Do you currently run or plan to run events that require handling bookings or registrations, such as seminars, community courses, non-profit fundraisers, social events, or even a large-scale event like a show, a sporting or religious event, or any kind of event where people need to book to attend or participate?
Co-ordinating event bookings can be a complex and time-consuming process. You will probably need to co-ordinate event schedules, dates, registration numbers, data administration, payments and invoicing, confirmations and reservations, reminders, cancellations … perhaps even accommodating special needs and providing tickets to attendees.
There are many advantages to setting up a web-based event registration system. It can streamline your business processes, save time and reduce costs, help you easily copy settings for repeat events, give event managers more control, improve user experience and grow your sales.
The problem is that setting this up can be very costly.
The good news is that if you own a WordPress-powered website or blog, you can easily install an inexpensive and professional web-based event booking system.
Introducing …
Event Espresso
Plugin Description
The Event Espresso online event registration plugin allows you to easily create an event and begin processing bookings in a few minutes.
(Event Espresso lets you set up multiple events and take online bookings)
Event Espresso is a flexible and feature-rich plugin that gives you full control over your event registration management process.
Create custom registration forms
You can employ a range of event registration strategies, from simple online enrollments and straight up ticket-selling, to creating custom registration forms in order to better understand your participants, or integrating your event registration forms with social media and email marketing solutions.
Access detailed information about your event attendees
Note: Currently, Event Espresso is transitioning between two different versions of their software: Event Espresso 3 and EE 4. The new EE 4 is fundamentally different than the older EE 3, as the software is being rebuilt using a different structure to accommodate future expansion. The Event Espresso 4 plugin software has different features, user interface, data structure, coding method and pricing. The company plans to eventually phase out Event Espresso 3, so keep this in mind as you read more about this plugin.
For more details go here:
Benefits Of Using Event Espresso
Here are just a few of the benefits of using Event Espresso to manage event registrations on your web site:
Automated Event Registration Management And Ticketing System
Event Espresso provides you with everything you need to turn your current website or blog into an automated and feature-rich event management website … from custom registration forms and automated response emails, to seating capacity limits, multiple price options and discount codes, to printable tickets and even seating charts.
Higher Business Productivity
By using an online event registration system like Event Espresso, you save time and increase your business productivity by literally doing away with the need to process registrations and sign-ups manually.
Essentially, you are enabling event attendees to complete the enrolment process themselves.
Allowing your clients to do all of the data entry frees you up from doing administration and lets you focus more of your resources on planning a more unique 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 customers to experience.
Some additional plugin benefits include:
- Lower Costs: Event Espresso gives you an inexpensive online event registration management solution compared to developing your own software or using a 3rd party provider. This is made possible through a model where Event Espresso users start with the core plugin (which suits the requirements of most users) and purchase add ons only when you need additional functionality.
- Increased Sales: With Event Espresso you can accept online event registrations 24 hours a day. Not only that, but, Event Espresso social and marketing add-ons (see below) let people interested in attending your event invite their friends who may be interested.
- Green And Paperless Event SignUp Process: With Event Espresso, the event sign-up process can be conducted wholly online, significantly reducing traditional paper waste from tasks related to admin and record-storage.
- All Information Belongs To You. You own all the data gathered from event attendees.
Event Espresso Features
The Event Espresso software delivers functionality to its customers via standard features (these come with the software) and optional features that customers can buy for an added cost, called add-ons.
Event Espresso provides many built-in to website owners. Here are just a few:
- Fast and simple to install and configure. Be up and running in minutes.
- Customized Event Registration Form. Event Espresso lets you gather specific information using custom event registration forms on your site to create a unique experience for your attendees.
- Custom Notification Emails. Configure automated registration and payment confirmation emails to communicate with your attendees.
- Tax Administration. Event Espresso 4 gives you several ways to handle taxes for your event and report tax fee components to registrants when purchasing tickets. Event managers can administer taxes globally or on a per-ticket basis.
- Smart Single Page Checkout. The Event Espresso 4 checkout process is smart, fast and intuitive. Registrants are given the option to automatically copy the primary registrant’s information for any additional attendees.
