Does your business currently run or plan to run events that require co-ordinating bookings or registrations, such as workshops, community classes, charity fundraisers, social events, or even a big event such as a music concert, a sporting or religious event, or any kind of event where people need to register to attend?
Co-ordinating event sign-ups can be a complex process. You will probably need to co-ordinate event schedules, dates, participant numbers, data administration, collecting payments and sending invoices, confirmations, reminders, cancellations … perhaps even accommodating special needs and delivering tickets to participants.
There are many benefits to setting up a web-based event registration system. It can streamline your business processes, save time and lower costs, help you easily replicate similar events, give you more control, create a more enjoyable client experience and increase your sales.
The problem is that setting up an online event registration system can be very costly.
The good news is that if you own a WordPress-based site, you can set up an inexpensive and highly professional online event registration system.
Announcing …
Event Espresso – WordPress Event Manager And Ticket Registration Plugin
Plugin Description
The Event Espresso online event registration WordPress plugin enables you to easily schedule your event and begin accepting bookings literally in a few minutes.
(Set up multiple events and receive online event bookings with Event Espresso)
Event Espresso is a feature-rich software that gives you full control of the event registration management process.
Create custom registration forms
You can use a number of event registration strategies, from simple online bookings and straight up ticket-selling, to creating custom registration forms in order to better understand your event participants, or integrating your event bookings with social media sites like Facebook.
View detailed information about event attendees
Note: At the time of writing this article, Event Espresso supports two different versions of their software: Event Espresso 3 and EE 4. The new Event Espresso 4 is considerably different than the older Event Espresso 3, as the software 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 pricing. The company plans to eventually retire Event Espresso 3, so keep this in mind as you read more about the benefits and advantages of using this plugin.
For more details, visit the plugin site here:
Plugin Benefits
Here are just a few of the benefits and advantages of using Event Espresso to manage event registrations on your website:
Hands-Free Event Registration Management
Event Espresso provides you with everything you need to turn your current website or blog into an automated and fully featured event management site … from custom registration forms and automated emails, to maximum seating limits, multiple pricing levels and discount codes, to printable tickets and seating charts.
Better Business Productivity
By using a web-based event registration system like Event Espresso, you save time and improve your business productivity by literally eliminating the need to process registrations manually.
Basically, you are enabling participants to complete the enrollment process on their own.
Allowing your customers to do all of the data entry frees up your time and lets you concentrate more energy on organizing a better event.
Full Control Over The User Experience
As you will see in a moment, Event Espresso gives you full control over the event management process that you want your participants to experience.
Some additional benefits of the plugin include:
- Reduced Costs: Event Espresso gives you an inexpensive online event registration management solution compared to other options or using a 3rd-party service. The cost is kept to a minimum through a model where Event Espresso users purchase the core plugin (which suits the requirements of most users) and then purchase optional add ons only when you need additional functionality.
- Higher Sales: Event Espresso lets you accept new event signups outside traditional business hours. In addition, Event Espresso social and marketing features and addons (see below) let people who are interested in registering for your event share your information with others who may be interested.
- Paperless Event Registration Process: With Event Espresso, your event sign-up process can be transacted entirely online, reducing traditional paper waste from tasks related to admin and record-storage.
- All Information Belongs To You. You control all the data you acquire from event participants.
Features
Event Espresso provides functionality to users through built-in features (these come with the software) and optional features that users can buy for an additional cost, called add-ons.
Event Espresso offers many features to site owners. Here are just some of these:
- Fast and easy to install and set up. Ready to start using in minutes.
- Custom Event Registration. Event Espresso lets you collect unique information using a custom event registration form on your site to plan a unique experience for your clients.
- Custom Notification Emails. Easily set up customized automatic booking and payment confirmation email messages to communicate with event attendees.
- Ticket Selector. Present several ticket options to prospective attendees and let them choose the ticket(s) that will best fit their needs.
- Custom Post Types. You can Event Espresso into your WP theme and display registrant information throughout other areas of your site.
- Default Price Types. Price types let you create new prices that adjust the base ticket price for your system-default ticket.
- In-App Documentation. Event Espresso 4 includes three useful in-app documentation systems: Help Tours, Help Tabs and Tool Tips.
