How to send a web push notification

Before you start

• You need subscribers — people who clicked "Allow" on your notification prompt. With none, there's no one to send to.
• If email is switched on for your relaybell, your account email must be verified first, or the send is blocked with the message "Verify your email to send notifications."
• Topics and Segments only appear in the "Send to" list after you've created them, both on the Audience tab. Until then you can only send to All subscribers.
• Personalization: {country} and {language} work automatically. {name} and {city} only fill in if that data was attached to each subscriber through your website code (the SDK) — usually a one-time developer task; until then those two show the fallback text.

Set it up

1. 1Click Send in the left menu. You'll see a form on the left and a phone-style Live preview on the right.
2. 2Type a Title (required) — the bold first line, e.g. "Flash sale". Keep it short; long titles get cut off on phones.
3. 3Type a Message — the smaller line underneath. It's optional to send, but a notification with only a title looks bare, so almost always fill it in.
4. 4(Optional) Personalize: to greet people by name, click +name (or +city, +country, +language) under the message. It drops a placeholder like {name} into the message. Always add a fallback in case you don't have that detail on file — type it as {name|there} so people with no name saved see "there" instead of a gap.
5. 5(Optional) Add an emoji: click the emoji button and pick one — it's added to the end of the message.
6. 6(Optional) Stuck on wording? Click Suggest to get AI-written alternatives (you must have typed a title or message first). Tap any suggestion to drop it into the title and message.
7. 7Fill in the Click URL — the web page that opens when someone taps the notification, e.g. https://example.com/sale. Leave it blank and relaybell uses the default link set in your Settings.
8. 8Choose who gets it under "Send to": All subscribers, or a Topic or Segment if you've created any on the Audience tab (they only appear in the list once they exist).
9. 9(Optional) Turn on A/B test, Delivery options, or Languages — each is explained below.
10. 10Click the blue button to send. It reads "Send to all subscribers" for an immediate send, or "Schedule per-timezone" if you turned on local-time delivery. You'll see a "Queued!" confirmation and the form clears.
11. 11Check the Activity tab afterward to see deliveries and clicks.

Every setting, explained

Send to (targeting)

Pick one audience: All subscribers (everyone), a Topic (a group people opted into), or a Segment (a saved group based on their details). Topics and Segments only show up here once you've created them. More advanced targeting — excluding a group, or messaging one specific person — isn't in this screen; it's only available through the API (a developer tool).

Personalization tokens {name}

Placeholders replaced with each subscriber's own value. Two of them — {country} and {language} — are captured automatically from the browser when someone subscribes, so they just work with no extra setup. The other two — {name} and {city} — only fill in if that detail was attached to the subscriber through your website code (the SDK's setTags), since there's nowhere in the dashboard to type someone's name. Always add a fallback with a pipe, like {name|there}, so anyone missing the detail sees sensible text.

Suggest (AI-assisted)

Rewrites your copy for you. Type a rough title or message first (the button stays greyed out until you do), click Suggest, then tap any option to load it into the title and message. When an AI key is configured it uses AI; otherwise it falls back to smart templated suggestions — either way you get three tappable options.

A/B test — send two versions, keep the winner

Sends two versions so you can see which gets more clicks. Your title/message at the top is Variant A; you fill in a Variant B title, message, and optional link. By default subscribers are split between the two. Tick Auto-pick winner and relaybell first tries both on a small share of people (you set the %, default 20), waits a set number of hours (default 4), then automatically sends the better-performing version to everyone else.

Send at each subscriber's local time

Instead of everyone getting it the instant you hit Send, each person receives it at the clock time you pick (default 9:00 AM) in their own time zone — delivered within 24 hours. Turning this on changes the send button to "Schedule per-timezone".

Smart send-time

relaybell works out the hour each individual person is usually most active and delivers to them then, automatically — no time for you to set.

Expire after (hours)

How long the notification stays valid. If a device is offline, the push is dropped after this many hours rather than arriving stale. Leave it blank for the 24-hour default; the maximum is 28 days.

Languages

Write the title and message in other languages. Add a row, enter a 2-letter code (like es for Spanish), and type the translated title and message. Each subscriber automatically gets the version matching their browser's language, and falls back to your main copy if there's no match. (Only the title and message translate — not the link.)

Templates / Save as template

Save a message you send often so you don't retype it. Click "Save as template", give it a name, and it appears as a pill at the top of the form — click the pill to load it, or the × to delete it. A template only remembers the title, message, and click URL; it does not save your targeting, A/B, delivery, or language choices.