Contacts

What is guest management?

Guest management is the process of managing information about people who attend or are expected to attend an event. This includes collecting, editing, and managing contact information, as well as organising contacts into groups for targeted communication. Contacts can be created manually, imported from Excel, or imported from a user profile. Each contact is assigned a personal event link that guests can use to access the event.

Oniva treats contacts and bookings as two separate entities that are closely related. Contacts include all information about people who are either attending the event or are potential attendees, regardless of their current booking status. Bookings, on the other hand, are the actual registrations made by attendees for the event. While contacts provide a comprehensive list of all potential attendees, bookings provide a more detailed view of actual attendance at an event. In some configurations, it's also possible for a contact to have multiple bookings.

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Import contacts

Import from Excel or accounts
In Oniva, contacts can be added either through an Excel import or through accounts. If accounts exist for the target audience (e.g. employees), users can be imported directly from the accounts and the data stored there (e.g. preferred language, gender, username, etc.) can be used. If people outside the system need to be added to the contact list, their data can be imported via Excel.

1. Open your event
2. Switch to the contacts menu
3. Select import contacts
   If multiple auhtorisation groups are available, the respective authorisation group must be selected during the import.

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Import through Excel

1. If your want to import your contacts from Excel, a file must be selected.
2. Map your Excel columns to the appropriate registration form field. This way the system knows which column contains which information.
3. Confirm the input.

Requirements for the Excel file

• Each contact must have an identifier (if an identifier is missing, the corresponding row will be skipped)
• The table may contain only one worksheet.
• No duplicate titles are allowed.
• Empty rows are not permitted.
• Use minimal formatting.
• Absolute values should be used in the columns instead of formulas.

Data fields for mapping Excel columns

• Identifier: The identifier is a value with which users can be uniquely identified. If no e-mail address is available, the customer, employee or user number can be used. This value must be unique for each contact.
• E-mail and/or mobile number: A cell phone number or e-mail address is required to invite the contact.
• Language: The language is required if the event is recorded in multiple languages. If no language is specified, the contact is assigned the default language.
• Account manager: The account manager of a customer contact can optionally be specified in order to trigger notifications to him or her (e.g.: notification to account manager when guest takes action). The account manager's account name must be specified for this (the account manager must have an account).  
• First name, surname, etc.: Depending on the configuration of the registration form, more data can be imported.

Please note that only the identifier is a required field. If you do not provide any information for the other fields, they will simply be left blank and can be filled in by the user when registering for the event.

Import through accounts

1. If your want to import your contacts from existing accounts, an account group must be selected. Account groups can be managed in the workspace or account settings (requires platform admin rights).
2. Confirm the input.

Import status

Depending on the size of the import, it may take some time for the import to be completed. The status of the import can be viewed by clicking on Logs in the top right-hand corner of the contacts. The system also shows how many contacts have been created, updated, deleted and skipped. Skipped means that the system could not capture the person because some information (e.g. email address) was missing or incorrect or because the record already exists and Update was not selected.

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Contact status

• ‍Open: The contact was added by the admin and has not yet visited the event website via the personal event website link.
• Accessed: The contact has visited the event website at least once.
• Registered: The contact has made a booking or was manually registered by the admin.
• Deregistered: The contact has declined the invitation or was manually unregistered by the admin.
• Waiting: The contact has made a booking on the waiting list or was manually added to the waiting list by the admin.
• Attended: The contact has a valid booking and has been checked in using one of the check-in solutions.

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Contact groups

Contact groups are a useful feature that allows you to organise your contacts into subgroups for better management and targeted communication. You can create contact groups directly under the "Contacts" menu. You can either use existing filters or search terms to pre-select your contact list, or you can manually select the desired contacts. Then, you can add them to the appropriate contact group. If you want to assign a contact group during the import of contacts, you can do so in the advanced options of the import process, either by creating a new group or selecting an existing one.

If you want to create a contact group based on criteria other than the available filters, you can also do this through an import. To do this, prepare an Excel file containing all the contacts that should be added to the contact group. It's important that each contact has an identifier specified.

To add a contact group retroactively with an import, follow these steps:

1. Prepare an Excel file containing all the contacts that should be added to the contact group, ensuring that each contact has an identifier.
2. In the Oniva interface, select the "Contacts" menu and click on "Import contacts".
3. Upload the prepared file and activate the option "Update existing contacts only".
4. Click on "Show advanced options" and select the contact group or create a new one.
5. Match the identifier from the Excel sheet to the corresponding table columns and skip everything else.

After completing the import, all contacts will be added to the contact group. To remove a contact from a contact group, simply open the contact and edit it to change the contact group assignment.

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Frequently asked questions

• What is the difference between contacts and bookings?
  Contacts list all contacts regardless of their booking status, while Bookings list all confirmed bookings.
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• The number of campaign recipients doesn't match the number shown under Contacts. What could be the reason?
  If the number of contacts doesn't match the number of campaign recipients, it could be due to the following reasons:
  - Some contacts haven't provided an email address.
  - Some contacts have unsubscribed from campaigns.
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• Two columns are displayed for a piece of information (email address / name, etc.) in my contact list. What could be the reason?
  If information appears in multiple columns, it indicates that the record in the registration form isn't linked with the correct identifier. The system doesn't recognise that the information in both columns corresponds to the same data. To ensure proper linkage of guest data, always work with a predefined identifier from the system where available. By default, the following identifiers are defined: title, function, firstname, lastname, organization, phone_mobile, image, job_title, badge_info, email, street, zip, city.