- Contact Profiles And Contact List. Event Espresso 4 lets you know who your customers are and how you have done business with them. Your Contact Profile page stores updated records like the name, biography, contact information, event registration details, private comments, and more about each client.
- Waiting Lists. Latecomers can join a waiting list if your event is completely sold out. You can also specify that wait-listed registrants pre-pay if you plan to add more capacity for your event.
- Public Commenting. Add social interactivity to your event pages by allowing potential prospects to interact with you online via commenting and past participants to post feedback that can help others consider whether or not to sign up. Moderation settings for commenting are configured via the WordPress commenting section.
- Works With The Most Up-To-Date Version Of WP. The EE 4 user interface follows all WordPress guidelines to help you build aesthetically beautiful event pages that are easier to use and mobile-friendly.
- Country Settings. Event managers can configure the country and currency settings to be used to run events, such as currency name, currency signs, decimal signs, characters and places, country codes, regions, and so on.
- Default Tickets. If you find yourself creating similar tickets for many of your events, you can automatically set one of those tickets as your default ticket for your new events simply by checking a box.
- Multiple Event Participant. Event Espresso 4 allows a single person or people to book multiple participants simultaneously. Event managers control how many people can enroll in one session by specifying either limits on ticket purchases per order, or per-ticket minimums and maximums.
- A Community Of Event Experts. Event Espresso provides users with access to an expert community of experienced event managers and other plugin users. You can network with other members of the Event Espresso community using their community chat room, support forums, job board, and social media discussions on Twitter, Facebook, Linkedin and Google+.
- Invoice Payment Reminders. Follow-up potential customers who have not paid in full for their registration with a standard but personalized PDF invoice with one click. Your invoices will address registered attendees who have not paid their registration in full by name, give them the balance they owe, and include a link to the event, a payment link and a link where they can download a PDF invoice.
- Event Posts. Publish your events using pages or posts and take advantage of WordPress custom post types. You can even customize the page templates to display event information in your own unique way.
Additional features include:
- Hooks, Actions And Filters. These allow web-based software developers to implement safer and more reliable customizations and extensions to the Event Espresso plugin that are compatible with WordPress.
- Maintenance Mode. Pause registration capabilities for regular site traffic when you need to make updates on your site. You can continue to work on your event pages during maintenance mode.
- Autonomy, Flexibility & Value: 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 company operates on a modular that provides users with great autonomy and flexibility and delivers value for money in the process.
The premium edition of Event Espresso also includes over 40 added features, including:
- Duplicating events – limits the work of re-entering event data when creating new events.
- Question groups that make it easy to reuse a series of questions for similar events.
- Option to skip the confirmation page in the registration process.
Add ons
As mentioned earlier, Event Espresso provides “add ons”, which allow end-users to further expand the capabilities of your event management process.
Some of these add ons include:
- Events Vector Maps Template Add on: The Vector Maps custom events list template allows you to display all scheduled events by location. There are four maps available: USA, UK, Canada and Australia.
- Recurring Events Manager Add-on: The Recurring Events management addon enables you to put your events on autopilot by scheduling repeated events weeks or months … even years ahead. You can schedule as many future events as you want. Event Espresso will automatically open and close registrations for all recurring events.
- Events Category Accordion Template Add on: The Category Accordion template displays event categories in a simple list. Clicking a category name displays the events related to that category and closes previously open categories.
- Social Media Buttons Add-on: The social media add-on displays Facebook, Twitter and Google+ buttons in your events. The Social Media addon is included free with any of the Event Espresso support licenses.
- Custom Template Add on: The Custom Template addon can display your event lists in a variety of exciting and interesting ways.
- Seating Chart Add on: The seating chart addon is suitable for venues and events that sell and reserve seats for attendees in advance. This is ideal for venues and events such as theaters, concert halls, play houses, sports arenas and stadiums. The Seating Chart add-on allows you to offer reserved or assigned seating to your events and venues right from your WordPress site. The Seating Chart add-on lets you control the experience for your attendees and design assigned seating charts and attach single pricing to each seat.
