
The wording comes from the Review Request Template (email type Review Request) in the Email templates section, which you edit like any other template. Keep its review fields in place: [review_buttons] shows the Google and Facebook buttons, and [review_google_link], [review_facebook_link] and [review_already_link] are the links on their own. These fields are what record a click, so a review link pasted straight into the template is not tracked.
KennelBooker asks a customer for a review only if their booking was checked out within the last few days, they have a working email address, and Booking Notifications and Marketing Emails are both ticked on their customer page. It never asks a customer who clicked a review button, pressed the already-reviewed link in the email, or was ticked Has already reviewed us - don't send review requests on their customer page. Bookings with an incident logged, sales and cremation bookings are left out, and review requests are only sent from paid accounts. Every eligible customer gets the same email, whatever their stay was like.
Email Settings: your email templates
An email template is the wording KennelBooker uses for each email. When your account is set up you get a default template for each email type, such as Online Acknowledgment, Confirmation Email, Receipt Email, Reminder Email, Cancellation Email, Unpaid Bookings Email, Post Card and Review Request.
The Email templates section lists your templates with their Applies to, Subject and Automatic columns. Click Edit to open one, or Add template to write a new one. In the template editor:
Template name: for your own reference. Customers never see it.
Email type: what the email is for (confirmation, reminder, receipt and so on). KennelBooker uses this to decide when it goes out.
Applies to: one service, or - all booking types -. A template for a specific service is used ahead of the all-booking-types one.
Send this template automatically: makes this the template KennelBooker sends by itself for that email type and service. Only one template can be automatic for an email type and service, so saving with this on turns it off on whichever template held that spot. If two templates do end up set to send automatically for the same email type and service (for example straight after you click Duplicate), KennelBooker uses the first one in the list. Templates with it off are still there to pick when you send an email by hand.
Subject line and Email body: the wording. Click any field under Fields you can use to drop it in where your cursor is, for example [pet_names] or [booking_dates]. KennelBooker swaps each field for the real detail when the email is sent.
Buttons: Save template (or Save changes), Duplicate, Delete and Close.
How to send boarding and daycare customers different confirmation emails
By default the same Confirmation Email template is used for every booking type. To give one service its own wording:
Go to Settings > Email Settings > Email templates and click Edit on your confirmation email.
Click Duplicate. A copy is created, its name ends in "(Copy)", and you are now editing the copy.
Change Applies to to the service, for example Boarding, and change the Template name so you can tell it apart.
Edit the subject and wording.
If you want KennelBooker to send it by itself, switch on Send this template automatically.
Click Save template. Click Close to go back to the list, where the new template now appears.
Email templates: changing the [signoff]
The [signoff] field in your email templates is built from your account details, separated by commas: the account owner's first name, your business name, your business phone number and your website. Change those details and the signoff changes in every email. To use different wording, delete [signoff] from the template and type the signoff you want instead.
Email Settings: resetting your templates
Reset to defaults, at the bottom of the Email templates section, puts every email template back to the KennelBooker default wording. Any wording you've written yourself is lost, and this can't be undone. KennelBooker asks you to confirm first.
What Email Settings doesn't do
Email Settings doesn't control text messages. SMS has its own page, Settings > SMS Settings.
Email Settings doesn't let you send from a free mailbox address such as Gmail, Hotmail or Yahoo.
Email Settings doesn't send marketing or newsletter emails. Those are sent from the Marketing feature.
Editing a template doesn't change emails that have already been sent.
Review requests don't collect, show or read your reviews. The review is written on Google or Facebook, and KennelBooker only knows whether a customer clicked.
SMS settings: where text messages are set up now
Text message (SMS) settings used to be on the same page as email. They now have their own page: Settings > SMS Settings. That page has Your SMS account (the Send text messages to customers switch, your Credits remaining, Top up with Buy credits, and your Sender name), Reminders before check-in (a reminder text per service with How many days before check-in), When a text is sent, and SMS templates. One SMS credit covers 160 characters. Click Save SMS settings to save. See SMS Messaging for the details.
