Guides
Thank first-time GitHub contributors to encourage future participation
Time to complete: 5 minutes
One way you can encourage more engagement with your GitHub repos is to thank anyone who contributes to your repos for the first time. This simple gesture can really help new members feel valued for their efforts and motivate them to keep contribute more the future.
By the end of this guide you will know how to use Orbit to:
1) Find members who contributed to your GitHub repos for the first time.
2) Send them a thank you message.
Pre-requisites
You must have the GitHub integration connected in order to perform this playbook.
Directions
Step 1) Create a list of first-time GitHub contributors
- Go to the Lists tab in your workspace. Click Create new list. Add a name and a description. In this case, we’ll use the following:
Name: Thank New GitHub Contributors
Description: Send a thank you message to members who contributed to your GitHub repos for the first time (i.e. opened an issue, commented on an issue, opened a PR, merged a PR)
Step 2) Auto-add members to your list
Next, we will use workflows to auto-add members to your list.
- Go to the Workflows Tab. Select Add Member to List
- Set up filters for your workflow. They should look as follows:
- For workflow step 2, choose your list from the dropdown. Then click Run Workflow. All currently matching members will be added to your list.
Step 3) Send your thank you message
- Scan your list for newly added members and figure out which ones you want to thank. The best way to do this is to click on the Activity button in the Activity column and see their latest activity.
- If the GitHub contribution seems significant, click View on GitHub to be brought directly to the PR or issue in GitHub
- From GitHub, send your thank you message as a comment. In this case, our DM will say:
- Go back to the list and update that member’s status to Done.
Thanks so much for contributing to our GitHub repo and making our code better. It means a lot to us.