- EE4 Event Ticketing Addon: The Ticketing addon gives you the ability to generate tickets with bar codes. The Bar Scanning add on adds the ability to scan ticket bar codes. The ticketing add-on includes the ability to customize event tickets. Multiple bar code types are included for managing check-in scans at the venue door. Attendees can either print out their tickets or display them on their mobile devices. The mobile app can be used for checking in or checking out registrants and to validate tickets.
- EE4 Events Table Template Addon: The Events Table Template addon gives event managers a simple and easy-to-use system that allows you to modify 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 included templates as a base template.
- JSON API Add-on: The new Event Espresso JSON API addon gives permission for other applications, web tools, mobile apps, etc… to access your Event Espresso data through an API (Application Programming Interface).
Note: Event Espresso regularly adds new features and improvements to the plugin, including new addons.
For more information about the newest Event Espreso features and add-ons, check out the plugin here:
User Testimonials
Below are some of the many great testimonials that satisfied plugin users have written about Event Espresso:
”I can’t even imagine what I would want the plugin to do that it doesn’t already do. I’m really happy with the features.” Jim Harmer
”Over the next 5-6 years we should be able to claim that we saved the company over $100,000 – Thanks Event Espresso!” David Waterman, KT Benefits & InkItDigital.com
”You guys have done an AWESOME job with this system…promise me to keep up the excellent work you guys are doing, for as long as you can… Respect!” Robert Jarnroth, Jarnroth Digital Productions
Event Espresso Tips
Whether you are a gym owner, teacher, seminar promoter, or event management professional, there are just countless possibilities of what you can do with the Event Espresso software.
After purchasing your copy of the plugin and becoming a registered owner, visit the support forum for new ideas and practical suggestions to streamline your event management process and improve the experience of your participants.
Product Support
Event Espresso is compatible with all WP plugins and WP themes that follow WordPress coding standards. If you have problems with the plugin, however, you will find that Event Espresso provides excellent user support, as so many of its users attest:
”Your plugin saved our client nearly $9000 in development costs because it handled the majority of the functionality we were looking for at a much lower cost. EventEspresso’s staff have been very responsive to our needs when we have them (which has been rare, because the plugin is so well coded). Great job on a great plugin!” Brandon P., Experience Farm
Event Espresso provides incredible support including access to a support forum, in-depth online documentation with faqs, knowledge base and how tos, priority 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 solid track record of support, so this is definitely a plugin you can depend on to manage your events.
Product License Pricing
Event Espresso is available in different editions, including a FREE basic edition (called Event Espresso Decaf). For personal support and advanced plugin features, however, you need to consider purchasing one of the premium plugin versions below:
- Personal Edition – This lets you configure Event Espresso on 1 site only. Pricing includes 51+ Premium features, (addons sold separately) and one year of upgrades and support. Price = $69.95.
- Everything Licensing – This enables you to run Event Espresso on 1 site only. Includes 51+ Premium features, 29 Premium addons and one year of upgrades and support. Price = $279.95.
- Developer Licensing – This license option enables you to install Event Espresso on 5 domains. It includes 51+ Premium features, (add-ons sold separately) and one year of upgrades and support. Cost = $249.95.
The cost of purchasing the Event Espresso plugin depends on whether there are any promotions or limited-time special offers. When we last checked, the software retails for the amounts shown above. Check the plugin’s website for the latest price: Event Espresso – Event Registration And Ticket Manager
Note: The pricing above was current at the time this article was written. This may or may not be the actual pricing charged by the plugin author when you visit the site.
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.
Search the software’s online documentation pages for answers to common questions about setup and how to use Event Espresso, and the support forums for questions related to your particular situation, or to report bugs and give feedback.
For detailed installation and support documentation, demos, downloads, videos, tutorials, FAQ and more, visit the Event Espresso product information pages.
We Recommend
Event Espresso is the leading WP event registration and ticketing manager software, used by thousands of event managers.
If you own a WordPress site and you currently run any event that requires managing dates and venues, booking participants, or reserving tickets or seating, then you will probably not find a more suitable WP plugin for your needs than Event Espresso.
For complete details, check out the plugin here: Event Espresso – Event Registration & Ticket Manager
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