Who to call, and who to text
This is the only part that really matters. Immediate family, closest friends and anyone who would be devastated to learn it from a group message should be told by phone, individually, by someone who knows them.
Everyone else, which is usually the larger group, needs the service details rather than the news itself. Colleagues, neighbours, congregation members, old friends and extended family are all in that group.
Getting that division right in the first hour prevents the kind of hurt that lasts years. The list is for logistics, not for telling people someone has died.
What the message needs to contain
Four things: whose service it is, the date, the time and the place. Anything else can follow later.
A working example: SERVICE FOR ROBERT HALE: Friday March 14, 11am, St Anne's Church, 40 Mill Lane. Reception afterwards at the church hall.
If there are two parts, such as a service and a burial, say which one people are being invited to. Guests unsure whether they are welcome at the graveside will often stay away from both.
Livestream links and people who cannot travel
Most funeral homes and many places of worship now offer a livestream, and the link reaching everyone is the difference between a distant relative watching and missing it entirely.
Send the link as its own message the day before, not buried in the original announcement. People search their phone for it in the hour before the service, and a standalone message is far easier to find.
Include the time zone if family are spread across the country. It is a small detail that prevents someone joining an hour late.
When things change at short notice
Funeral arrangements move more often than people expect. A time shifts, a venue changes, a burial is delayed.
One message to everyone at once is far easier than a round of phone calls at a moment when the family has no capacity for them, and it is covered by the payment already made.
Because it sends at a set time each day, anything changing within the hour still needs phone calls. Scheduling messages in advance covers what can be set up ahead.
Letting someone else handle it
The person organising this does not have to be the closest family member, and usually should not be. A cousin, a family friend, or someone from the congregation can set it up and send the messages.
Sharing the sign-up link is something anyone can do. It can go into a family group chat, a workplace, or a congregation, and people add themselves without the family being asked for numbers.
For a memorial held weeks or months later, the same approach works with more time to prepare. How congregations reach their members covers the community side, which often overlaps.