Contact management plays a crucial role in event organisation. In this article we will explain the main features of contact management in Oniva, from creating individual contacts to organising contact groups.
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.
In Oniva, you can add contacts in two ways: via an Excel import or by transferring existing accounts. If accounts already exist for your target group (e.g., employees), you can import them directly. Stored data such as language, gender, or username will be automatically transferred. This increases security, as only registered users gain access. This feature is only available with a premium licence (see article on authorisation groups).
If you want to add new people to your contact list, you can upload their data via an Excel import. The order or naming of columns does not matter, as you can assign them to the correct Oniva data fields during the import process.
Important formatting requirements:
If multiple authorisation groups exist, the appropriate group must be selected during the import. When importing from existing accounts, you select an account group that is managed in the workspace or account settings (admin rights required).
During the import, you can specify what should happen to the data:
During the import, you can directly assign contacts to a contact group. More information on this can be found in the next section.
After selecting the file, you must assign the Excel columns to the appropriate Oniva data fields. Unassigned columns will not be imported. If you need custom fields such as CRM number, account manager, or keywords, create them in the registration form beforehand. If these fields should be visible only to you but not to guests, activate the "Hide for contact" option.
The identifier is used to uniquely recognise a contact and determines whether an existing record is updated or a new one is created. Suitable identifiers include email address, customer number, or employee number, as names can appear multiple times. If a contact registers themselves without an invitation, the system automatically generates a random 16-character ID. Identifiers can be exported along with the contacts.
In addition to custom fields, the following fields are available by default:
Note: Only the identifier is mandatory. All other fields can be left empty during the import and completed by the guest. The more data you import, the less the guest has to fill in themselves.
Before importing, you can review the data of the first contact. If everything looks correct, you can start the import. Once completed, the status will be available in the import log.
Depending on the size of the import, it may take some time to complete. You can check the import status by clicking on logs in the upper right corner of the contacts section. The system also shows how many contacts were created, updated, deleted, and skipped. "Skipped" means the system could not process the contact because the identifier was missing or incorrect, or because the record already existed and updating was not selected. To see which records were skipped, you can review the detailed log and filter for "skipped" entries. The detailed log always displays the row number along with a message. You can then check the corresponding row in the Excel file.
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:
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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