Email Settings: frequently asked questions
Which email address do my customers' emails come from?
KennelBooker emails come from [email protected] unless you've changed the From address in Settings > Email Settings. The From address can be changed to an address at your own domain with Request Change, then confirmed through Postmark and Verify Request.
Where do customer replies go?
While your KennelBooker emails come from [email protected], customer replies go to the Reply-to address in Settings > Email Settings. Once your emails come from your own From address, replies go to that From address.
Can I use my Gmail or Hotmail address as the From address?
No. The KennelBooker From address must be an address at your own domain, such as [email protected]. Free mailboxes such as Gmail, Hotmail, Outlook, Yahoo, iCloud and me.com are refused. You can still put a Gmail or Hotmail address in the Reply-to address so replies reach you there.
Can I get a copy of every email KennelBooker sends my customers?
Yes. In Settings > Email Settings, enter your address in Bcc a copy to and click Save all email settings. KennelBooker then sends you a blind copy of every email that goes to a customer, and the customer can't see that you were copied. Choose the address carefully: once it's saved, only KennelBooker support can change it.
Can I check an email before it goes to the customer?
Yes. In Settings > Email Settings > Emails that send themselves, switch off the email you want to check, for example Send the confirmation when a booking is confirmed. KennelBooker then won't send it by itself, and after you add a booking you can pick the template, edit the subject and wording, and click Send Confirmation Email.
How do I attach my terms and conditions to the confirmation email?
In Settings > Email Settings > Documents attached to emails, type a document name, choose the bookings, choose Confirmation Emails under On which emails, then click Choose file and upload. KennelBooker attaches PDF, DOC, DOCX, XLS, XLSX and TXT files up to 5MB.
Can KennelBooker attach the invoice to the confirmation email?
Yes. In Settings > Email Settings > Emails that send themselves, under Attach a PDF invoice to the confirmation for, switch on each service that should get a PDF invoice with its confirmation email. There's a separate switch, Attach a PDF invoice to cancellation emails, for cancellations.
How many days before check-in does the reminder email go out?
You choose. In Settings > Email Settings > Reminders before check-in, each service has its own Days before check-in box. The Send reminder emails master switch must be on, as well as Send a reminder for the service.
What time of day do reminder emails go out?
KennelBooker sends reminder emails around lunchtime, at about 1pm, on the day they're due (the number of Days before check-in you set for that service).
Can I use my own email address as the From address on a free trial?
No. Changing the From address in Settings > Email Settings is only available on paid accounts. Until then your emails come from [email protected], and replies go to your Reply-to address.
Can I have different reminder or confirmation wording for each service?
Yes. In Settings > Email Settings > Email templates, open the template, click Duplicate, set Applies to to the service and edit the wording. A template for a specific service is used ahead of the all-booking-types template. Switch on Send this template automatically if KennelBooker should send it by itself.
What do the fields in square brackets do in my email templates?
Fields such as [customer_first_name], [pet_names] or [booking_dates] are placeholders in KennelBooker email templates. When the email is sent, each one is replaced with the real detail from the booking, so [customer_first_name] arrives as the customer's first name. The template editor lists every field you can use for that email type under Fields you can use.
Can I undo Reset to defaults?
No. Reset to defaults in the KennelBooker email templates puts every template back to the default wording, and your own wording can't be recovered afterwards. Copy any wording you want to keep before you reset.
How do I ask my customers for a Google review automatically?
Go to Settings > Email Settings > Review requests, paste your Google review link, choose Days after checkout, switch on Send review requests and click Save all email settings. KennelBooker then emails each eligible customer a Google button (and a Facebook button if you add that link) a few days after their booking is checked out.
Will the Email Settings review request email a customer who has already reviewed us?
Not if KennelBooker knows. A customer who clicks a review button, presses the already-reviewed link in the email, or is ticked Has already reviewed us - don't send review requests on their customer page is never asked again. KennelBooker can't see Google or Facebook, so tick that box yourself for a customer who tells you they have reviewed.
Which customers get a review request from KennelBooker?
