Frequently Asked Questions
Frequently Asked Questions
The Home Screen features seven sections.
The Alerts section features the most recent Alerts from the User’s followed Groups. This section differs from all the other in that it brings the User directly to an Alert rather than the Group Details Tab.
Trending NOW! features Groups that have sent popular Alerts in the recent past.
The Public section shows all available Public Groups, ranked in order of relevance, popularity and proximity to the User.
Emergency Groups collects Auto-Follow Groups that are not being followed by the User.
Auto-Following shows all local emergency Groups that the User is automatically following due to their location.
Following lists all Groups that the User is actively following.
Leading lists all Groups that the User has either created or is authorized to lead.
There are two basic types of Group:
Firstly, there are Public Groups. These Groups can be followed by any Know NOW! User.
Secondly, there are Private Groups, which are unsearchable and can only be followed by invitation from the Group Owner or Leader.
Beyond the two basic types of Group, there is a subset of Public Groups called Emergency Groups. Emergency Groups generally belong to emergency management or other government agencies, with Users in their area following them by default.
There are numerous ways to follow a Public Group and all are very simple.
Firstly, a User can long press any Group Avatar on the Home Screen and press the “Follow” button from the resulting menu.
Next, a User can short press any Group Avatar and select the “Follow” button on the Group Details Tab.
The Map Screen also allows Users to follow Groups. All they have to do is press a Group Avatar and press the orange “Follow” button on the right-hand side of the Group Preview.
Finally, Users can also follow Groups directly from the Search Screen by pressing the orange “Follow” button to the right of any featured Groups.
For Private Groups, the User has to be invited by the Owner or Leader of that Group. Invitations appear both as in-App notifications and also behind an envelope icon in the header of the App. To follow the Group, the User just has to press Accept on the relevant invitation and follow the on-screen prompts.
Yes. Every Alert from your Auto-Followed and Followed Groups will be delivered to your phone as a push notification as soon as it’s sent. However, Know NOW! gives you the option of disabling push notifications for any individual Group by pressing the Disable Notifications button on the Group Details Tab.
Regardless of Know NOW! subscription level, all Users are allowed to follow unlimited Groups.
To create a Group, navigate to the Leading section of the Home Screen, select the Create Group tile and fill in the various fields.
Know NOW! Users of all levels can create unlimited Groups.
As soon as a User follows a Group, the assorted buttons that previously said “Follow” will now say “Unfollow”. Pressing the “Unfollow” button will remove the User from that Group’s Followers.
NOTE: If a User elects to unfollow a Private Group, they will need to be re-invited to the Group if they wish to follow it again in the future.
If you are in the Following view of a Group that you also own or lead, the orange button in the header will allow you to quickly switch to the Leading view. When in Leading mode, this orange button becomes blue and allows you to switch back to the Following view.
The Envelope icon will appear in the header of the App when you have pending invitations that have not yet been accepted or declined. These invitations could be to follow a Private Group, lead a Group or join another User’s Contacts list. Pressing the Envelope will open a list of all outstanding invitations, which the User can either Accept or Decline.
Yes. In order for Emergency Groups to send you Alerts based on your current location, we request that you allow the Know NOW! App to access your location settings. If you allow Know NOW! to always access your location, the App will automatically update your local Emergency Groups without you having to open the App. If you choose to allow Know NOW! to access your location only when using the App, you will need to open the App anytime you travel in order to update your Emergency Groups.
However, if you actively follow any Emergency Groups, you will always receive their Alerts irrespective of your location settings.
To change your Group Avatar, navigate to the Leading view of your Group and press the Avatar itself. From here, just follow the on-screen instructions.
After creating a Group, you can edit the Group Name, Group Handle, Group Description and Group Location at any time by navigating to the Leading view of that Group and pressing the pencil icon next to Group Details.
If you are in the Leading view of a Group that you also follow, the blue button in the header will allow you to quickly switch to the Following view. When in Following mode, this blue button becomes orange and allows you to switch back to the Leading view.
Solid blue stars next to a Username indicate that that User is a Follower of the Group. In the case of Private Groups, wireframed blue stars denote a User who has been invited to follow the Group but has not yet accepted the invitation.
There is currently one simple way to begin the process of inviting Followers to a Private Group and that is pressing the blue plus icon next to the word “Followers” in the Overview section of the Details Tab will bring you directly to the Invite Followers Screen.
Once you have landed on the Invite Followers Screen, you can either select one of your existing Contacts from the alphabetical list or you can type in the Search bar to invite a non-Contact. Once you have found your desired User, press their Username and follow the on-screen instructions.
