Does your company currently run or plan to run events that require registrations, such as seminars, training classes, non-profit fund-raisers, corporate events, or even a large-scale event such as a concert, a sporting or religious event, or any kind of event where people need to book to attend?
Co-ordinating event sign-ups can be a complex process. You will most likely have to co-ordinate event schedules, date availability, attendee numbers, data collection, payment processing and invoicing, confirmations and reservations, reminders, refunds and cancellations … perhaps even accommodating special needs and issuing tickets to attendees.
There are many advantages to setting up an online event registration system. It can streamline your business processes, save time and lower expenses, help you easily reproduce recurring events, give event managers more control, improve client experience and increase your sales.
The problem is that this can be quite expensive.
The good news is that if you own a WordPress-powered digital presence, you can install an inexpensive and professional online event booking system.
Presenting …
Event Espresso – WordPress Event Management And Ticketing Registration System
Plugin Description
The Event Espresso online event registration WordPress software lets you easily create an event and start receiving bookings literally in minutes.
(Set up multiple events and take online event registrations with Event Espresso)
Event Espresso is a versatile and feature-rich plugin that gives you complete control of your event registration management process.
Create custom event registration forms
You can employ multiple event registration strategies, from simple online sign-ups and straight up selling tickets, to creating custom registration forms for collecting detailed information about your event participants, or integrating your event bookings with social media sites like Facebook.
View detailed information about your event attendees
Important: Currently, Event Espresso offers two different versions of their plugin: EE 3 and EE 4. The new Event Espresso 4 is fundamentally different than the older Event Espresso 3, as the plugin has been rebuilt using a different structure to allow for future growth. The Event Espresso 4 plugin software has different features, user interface, data structure, coding method and price. The company plans to eventually phase out EE 3, so keep this in mind as you read more about this plugin.
For more details, visit the plugin site here:
Benefits
Here are just a few of the benefits and advantages of using Event Espresso to manage event registrations on your website:
Automated Event Registration Management
Event Espresso provides you with everything you need to turn your current online presence into a feature-rich and professional event management site … from custom registration forms and automated response emails, to seating capacity limits, multiple pricing options and discount codes, to printable tickets and seating charts.
Better Business Productivity
By using an online event registration solution like Event Espresso, you save time and increase your business productivity by literally doing away with the chore of processing registrations manually.
Basically, you are making it easier for event attendees to complete the registration process by themselves.
Letting your participants to do the data entry frees you up from doing admin work and lets you focus more of your time on planning a more unique event.
Full Control Over The User Experience
As you will soon discover, Event Espresso gives you full control over the event management process that you want your attendees to experience.
Additional plugin benefits include the following:
- Less Costs: The Event Espresso plugin is a very inexpensive online event registration management solution compared to other options or using a 3rd-party service. This is made possible by using a model where you start with the core plugin (which suits the needs of most users) and buy add ons only if you need extra functionality.
- Increased Sales: Event Espresso lets you accept new registrations 24/7. In addition, Event Espresso social sharing and marketing addons (see below) let people interested in registering for your event invite other people they know who may be interested.
- Green & Paperless Event SignUp Process: With Event Espresso, the event registration process can remain entirely online, reducing traditional paper consumption from tasks associated with enrollment.
- Own Your Data. You control all the data gathered from your event participants.
Event Espresso Features
Event Espresso provides functionality to users through built-in features (these come with the software) and optional features that users can purchase, called add-ons.
Event Espresso offers many built-in to WP users. Here are just a few:
- Quick and simple to install and implement. Be up and running in no time.
- Custom Event Registration Forms. Event Espresso lets you collect specific data using custom event registration forms on your site to create a customized experience for your users.
- WordPress Event Calendar. Registrants can easily see your upcoming events and add these to their schedule with a WordPress calendar.
- Tax Admin And Reporting Options. Event Espresso 4 provides several options to handle taxes for an event and report tax fees to registrants when purchasing tickets. Event managers can administer taxes globally or on a ticket-by-ticket basis.
- Custom Post Types. You can Event Espresso into your WP theme and reuse contact details throughout other areas of your site.
- Spam Protection. Eliminate the chance of spammers and robots creating bogus registrations on your website with reCAPTCHA settings to authenticate human activity.
- Mobile Registration And Ticketing Apps. The Event Espresso mobile registration system enables you to authenticate tickets, speed up door registrations, create various check-in “stations” and track all participants.
