Notifications
Summarize
Summary of Notifications
Notifications in ServiceNow let you alert users about important application events and share information through various channels such as email, SMS, and push notifications. They support multilingual interactions by adding translations, enhancing user engagement across different languages.
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Triggers
You can configure notifications to trigger either from table updates or specific events. Event-driven notifications are preferred when conditions are complex or when notifications originate from workflows, facilitating easier debugging and more precise control. Simple notifications can use the Notification activity in a workflow or the Send an email action in Flow Designer, while complex or critical notifications benefit from triggering events and linking notifications to those events.
Notification Content
Notifications support dynamic content through email templates, email scripts, and notification variables:
- Notification variables enable insertion of field values from the base record or related records using dot-walking, without scripting.
- Email scripts allow further customization, such as setting recipient and sender details.
- Reusable content should be organized into email templates for efficiency and consistency.
- Scripts should be created in System Notifications > Email > Notification Email Script and referenced appropriately to ensure proper functionality.
Configuring Recipients
Notifications can be sent to users, groups, or specific email addresses. When sending to groups, enabling the "Include members" option ensures all group members receive the notification, not just the group email address.
Subscription-based notifications allow recipients to choose which emails they want to receive. Administrators can make certain notifications mandatory, overriding user preferences. Unsubscribe links can be included to give users control over their subscriptions.
Additional Features and Best Practices
- Email watermarks are included by default to track and process user responses correctly; they should only be omitted when no response is expected.
- For troubleshooting, consult the "Troubleshooting Outbound Email" knowledge base article available via the ServiceNow HI portal.
After the data model is defined and users are able to interact with the application, determine how the application should communicate with users. Configure notifications to alert users to important application related events, share application information in the knowledge base, and add translations to allow users to interact with the application in their native language.
The ServiceNow AI Platform can notify users by email, SMS text message, or push notifications.
Triggers: Event Driven Notifications vs Table Updates
Configure notifications to trigger based on updates to a table or based on an event. Use event-based triggering when triggering requirements cannot be easily implemented in the notification conditions or when the notification is triggered from a Workflow. Creating specific events also enables easier notification debugging.
Use the Notification activity in a workflow or the Send an email action in Flow Designer for simple notification use cases. For complex or critical notifications, trigger an event from a workflow or a Flow Designer flow and configure a notification to fire off that event.
Notification Content
ServiceNow notifications support static and dynamic content using email templates, email scripts, and notification variables.
Notification variables add dynamic information to the body of a notification, such as field values from the base record. The variables also support dot-walking, which allows field values from any related records to be included in the content without scripting.
For example, use the URI_REF variable to point to the record that originated the email.
Use email scripts or dot-walk from the base record to include dynamic content that is not available in the record. Use the mail script API to set notification details, such as the recipient and sender addresses, etc.
Create email templates for content used in multiple notifications. Adding the content to an email template enables administrators to create reusable content for the subject line and message body of email notifications.
Configure recipients
ServiceNow emails can be sent to users, groups, or individual email addresses. When sending to groups, check the Include members field on the group record for the notification to be sent to all members of the group in addition to the group email.
Subscription-based notifications - Select the Subscribable option on the notification to allow recipients to pick and choose the emails they want to receive.
For a subscription-based notification, the Mandatory option can be set to true for the recipients to receive the notification regardless of their individual preferences. Optionally, configure unsubscribe links in the outgoing email to allow users to remove themselves from the notification.
ServiceNow uses email watermarks to correctly process user responses to notifications. Email notifications automatically include watermarks unless the Omit watermark option is selected in the notification. Omit watermarks only when no email response is expected from the recipients.
The Troubleshooting Outbound Email knowledge base article provides troubleshooting steps for the most common notification issues. Log in to the HI portal (https://hi.service-now.com) to access the article.