- Spam Protection. Reduce the risk of spamming and robots making bogus registrations on your website by using reCAPTCHA features that provide human validation.
- Mobile Registration And Ticketing Apps. The Event Espresso mobile registration system lets you authenticate tickets, speed up in-venue registrations, set up multiple check-in “stations” and track attendees.
- Manual Registration Option. you have the option of booking event participants at the door, or sending in paper forms for manual registration later.
- Administrative Pre-approval. Control who can and cannot register for your events.
- Public Commenting. Add “social proof” by allowing potential customers to ask questions about your event and previous participants to post feedback that can help others choose whether or not to register. Moderation settings for public commenting are specified using the WP built-in commenting system.
- Optimized For The Latest WordPress Version. The Event Espresso 4 user interface follows the WordPress guidelines to help you build highly aesthetic event pages that are responsive and mobile-friendly.
- Your Organization Settings. Configure your organization’s profile to display throughout Event Espresso and your front-end templates. Your organization fields include: company name, address, city, state, country, zip/postal code, primary contact email address, phone number, VAT/tax number, business logo, Facebook profile URL, Twitter URL, LinkedIn URL, Pinterest profile URL, Google+ profile URL, Instagram URL.
- Default Tickets. If you create identical tickets for your events, you can set up as your default ticket for the next event simply by checking a box.
- Register Multiple Attendees. EE 4 allows a single person or an organization to enroll multiple attendees simultaneously. You specify how many people can enrol in one registration by specifying either a limit on ticket purchases per order, or per-ticket minimums and maximums.
- Registrant Records. You can manage your attendee’s profiles and payment history and keep all of their information organized and easily accessible.
- Invoice Payment Reminders. Follow-up potential attendees who have not paid in full for their admission with a standard but personalized PDF invoice with one click. Your invoices will address registered customers who have not paid their registration in full by name, display the balance they owe, and include links to the event, a payment link and a link to download a PDF invoice.
- Event Reports. Quick-view event reporting provides you with information of all of your registrations and transactions, allowing you to measure the performance of your events with the aggregate number of registrations and amount of revenue you’ve collected.
Additional features include:
- Define Extra Meta Information. This feature allows web-based software developers to have more control and options over your content and how your information displays to readers.
- Maintenance Mode. You can pause registration capabilities for regular website traffic when you need to make changes on your website. You can continue to work on your event pages during maintenance mode.
- Flexibility, Autonomy & Value: According to the philosophy stated on their website, Event Espresso’s aim 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 model 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:
- Email shortcodes that includes attendee data in notification emails and newsletters.
- Default surcharge (the same as adding a service fee to tickets).
- Default payment status.
Event Espresso Add-Ons
In addition to an amazing number of features, Event Espresso provides “addons”, which allow you to significantly expand the functionality of events.
Some of these add-ons include:
- EE4 Events Grid Template Add-on: Displays events in a pure CSS grid-like structure using the featured image. Hovering over the image will display further information. If the event does not have a featured image, a default image will be used instead.
- Recurring Events Management Add on: The Recurring Events management add on lets you put your events on autopilot by scheduling recurring events weeks or months … even years in advance. You can add as many classes, meetings, courses and conferences in advance as you like. Event Espresso will automatically open and close bookings for all recurring events.
- Events Date Range Template Add-on: The Date Range custom event list template lets your users to search for events that take place in a certain date range.
- Social Coupons Integration Add-on: If your website is featured on Groupon.com you can easily accept Groupon codes to your events. You can also specify whether events accept the social coupons or not.
- WP User Integration: The WP User Integration add-on lets you take full advantage of the WordPress user system. With the WP User Integration add-on you can give your users a special incentive by offering member prices and overriding event prices when members are logged in. You can even set up member-only events where only registered users of the website can have access to these special events. Members can also store personal data into their profile page allowing them to quickly register for events by auto-filling in the personal information on the event booking form. Your users can also look up previous events and pay for events.
