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Waitlist Refresher

  • 1.  Waitlist Refresher

    Posted 06-23-2021 11:26

    Welcome back to the next edition of Tip of the Week! So, returning to in-person events may mean you are using some features that maybe you haven't used recently due to a virtual format. One that comes to mind may be the waitlist features, whether that be the overall event waitlist to manage the onsite capacity, or the session waitlist to manage the room capacities.

    Let's review how to configure these and some tips to efficiently manage this process:

    • Event Waitlist:
      • First, you can enable the Event Waitlist feature within Event Configuration.
      • Next, customize how you'd like the page to appear when someone adds themselves to the waitlist for your overall event.
        • Within the Flex Site Designer, access the menu to the left of the canvas and scroll to the Other section to select the Waitlist page.
        • Use the Build menu similar to the actual Registration Process and add the fields and information you'd like to collect.
      • Now, consider how you'd like to manage this process once the waitlist is officially open. Will it be all manual by you and your team, or automated?
        • If manual, you can still use the Waitlist Notification email to notify an invitee when a spot has opened up. It is just your responsibility to manually send that email and monitor if they complete the process.
        • If automated, use the Waitlist Notification email to send out when a spot opens up and even set how long an invitee has to fill the spot, as well as how it should be prioritized to the next invitee.
          • For prioritization, this depends on your event and the attendees. If it is generally open to the public, consider setting this to 'Waitlisted date' so the system can go in order. If you are looking for more attendance from a certain type, such as VIPs, you can set it to prioritize by Contact Type.
      • Familiarize yourself with any manual steps, such as ad-hoc adding or removing an invitee from the waitlist. Review this helpful Knowledge Base article to learn all the ins and outs of managing waitlisted invitees

    • Session Waitlist:
      • Although the thought process behind a session waitlist is very similar to the event waitlist, how it is configured and managed in your Flex event is slightly different.
      • You can enable a session waitlist in the session settings under the Status & Capacity section. Once you choose to enable this, you can also set a waitlist capacity if desired.
      • For a visual understanding of how this functions, an invitee can navigate through the registration process as usual, and then when viewing and registering for all the various sessions, instead of selecting this session it will instead prompt them to Join Waitlist with a Capacity Full message.
      • Now, the process is similar where you can use the Session Waitlist Notification to either manually notify a registrant, or automatically send them the notification and use different send settings and prioritization to manage this.
      • Since this process is built into your event, consider using this to your advantage when promoting break-out sessions or unique experiences that you're looking to draw some attention and excitement to.

    Questions for You:

    • How are you using the waitlist features today, whether for in-person or virtual events?
    • Do you use the waitlist notification email or do you manage the process through a different method?

     

    Let us know below! #CventTip


    #Flex-Creating/ManagingEvents
    #PromotingYourEvent

    ------------------------------
    Danni Czark
    Senior Associate, Online Community Marketing
    Cvent
    ------------------------------


  • 2.  RE: Waitlist Refresher

    Community MVP
    Posted 06-23-2021 15:35
    We use session waitlists but would like sessions questions to be available.
    When I move someone off the waitlist, I need for them to go back to answer questions.
    You know how that goes. :)

    ------------------------------
    Steven Schlossman
    Jack of all trades. Master of none.
    BMW Car Club of America
    ------------------------------



  • 3.  RE: Waitlist Refresher

    Posted 06-23-2021 16:50

    Hi Steven,

    Great feedback! For other users viewing this discussion, if you agree with Steven's note on session questions, be sure to upvote his idea here! :)

    Best,

    Danni



    ------------------------------
    Danni Czark
    Senior Associate, Online Community Marketing
    Cvent
    ------------------------------



  • 4.  RE: Waitlist Refresher

    Posted 06-24-2021 14:03
    Where would I find a report that shows who is currently on our waitlists?  Our general session report shows the waitlisted people as if they are registered for the session.  It's a little confusing.

