Newsfeed & Announcements

This topic explains how to use the Newsfeed in Coursebox to share announcements, micro-learning, events, embedded videos and attachments with your whole learner community. It covers how the Newsfeed differs from Groups, how to control who can post and react, and how to schedule, broadcast and pin content so the right message reaches the right people at the right time.

For Business & Enterprise Accounts only. To upgrade your account, go to: https://www.coursebox.ai/pricing.

Watch the tutorial videos found in our YouTube Video Library.

What is the Newsfeed

The Newsfeed is your platform’s central communication hub. It sits at the top of the left-hand menu under Announcements and is where Super Admins, Approved Admins, Approved Experts and (optionally) learners share updates with the whole community.

Posts can include:

Simple text updates
Attached files, PDFs and images
Embedded videos (YouTube, Vimeo) and external links
Interactive HTML content (forms, iframes, embeds)
Events with date, time and RSVP

Learners can like, comment on and react to posts, creating a social learning environment alongside the formal courses. Posts can also be scheduled in advance and marked for inclusion in email broadcasts so they reach learners who don’t log in every day.

Newsfeed vs Groups

Both the Newsfeed and Groups support posts, comments, files and embeds. The difference is who sees them.

Feature	Newsfeed	Groups
Audience	Every user in your installation	Only members of that specific Group
Best for	Platform-wide announcements, micro-learning drops, events open to all	Cohort discussions, paid memberships, private communities, webinar groups
Visibility control	Influencer Modes and User Types permissions	Group privacy setting (Public, Private, Paid)
Email broadcast	Yes, on a per-post basis	Yes, with a configurable broadcast frequency

Tip: Use the Newsfeed for things every learner should see (a new feature, a global event, a CEO update). Use a Group when the message is only relevant to a subset of users.

Enable the Newsfeed

The Newsfeed is enabled by default on Business and Enterprise plans. If it has been hidden from the left-hand menu, a Super Admin can re-enable it.

Navigate to Settings.
Scroll to Manage Left Hand Menu Items Visibility.
Locate Announcements (the Newsfeed) in the list.
Click the visibility (eye) icon to show it.

For details on left-hand menu visibility, see User Types, Access, Permissions & Visibility.

Control who can post on the Newsfeed

By default, every user can post on the Newsfeed because Coursebox is designed as a social learning platform. A Super Admin can restrict posting to specific user types.

Navigate to Settings on the Course Page.
Scroll down to locate the News Posts section.
Click Change access.
Tick the checkboxes for the user types you want to allow to post (for example: Super Admin, Approved Admin, Approved Expert, Learner).
Click Save.

Tip: For corporate training portals, restrict posting to Approved Admins and Approved Experts so the Newsfeed stays curated. For community-led learning environments, leave it open to all learners.

For the full walkthrough, see Change Access to Newsfeed Posts.

Control who can like and comment

Engagement permissions are managed separately from posting permissions.

Navigate to Settings.
Scroll to the News Reactions section.
Click Change access.
Tick the user types that should be able to like and comment on posts.
Click Save.

For the full walkthrough, see Change Access to News Reactions.

What you can post

The Newsfeed supports the same post types as Groups:

Simple text — short updates, reflections, announcements.
Images and files — attach a PDF, document or image to the post.
Events — create a date-bound post that members can RSVP to.
Embedded videos and links — paste a YouTube or Vimeo URL and Coursebox renders the player inline.
Interactive HTML embed — paste an iframe or HTML snippet to surface forms (Typeform, Google Forms), calendars (Calendly), surveys, Looms, slide decks or any other web embed.

Tip: HTML embed is the most powerful and least-used option. Use it to drop a Calendly link for a live AMA, a Typeform pulse survey, or an interactive H5P element directly into the feed.

Create a post

Open the Newsfeed (Announcements) from the left-hand menu.
Click into the “Share something...” field at the top.
Type your message.

Use the icons below the field to add:

Advanced — formatting options including the HTML embed view
Add — attach a file, image or PDF
Group — limit the post to a specific Group instead of the full Newsfeed
User Types — limit the post to specific user roles
Events — turn the post into a calendar event

Click the paper-plane (send) icon to publish.

Schedule a post

You can publish a post immediately or schedule it for a future date and time.

Click the arrow next to the send icon.
Select Schedule.
Choose the date and time.
Click Schedule to confirm.

Tip: Schedule a week of micro-learning drops on Monday morning. Each post fires on its own day without you needing to log in.

Include a post in an email broadcast

Posts can be sent to learners by email so they reach inboxes, not just the in-platform feed.

When creating or editing a post, open the Advanced options.
Tick the Include in email broadcast option.
The post will be included in the next scheduled broadcast email to the configured recipients.

Broadcast frequency is set at the Group or platform level. For example, if broadcast frequency is set to 1, members receive an email for every qualifying post; if set to 5, they receive a digest after every five posts.

Mention a user or a Group in a post

The Newsfeed supports @ mentions for both users and Groups.

Type @ followed by a user’s name to tag a learner. They will receive a notification.
Type @ followed by a Group name to link the Group into your post. Members of that Group will be notified.

For more on mentions, see Mention a Group in a Post.

Reactions, likes and comments

Learners can react to posts with likes and threaded comments. Comments support @ mentions, attachments and embedded media in the same way as posts.

Reaction permissions are controlled through Change Access to News Reactions (see above). If reactions are disabled for a user type, members of that type can still read posts but cannot like or comment.

Control whose posts learners see (Influencer Modes)

By default, every user automatically follows the Super Admin, so all learners see the Super Admin’s Newsfeed posts and any posts from Groups they belong to. Super Admins can broaden this so learners also see posts from other contributors.

Navigate to Settings.
Locate the Influencer Modes section.

Choose one of:

Super Admin only (default) — only Super Admin posts appear in everyone’s feed.
Approved Experts — learners auto-follow Approved Experts as well.
All users — learners see every user’s posts.

Click Save.

Tip: “Approved Experts” mode is the right setting for most enterprise learning portals. It lets your subject-matter experts and facilitators reach the whole community without opening the feed to every learner.

For details, see Set Influencer Modes.

The top-right widget on the Newsfeed home page doubles as the first post every new user sees when they log in. This is the fastest way to onboard new learners with a welcome message, a video, a checklist or a link to a starter course.

Open the Newsfeed.
Click the pencil (edit) icon on the top-right widget.
Edit the title, description, embedded video, image or attached file.
Click Save.

The next time a new user logs in, this content appears as their welcome post. To preview, click Setup in the Onboarding Welcome Popup settings.

For more, see Manage Onboarding Welcome Pop Up.

Super Admins can choose whether learners can share Newsfeed posts to external social media (LinkedIn, Facebook, X).

Navigate to Settings.
Locate the Manage Social Media sharing section.
Toggle social sharing ON or OFF for posts and Learning independently.
Click Save.

Tip: Enabling social sharing for posts turns your most engaging Newsfeed updates into organic marketing for your training brand.

Common use cases

Daily or weekly micro-learning drops. Schedule a short post each morning with a tip, video or reflection prompt.
Welcome message for new users. Use the onboarding widget to greet new learners with a video walkthrough.
Platform-wide announcements. New courses, upcoming maintenance, policy updates, leadership messages.
Event invitations. Create an Event post for live webinars, Q&A sessions or in-person workshops.
Embedded forms and surveys. Drop a Typeform, Google Form or Coursebox survey into a post to gather feedback from the whole community.
Showcase learner achievements. Tag learners who have completed certifications or won internal awards.
Push out external content. Embed YouTube videos, podcast episodes or articles relevant to your learners’ development.