There are two ways to get to the Create Alert Screen. The first way is to go to the Leading view of the relevant Group and press the Alerts Tab. While on the Alerts Tab, an orange Create Alert button will always appear at the bottom of the screen above the Main Navigation. Pressing this will bring you to the Create Alert Screen.
Alternatively, if you long press any Group Avatar in the Leading section of the Home Screen, you can press the Create Alert button from the resulting modal.
Once you land on the Create Alert Screen, there are six distinct sections.
Firstly, there is the optional Subject field which allows you to give a 26-character subject to the Alert.
Next, there is an optional field called Message where the Alert Sender can include an Alert Message up to 280 characters.
The third section is the Media Navigation which allows the Sender to add (in order) Locations, Photo/Video, Audio, Documents and Web Links to the Alert. This section is also optional.
NOTE: While each of the first three sections are individually optional, one of the three is required in order to send an Alert.
The fourth section is Send Date, which allows the Sender to either send an Alert immediately or schedule an Alert up to 364 days into the future. The Send Date defaults to “Now”.
The fifth section is Expiration Date, which allows the Sender to set an Alert Expiration up to 30 days after the Send Date. The Expiration Date defaults to 5 days after the Send Date.
Once you have entered all of your desired information, pressing the Preview Alert button will allow you to see the exact Alert that your Followers will receive, to which you can click Send or Cancel.
NOTE: Emergency Groups will have one additional field, namely Alert Priority, where they can select either Non-Critical or Critical.
If the Sender wants to add Locations to an Alert, they must first press the Locations button on the Create Alert Screen, which is the first of the five blue buttons in middle of the screen. This will bring them to the Alert Locations Map. There are two main ways to add Locations to the map.
Firstly, the Sender can type the address or coordinates of the Location they want to add into the Search Map bar at the top of the screen. Pressing enter/return on their desired address or selecting one from the suggestion list will drop an Alert Pin at that location. This will then open the Pin Information box where the Sender must enter a Location Name and also has the option of entering a radius around the Pin. When the Sender is happy with the Pin Information, pressing Save to List will add the Pin to the Locations List or pressing Save to Alert will save the Location to the Alert and return to the Create Alert Screen.
The second method of adding a Location to the map is to press the pin button on the map controls toolbar on the right-side of the screen (the second of the three buttons) and then press the map at the desired location. This will drop an Alert Pin and open the Pin Information box as mentioned above with the same Save to List and Save to Alert buttons mentioned previously.
The Sender also has the option of adding more Alert Pins by doing either of the abovementioned actions again.
If the Sender wants to return to the Create Alert Screen without saving any Locations, they can press the X in the top right-hand corner of the screen.
To delete an Alert, the Group Owner or Leader can either press the Alert and select the trash can in the Alert Subject bar or press the three-dot menu next to the Alert in the Alerts Tab and select Delete. Both actions will then open a modal informing the Owner or Leader that deleting an Alert is a terminal action to which they can press Delete or Cancel.
To change the email address or phone number associated with your account, navigate to the menu button in the top right-hand corner of the screen and select Settings from the resulting menu. This will bring you to the Account Tab of the Setting Screen. The first section of the Account Tab is the Account Information section. Here, pressing the existing Email or Phone Number will allow you to edit it, along with allowing you to set one of them as your primary contact method.
To change the password on your account, navigate to the menu button in the top right-hand corner of the screen and select Settings from the resulting menu. This will bring you to the Account Tab of the Settings Screen. The first section of the Account Tab is the Account Information section. Here, pressing Change Password will bring you to a new screen that requires you to enter your old password along with your desired password. If you are successful with the password change, you will be automatically logged out of Know NOW! with the new password being required to log back in.
If you are an active Know NOW! Plus subscriber but want to return to a free Know NOW! account, you can do so by following the steps below:
- Apple: On your Apple device, open the Settings app and tap your name. From there, tap Subscriptions, select Know NOW! and press Cancel Subscription.
- Android: On your Android device, go to your subscriptions in Google Play. Select Know NOW!, press Cancel subscription and follow the instructions.
The Contacts section allows Users to verify other Know NOW! Users without adding them to a Group as a Leader or Follower. This feature is particularly useful if a User has numerous people that they easily want to add to a Group later.
To invite Contacts, you must first navigate to the menu button in the top right-hand corner of the screen and select Contacts from the resulting menu. This will open the Contacts Screen, which shows all of your current Contacts. To invite a new Contact, simply press the Invite Contacts button that is always positioned at the bottom of the Contacts Screen. This will bring you to the Invite Contacts Screen where you can search the entirety of the Know NOW! App for the User you wish to invite. Once you have found your desired User, simply press their Username and follow the on-screen instructions to invite them to your Contacts list. NOTE: Inviting a Contact is a reciprocal act, i.e., if another User accepts your invitation, you will be added to each other’s Contacts lists.