Create a broadcast group with dynamic group members

As part of an emergency preparedness program, we want to be able to send notifications to all employees based on the West Coast of the United States whenever a natural disaster affects the area.

We want to send notifications to all group members immediately, regardless of how other members respond to the notification. To do this, we can use the broadcast group type. Broadcast groups notify all members at the same time and do not use shift schedules or escalation paths. They are intended for situations where we need to contact all members of a group simultaneously. To ensure that this broadcast group stays current as more users are added to xMatters, we'll also use dynamic groups to populate the group membership. Dynamic groups are automatically generated to include members that match specified criteria. In this case, we'll add dynamic groups that select recipients based on their site. This ensures that new xMatters users will be included in the group as long as they are assigned to an appropriate site.

We can also restrict who can modify and target this group so that only authorized users can send notifications or change its membership.

Create a broadcast group

From the Groups tab, click Add Group.
In the Name field of the Add Group dialog box, type the group name, 'West Coast Employees'.
Add a description, 'Employees based in our Washington, Oregon, and California offices'.
Select Broadcast Group as the Group Type.
From the Members tab, type the name of a user, device, broadcast group, or dynamic group you want to add in the search field.
- In this example, begin typing 'Washington'. When the 'Washington Employees' dynamic group is displayed, click its name to add it to the members list.
- Repeat this step for the remaining members you want to add to the group. In this example, add the dynamic groups 'Oregon Employees' and 'California Employees'.
Click Save. The broadcast group interface is displayed.
To change who can modify this group, click the People tab. In the Group Admins section, click Add Group Admins and search for and select the users who will have permission to edit the group, add and remove members, target the group for notification, and delete the group.
- In this example, add Mary McBride as a group admin.
Click Add.
To change who can view and target this group for notification, in the Observers section of the People tab click Manage Observers. By default, the group is observed by all roles.
- In this example, select Observed By Selectedthen, Group Supervisor.
Click Save.
From the Overview tab, click Options and select Edit Group.
- Deselect Allow Duplicates so members do not receive more than one notification if they are included in the group multiple times.
- Enable Use Failsafe Devices so xMatters will contact a member’s failsafe device if they do not have any devices with an active timeframe. (Users must configure a device as failsafe in their personal device settings.)
- From the Site to Use for Holidays menu, select None. This prevents the group from becoming inactive on holidays.