- Event Check-In List. Generate an exportable list of event registrants and confirm those who have attended.
- No-Ticket Events. You can set up events without making it necessary for registrants to book tickets. Use Event Espresso for all kinds of events, not only those that need tickets.
- Event RSS Feeds. Keep your users updated about your events, drive quality traffic and reach a wider number of prospects with the built-in XML RSS events feed.
- Works With The Most Recent Version Of WordPress. The EE 4 user interface follows all WordPress guidelines to help you create visually attractive event pages that are responsive and mobile-friendly.
- Country-specific Settings. You can configure the country and currency settings that will be used for your events, including currency name, currency symbols, decimal characters and places, country codes, regions, etc.
- Exportable Data. You can export all the information gathered from event attendees into Excel or CSV format for compiling reports, implementing marketing strategies, reviewing attendee statistics, etc..
- Venue Management. The venue manager in EE 4 lets information about a venue to display throughout the Event Espresso admin and the public areas of your website to inform users of the location of your event. The venue profile has many of the standard WordPress settings such as tags, categories, discussion settings, comments, etc., but also lets you reuse venue details such as venue capacity, venue site URL, phone number, physical and/or virtual location, Google map, etc. You can also list venue profiles on different locations in your theme as well as on a venue archive page on your site where you can set up and reuse venue profiles for multiple events or display all the events for a specific venue.
- Automatic Updates. Event Espresso offers easy one-click updating to make sure that you have the latest features and to keep your software installation working with new versions of WordPress.
- Staff Member Management. Save time and keep your data organized by reusing staff profiles for multiple events or displaying their profile using a shortcode in any event description.
- Categorize Events. If you have a number of types of events like free and paid, conference speakers and mastermind sessions, different kinds of exercise classes, etc. you can categorize them to help your participants to find what they’re looking for. You can display all the events in a category on a custom event category page, make the events searchable by category, and color-code your events on the Event Espresso events calendar to make these easier to find, as well as suggesting other events in the categories that interest your existing customers.
Additional features include:
- Hooks, Actions And Filters. These features allow web-based software developers to implement safer and more reliable customizations and extensions to the Event Espresso application that are compatible with the WordPress software platform.
- Maintenance Mode. You can pause registrations for normal site traffic whenever you need to carry out maintenance on your site. You can still work on the back-end of your site during maintenance mode.
- Autonomy, Flexibility & Value For Money: Event Espresso states on their website that their mission is to “empower business and organization leaders with the event registration, ticketing and management tools that maximize the success of events.” To achieve their objectives, the software has been built using a model that provides users with great autonomy and flexibility and delivers value for money in the process.
The premium version of Event Espresso also includes 40+ additional features, including:
- Live-filtering when searching for events within the Event Espresso admin.
- Default surcharge (the same as applying a service fee to tickets).
- Default payment status.
Event Espresso Add-Ons
As mentioned previously, Event Espresso provides “add-ons”, which allow end-users to significantly enhance the functionality of the event management process.
Some of these addons include:
- Events Vector Maps Template Add on: The Vector Maps custom events list template lets you display your upcoming events by location. There are 4 maps available: USA, UK, Canada and Australia.
- Recurring Events Manager Add-on: The Recurring Events management add-on enables you to put events on autopilot by scheduling recurring events weeks or months ahead. You can add as many future events as you like. Event Espresso will then automatically open and close bookings for all recurring events.
- Events Date Range Template Add-on: The Date Range custom event list template enables your users to search for events that occur within a certain date range.
- EE4 Events Social Sharing Addon: Add social sharing features to the end of your Event Espresso “thank you” page that lets your attendees to share a message about their event registration on Twitter and Facebook after booking.
- Custom Files Add-on: The Custom Files add on allows you to bypass certain aspects of the plugin.
- Seating Chart Add-on: The seating chart add on is great for venues and events that sell and reserve seats for attendees in advance. This is perfect for venues and events such as theaters, concert halls, play houses, sports arenas and stadiums. The Seating Chart addon allows you to offer reserved or assigned seating to your events and venues right from your WordPress website. The Seating Chart add-on lets you manage the experience for your customers and design assigned seating charts and attach single pricing to each seat.
- Multi-Event Registration Add on: The Multi-Event registration add-on gives your potential customers the ability to book multiple events at once. In each event listing registrants will be given the option to either register for a single event or add multiple events to their cart. With the Multi-Event Registration add-on, attendees can register for several events at once and even add additional attendees to any of the same events in the same checkout process.
