Canvas Catalog Needs Your Feedback: Custom Messages for Registration Forms

[matekiss]

At Instructure, we’re constantly working to enhance your experience with Canvas Catalog, and we’re excited to introduce a potential new feature: Custom Messages on Registration Forms! But we need your expertise to shape it into something truly impactful.

This feature would allow course administrators to include personalized messages on registration forms—helpful for sharing course-specific policies, payment reminders, or a welcoming touch. As we explore this idea, we want your insights to ensure it fits seamlessly into your workflow and meets your needs.

Why Your Feedback Matters

We believe that the best features are designed with our users in mind. This questionnaire is your opportunity to tell us what matters most to you. Should custom messages be tied to individual courses, or should there be a single message for all courses? How would you like these messages to appear? Your responses will guide us in making thoughtful, user-centric decisions.

Share Your Thoughts in Just a Few Minutes!

We’ve designed a short and engaging questionnaire to gather your input. It only takes a few minutes, and every response will help us create a feature that works best for our users.

Fill out the questionnaire here: https://forms.gle/ELDuoU3jJkSFuBhCA
Deadline: February 28

Let’s Build Together

We’re excited about this journey and can’t wait to see what we can achieve with your help. Whether you’re an administrator, instructor, or key stakeholder, your input is invaluable.

Thank you for your continued support and enthusiasm. Let’s create something amazing—together.

Best,
Máté

[jb2483929]

Sounds useful! Form needs to be made public.

[matekiss]

Thanks @jb2483929 ! Could you please try now?

[jb2483929]

Yes, can access now

[rpsloan]

Hi @matekiss! For those who do not use user registrations (since our third-party tool allows us to create accounts via Canvas) would this also become available for user enrollments page? If it's not doable, maybe an easier way to edit the text above/below the Enroll/Bulk Purchase buttons on the course listing page (on the right-hand side of the course image). Having the ability for custom messages would be loved by our catalog admins, but this won't be usable for them due it being tied to registration.

[hechla]

Hello @matekiss ,

I'm a little confused because the Registration only needs to happen once. While a user normally clicks through a course listing to get to the Registration page the registration isn't actually tied to a listing. When I inquired if there was any way to get analytics on which course listing the user clicked through to get the Registration page I was told that information wasn't available. And if the user is already signed in they won't get the Registration page at all so they wouldn't see any custom information on the Registration page. Therefore I would be hesitant to include anything too important on there. 

[matekiss]

Hi @rpsloan ,

That’s a great question! Right now, we’re still in the Discovery phase, so nothing is set in stone yet—we're figuring out what would be the most useful based entirely on feedback like yours. I totally get that if you're not using user registrations, this feature as initially described might not be all that helpful. Expanding it to the enrollment page or adding a way to customize the text near the Enroll/Bulk Purchase buttons on the course listing page is a really interesting idea! That could make messaging way more flexible for admins.

Curious—would you prefer a single message for all courses, or should it be course-specific? And do you see a need for different messages depending on whether someone is just browsing vs. already enrolled?

I’ll pass this along to the team as we explore the best approach, and I’d love for you to share any other thoughts in the questionnaire. The more input we get, the better we can shape this into something truly valuable for Catalog admins like you!

Thanks for the great feedback—keep it coming!

Best,
Máté

[matekiss]

Hello @hechla,

That’s a really insightful point—thanks for bringing it up! You’re absolutely right that registration only happens once per user, and if they’re already signed in, they wouldn’t see the Registration page again. That’s definitely something we need to factor in when shaping this feature. Right now, we’re still in the Discovery phase, meaning nothing is finalized yet—we’re gathering feedback to understand the best way to approach this. If a course-specific message is important, we might need to explore other locations where it could appear to ensure visibility, especially for returning users who don’t go through registration again.

Would something like an optional message on the enrollment page or course listing be more useful in your case? Or do you think there are other touchpoints where admins should be able to communicate key information?

I really appreciate you thinking through this with us! Looking forward to hearing your thoughts.

Best,
Máté

[hechla]

Hello @matekiss,

An optional message on the enrollment page would definitely be better. I know I was helping someone recently put a custom message on their enrollment page when the enrollment was closed, but they had a wait list option. Anyway, we figured out how to customize the ProductEnrollment__Notice but that changes it for all listings. So being able to customize something on that page would be great. All scenarios should be taken into account... 

• While enrollment is open, normal. 
• Before enrollment is open.
• After enrollment period closes.
• Enrollment is full and there's a wait list
• Enrollment is full and there's no wait list. 

Is that all of the scenarios? 

I mean, there could be other needs for custom messaging outside of that reasoning. We recently ran a promotion for January 2025 (25% off all of our non-credit courses) but there was one course we didn't want it to apply to. So, I added a custom banner to the Catalog home page, notifying users of the promotion, and the exception) and on the course detail page I included a note down in the description that this course wasn't eligible for the promotion. Granted, someone could have used the promotion code on that course if they wanted because there's currently no way to easily set a promotion code for all listing except one, but that's another issue. Anyway, having the ability to include a custom message up under the enroll now button would have been great. 

[KaylynnPalmer]

Sounds Good

[rpsloan]

@matekiss Thanks for sharing that information! I think the use cases that @hechla has listed would be similar to us.

[matekiss]

Hello @hechla , @rpsloan 

Really appreciate you both taking the time to share your thoughts! @hechla, your breakdown of different enrollment scenarios is super helpful—it’s exactly the kind of detail that helps us design features that truly meet user needs. And @rpsloan, knowing that these use cases resonate with you as well is great validation that we’re on the right track. Right now, we’re focusing specifically on custom messaging for the registration page, but this discussion has definitely surfaced other interesting use cases that are worth exploring. The idea of having more targeted messaging in different parts of the enrollment journey—like under the "Enroll Now" button—makes a lot of sense. While that’s outside the scope of this particular questionnaire, I’m definitely noting it down as something to consider.

If you haven’t already, I’d love your input in the questionnaire to help us shape the registration page messaging feature in the best way possible. Thanks again for your insights—I always appreciate hearing how these potential features could make a real difference for you!

Best,
Máté