- Seating Chart Add on: The seating chart add on 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 lets you promote reserved or assigned seating to your events and venues from your WordPress website. The Seating Chart addon lets you control the environment for your customers and design assigned seating charts and attach single pricing to each seat.
- EE4 Event Ticketing Add-on: The Ticketing addon gives you the ability to create tickets with bar codes. The Bar Scanning addon gives you the capacity to scan ticket barcodes. The ticketing add-on includes the ability to customize event tickets. Multiple bar code types are included for handling check-in scans at venues. People 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 attendees and to validate tickets.
- Events Calendar Addon: This addon uses the WordPress calendar to display events and categories of events via a nice graphical calendar.
- JSON API Add on: The new Event Espresso JSON API add on permits other applications, web tools, mobile applications, etc… to access your Event Espresso details through an Application Programming Interface (API).
Note: Event Espresso regularly adds new features and improvements to its software, including new add ons.
For full details about the latest Event Espreso features and addons, check out the plugin here:
Customer Feedback
Below are a few of the many testimonials that users have posted about Event Espresso:
”Event Espresso is one of the nicest Event Managers (WP Plugin) I have come across.” Joe Distefano, Citizen Joe
”Your plugin rocks! Seriously, saved me hours on the phone setting up attendance manually. Kudos. :)” William, Petruzzo Photography
”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
Useful Tips
Whether you are a gym owner, trainer, workshop planner, or event consultant, there are just unlimited possibilities of what you can achieve with the Event Espresso software.
After downloading the plugin and becoming a licensed user, visit the forums for useful ideas and practical suggestions to improve your event management and registration workflow and enhance the experience of your event registrants.
Support
Event Espresso is compatible with most WordPress plugins and themes that follow standard WP development rules. If you have problems with the plugin, however, you will find that Event Espresso provides highly responsive customer support, as so many of its clients confirm:
”These guys are right on any problem or issue or even general questions. You can’t really put a value high enough on the kind of support these guys offer.” Mark Wigston, Muskoka Graphics
Event Espresso provides comprehensive support including access to a support forum, in-depth online documentation with faqs, knowledge base and how tos, custom development 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 a well-staffed team of experienced web developers with a proven track record of support, so this is definitely a plugin you can count on to run and manage your events.
Plugin Cost
Event Espresso is available in a number of plugin editions, including a FREE basic edition (referred to as Event Espresso Decaf). For support and advanced software options, however, you will want to consider purchasing one of the premium plugin editions below:
- Personal License Edition – This license allows you to install Event Espresso on 1 domain only. Includes 51+ Premium features, (add ons sold separately) and 1 year of upgrades and support. Cost = $69.95.
- Everything Licensing – This option allows you to configure Event Espresso on one domain only. Includes 51+ Premium features, 29 Premium add-ons and 1 year of upgrades and support. Cost = $279.95.
- Developer License – This license lets you install Event Espresso on five domains. Includes 51+ Premium features, (addons sold separately) and 1 year of upgrades and support. Price = $249.95.
Pricing details of the Event Espresso plugin can vary, depending on whether there are any promotions or limited-time specials being offered. Currently, the plugin is selling for the pricing shown above. Check the plugin’s website for the current pricing: Event Espresso – Event Espresso
Note: The above reflects the pricing when this article was written. This may or may not be the actual price charged by the plugin developer when you visit the website.
Additional Info
Event Espresso regularly adds new features and improvements to the software. Make sure to register for their newsletter when you visit their site to receive the latest information and updates.
Look up the software’s documentation pages for answers to common questions about setup and using Event Espresso, and the support forums if you have questions related to a specific situation, or to report errors and give feedback.
For detailed documentation, demos, downloads, videos, tutorials, FAQ and more, visit the Event Espresso product website.
The Bottom Line
Event Espresso is the preferred WP event registration and ticketing management plugin, used by thousands.
If you own a WordPress site and you currently run any event that involves scheduling dates and venues (offline and online), booking attendees, and reserving tickets or seating, then you will probably not find a better software for your needs than Event Espresso.
For more details, visit the plugin website here: Event Espresso
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