- EE4 Events Table Template Add-on: The Events Table Template addon provides you with an easy-to-use system that allows you to edit the look and feel of your event lists. It comes with a simple table template with category filters, table search, table paging and more. It also lets web developers design their own custom templates using one of the templates included as a source template.
- Infusionsoft Integration Add on: With the Event Espresso 4 Infusionsoft integration all-in-one sales and marketing software addon, you can completely automate your customer relations and email marketing campaigns to seamlessly capture registrant data, track registrations, and accept payments from your website.
Note: Event Espresso regularly adds new features and improvements to its plugin, including new add ons.
For more information about the newest Event Espreso features and add-ons, visit the plugin website here:
Customer Feedback
Here are some of the testimonials that users have written about Event Espresso:
”Event Espresso is one of the nicest Event Managers (WP Plugin) I have come across.” Joe Distefano, Citizen Joe
”Event Espresso event management plugin for WordPress is really an awesome plugin.” Cheryl Smithem, Charleston PR & Design
”I’m so excited to fire Eventbrite! Event Espresso has an amazing WP plugin for event management. We’re testing it now & are very impressed! In a nutshell Event Espresso saves us money & does everything Eventbrite did before. :)” Dustin Nay
Event Espresso Tips
Whether you are a gym owner, trainer, festival planner, or event consultant, there are just unlimited possibilities of what you can achieve with the Event Espresso plugin.
After purchasing the plugin and becoming a licensed owner, search the forums for inspiration and practical suggestions to streamline your event management process or enhance the experience of your customers.
Support
Event Espresso is compatible with other WP plugins and WP themes that follow WP coding standards. If you have problems with the plugin, however, you will find that Event Espresso provides excellent end-user support, as so many of its satisfied users attest:
”Thank you Seth for being so responsive and going above and beyond the call of duty with your app! I highly recommend Event Espresso for its functionality and for the stellar support. Seth has a deep knowledge and understanding of WordPress and has built a tool that is seamless to use for both organizer and attendee alike! After looking at a bunch of alternatives, Event Espresso far surpasses the other apps that are available.” Wendy Troupe, ICS North Pole Express
Event Espresso provides amazing support with access to a support forum, in-depth online documentation with faqs, knowledgebase and how tos, one-on-one support and even a monthly VIP member pass that gives you access to community of developers, designers, event managers, publishers and webmasters that use Event Espresso tools, plus faster support response times.
In addition, Event Espresso boasts an established team of experienced WordPress web developers with a proven track record of support, so this is definitely a solution you can rely on to manage your events.
Software Price
Event Espresso is available in different editions, including a FREE basic edition (named Event Espresso Decaf). For support and advanced plugin features, however, you should consider using one of the ”Pro” plugin editions below:
- Personal License – This enables you to set up Event Espresso on one domain only. Price includes 51+ Premium features, (addons sold separately) and one year of upgrades and support. Cost = $69.95.
- Everything License – This lets you set up Event Espresso on 1 domain only. Includes 51+ Premium features, 29 Premium addons and one year of upgrades and support. Price = $279.95.
- Developer Licensing – This enables you to install Event Espresso on 5 domains. Includes 51+ Premium features, (addons sold separately) and one year of upgrades and support. Cost = $249.95.
Current pricing for the Event Espresso plugin depends on whether there are any promotions or limited-time specials being offered. Presently, the software is selling for the pricing shown above. Check the plugin’s website for the current pricing: Event Espresso – Event Manager And Ticketing Registration System For WordPress
Please Note: The pricing above was current when this article was written. This may not be the actual pricing charged by the plugin developer when you visit the website.
Additional Info
Event Espresso regularly adds new features and improvements to its plugin. Make sure to register for their newsletter when you visit their site to receive the latest information and updates.
Look up the plugin’s documentation pages for answers to common questions about setup and how to use Event Espresso, and the support forums for questions related to a particular use-case, or to report problems and share feedback.
For detailed documentation, demos, downloads, videos, tutorials, FAQ and more, visit the Event Espresso web site.
We Recommend
Event Espresso is the preferred WordPress event registration and ticketing manager software, used and trusted by thousands of WP site owners.
If you own a WordPress-powered site and you intend to run events that require scheduling dates, times and venues, booking participants, and/or booking tickets or seating, then you will probably not find a better WP plugin for your needs than Event Espresso.
For full details, check out the plugin here: Event Espresso – WordPress Event Registration And Ticketing Manager System
***