Customers whose booking was checked out within the last few days, who have a working email address and have both Booking Notifications and Marketing Emails ticked on their customer page. Customers with an incident logged on that booking are left out, and so are sales and cremation bookings. Only paid accounts send review requests.
Can I send review requests only to customers who had a good stay?
No. Every eligible customer gets the same review request, whatever their stay was like. Google doesn't allow asking only the customers you expect to be happy. The email does invite anyone with a complaint to reply to it.
Can I change the wording of the review request email?
Yes. In Settings > Email Settings > Email templates, click Edit on the Review Request Template. Keep fields such as [review_buttons] in it, because they are what record a customer's click.
Where do I set up text message (SMS) reminders?
SMS reminders are no longer on the Email Settings page. They're on Settings > SMS Settings, under Reminders before check-in, where each service has its own How many days before check-in setting.
Email Settings: common problems
My settings didn't save
Email Settings only saves when you click Save all email settings. If the Reply-to address box turns red, the page didn't save because the reply-to address is empty or isn't a valid email address. Enter a working address and save again. A red review link box has the same effect: if a link in Review requests isn't valid, the whole page stays unsaved until you correct it (see the review request messages below).
"Email Address cannot be a public email domain"
You'll see "Email Address cannot be a public email domain, it must be a private email domain for example: [email protected]" when you request a From address at Gmail, Hotmail, Yahoo, Outlook, iCloud or another free mailbox. KennelBooker can only send from an address at your own domain. You'll also see "Email cannot be blank" if the address box is empty, and "Agree by clicking the checkbox" if you didn't tick I agree and understand the above restrictions.
"We haven't had confirmation yet"
When you click Verify Request before Postmark has your confirmation, KennelBooker shows "We haven't had confirmation yet. Please open the email sent to" your address "and click the confirmation link, then check again." Find the verification email from Postmark (check your spam folder), click its confirmation link, then click Verify Request again. If you see a message that KennelBooker couldn't reach its email provider, wait a minute and try again.
I can't change or remove the Bcc address
Once a Bcc address is saved in Settings > Email Settings, the box is replaced by "Bcc:" and the address, and it can't be changed on the page. Contact KennelBooker support with the address you want to use instead, or ask for it to be removed.
My customer didn't get the confirmation email
Check that Send the confirmation when a booking is confirmed is on in Settings > Email Settings (if it's off, staff must send it by hand). Check the customer has an email address: KennelBooker shows "Cannot send booking email - customer has no email address on file!" when they don't. If you see "Customer has opted out of email confirmations", the customer has opted out and KennelBooker won't send them the email. Also ask the customer to check their spam folder. If none of these explain it, contact support with the booking reference and the customer's name.
"You have no template saved for this booking type"
This message appears on the booking created screen when there's no email template that applies to that service. Add one in Settings > Email Settings > Email templates, either for that service or for - all booking types -.
"Cannot accept files of this type"
Documents attached to emails must be PDF, DOC, DOCX, XLS, XLSX or TXT files. Images (such as PNG, JPG or GIF files) aren't accepted. Save the file as a PDF and upload it again.
"Review links must be full web addresses starting with https://"
You'll see "Review links must be full web addresses starting with https:// (no spaces), up to 500 characters." when a link in Review requests is not valid. Nothing on the Email Settings page is saved until it is fixed, including your other settings. Copy the link again from Google or Facebook, check it starts with https:// and has no spaces, and click Save all email settings again.
"Add your Google or Facebook review link before switching review requests on"
You turned on Send review requests without a link, so the page didn't save. Add at least one link in Google review link or Facebook review link and save again.
"Review request settings couldn't be saved just now"
KennelBooker shows "Review request settings couldn't be saved just now. Everything else on this page was saved." when only the review request settings failed. Click Save all email settings again. If it keeps happening, contact support.
A customer says they didn't get a review request
Check that Send review requests is on and saved, that the customer's Booking Notifications and Marketing Emails are ticked and their email address is right, that nobody ticked Has already reviewed us, and that the booking was checked out within the last few days with no incident logged. Customers who already clicked a review button in an earlier email are not sent another. Also ask them to check their spam folder.
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