Helpful information regarding how to participate in discussion forums.

Q: How do I join/subscribe to an eGroup?
Upon logging in and landing at eGroups Home, you’ll notice four sets of eGroups:

• Legal Marketing Discussions
• Committees
• Chapter
• Support/Feedback

Click on any particular eGroup name or, under “Actions”, select “digest” or “post”.

Confirm your e-mail address, select how you’d like to review future messages and “Save”.

Q: I serve on a committee, but it isn’t listed at eGroups Home.
Contact Membership Services to confirm that your member record reflects participation on a committee.  Please note that synchronization across all of the association’s systems sometimes takes up to 24 hours.

Q: I am affiliated with an LMA Chapter, but it isn’t listed at eGroups Home.
Contact Membership Services to confirm your Chapter affiliation.  Please note that synchronization across all of the association’s systems sometimes takes up to 24 hours.

Q: How do I change how messages are displayed in my inbox?
From eGroups Home, select “My Subscriptions” on the left side of the page.  Select either Text or HTML to establish how messages will be delivered to your e-mail inbox.  You must select SAVE at the bottom of the My Subscriptions page to save your options.

Q: What is the PDA option?
From the My Subscriptions page, you may select PDA to receive specially-formatted posts to your personal digital assistant on a real-time basis. This format includes the ability to respond directly from your PDA instead of responding via LMA Connect.  You cannot receive PDA-formatted daily digests. You must select SAVE at the bottom of the My Subscriptions page to save your options.

Q: How do I unsubscribe from an eGroup?
From the My Subscriptions page, select “Not Subscribed” and select SAVE at the bottom of the My Subscriptions page to save your options.

Q: How do I post a message to an eGroup?
There are two ways to initiate a post to an eGroup:
1.  From eGroups Home, select Post Message from the left side of the screen.  From the scroll down menus, select the eGroup(s) where you’d like to post your message. Enter relevant information and select Save.  Any attachments will be posted to the appropriate eGroup Library.

2.  From eGroups Home, under Actions, select “post”.  From the scroll down menus, select the eGroup(s) where you’d like to post your message. Enter relevant information and select Save. Any attachments will be posted to the appropriate eGroup Library.

Q: How do I respond to others’ posts?
From a received e-mail or the online discussion board, you can click either the “Reply to eGroup” link to send your message to the entire forum, or the “Reply to Sender” link to send your message only to the sender.  We recommend replying only to the sender for comments like “me, too” that add little value to the discussion.

Q: I’m having trouble viewing the HTML e-mail messages. How do I fix this?
If images are not appearing, it is likely that your e-mail client is set to suppress images. This should be something you can change in your security or viewing options. If you would rather receive text-based e-mail, go to the “My Subscriptions” page and select the “Text” format option near the top of the page. Be sure to hit “Save” at the bottom of the page once you’ve made this change.

Q: Why do I have to post messages and reply to them through the Web site?
There are many LMA Connect features that are made possible because of the Web interface:

• When you send an attachment through this new system, it automatically places it in the eGroup Library
• Auto-responses like "out of office" won't clutter up this new system
• Disclaimers and other messages at the end of e-mails will no longer fill pages upon pages

Q: Why do my e-mails contain a warning that says I shouldn’t forward them?
To make it easier to post and reply in the discussion forums, we have enabled an automatic login feature. This means that your login credentials are encrypted in eGroup e-mails.  If you forwarded the message to someone else, he/she would be able to click any of the links and log in to LMA Connect as you. For this reason and for your protection, we strongly advise against forwarding e-mails.

Q: I clicked on the links in the e-mail a few days ago and it logged me into LMA Connect automatically. Why isn’t it working now?
Our highest priority is protecting the information with which you have entrusted us. Because the automatic login potentially allows someone else to log in to LMA Connect as you, we have set these links to expire five days after the message was posted.

Q: Can I search for postings across all eGroups?
Yes. From eGroups Home, click “Advanced Search” in the left navigation. This will let you search based on keywords in the posts, search all or specific forums, and select the date range in which you’d like to search.

Q: How do I change the information showing up in the signature block?
If you would like to change the information that appears or the order in which it appears, click the “My Signature” link in the left navigation.  You can add, delete or reorganize the fields that show up in your signature. Please note that the content of these fields is pulled directly from your profile, so if you want to change the information itself, you will need to make the change to your profile.