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    Kim Abbott
    North Carolina Electric Membership Corporation
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  • 5.  RE: Waitlist Refresher

    Posted 06-24-2021 15:50

    Hi Kim,

    I hope you are doing well! To view session waitlists data, I would recommend running the Agenda Items - Registration Summary report. This will return a list of all agenda items in your event, as well as each item's total capacity, current registration numbers, remaining capacity, and waitlisted numbers. Clicking on the numbers in the Waitlisted columns will return a list of the waitlist attendees for the various sessions. 

    Let me know if you have any additional questions or feedback!

    Best,

    Danni 



    ------------------------------
    Danni Czark
    Senior Associate, Online Community Marketing
    Cvent
    ------------------------------



  • 6.  RE: Waitlist Refresher

    Posted 06-28-2021 08:30
    Thanks Danni, that did the trick!


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    Kim Abbott
    North Carolina Electric Membership Corporation
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  • 7.  RE: Waitlist Refresher

    Community MVP
    Posted 06-25-2021 14:36
    Hi!

    Cvent's waitlist is triggered when event capacity is reached.  Waitlist is not triggered when registration type capcity is reached prior to the event capacity.  We have determined several options and Cvent recommended using registration approval as a workaround.  What are people doing for this scenario? 

    Thank you!


    ------------------------------
    Loretta Peterson
    Events Associate
    CDW
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  • 8.  RE: Waitlist Refresher

    Posted 06-28-2021 09:09
    Edited by Jill Campbell 06-28-2021 09:12
    Hi Loretta,
    I've had this situation many times for certain types of events, but it's been awhile since I had to create this type of meeting. To deal with this, I'd create a survey in Inquisium to collect all of the waitlist information. Then, I'll adjust the "closed" message for that Registration Type in Language Management for the event saying, "Registration is full. Click here to be added to the waitlist: {survey link}." Inquisium is great because you can sort by the date they completed the form to know the order they signed up on the waitlist. Then, I just manually add the waitlisted person to the event. You can also remove responses in Inquisium so that only those still waiting to get on the waitlist are listed.

    Hope this helps!

    ------------------------------
    Jill Campbell
    Cvent Specialist
    Chubb INA Holdings Inc
    ------------------------------



  • 9.  RE: Waitlist Refresher

    Community MVP
    Posted 06-25-2021 14:47
    A tip I got from Cvent's Tech Support Team:

    Session Registration Type Capacity Waitlist


    We had session-level capacities for each of our registration types within each session plus our event planning team wanted a session waitlist.  This workaround was feasible because we only had three registration types and two sessions. 

    • Enter event-level capacities in Event Details > Registration Types
    • Create a session for each registration type,
      • Limit attendance to a specific registration type
      • Set capacity
      • Turn on waitlist
    6 sessions were created and availability limited to each Registration Type

    Session 1 - Registration Type A
    Session 1 - Registration Type B
    Session 1 - Registration Type C

    Session 2 - Registration Type A
    Session 2 - Registration Type B
    Session 2 - Registration Type C

    What are other ways people are building out this situation?

    ------------------------------
    Loretta Peterson
    Events Associate
    CDW
    ------------------------------



  • 10.  RE: Waitlist Refresher

    Community MVP
    Posted 06-25-2021 16:41
    I cherry pick those off the waitlist. :)

    ------------------------------
    Steven Schlossman
    Jack of all trades. Master of none.
    BMW Car Club of America
    ------------------------------



  • 11.  RE: Waitlist Refresher

    Posted 06-28-2021 09:51
    I have a follow up question.  If a person is added to a session waitlist, is there a way for that person to be automatically added to the session if space becomes available?  

    Steve - when you say you cherry pick off the waitlist, do you modify a person's registration when space becomes available?

    ------------------------------
    Kim Abbott
    North Carolina Electric Membership Corporation
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  • 12.  RE: Waitlist Refresher

    Community MVP
    Posted 06-28-2021 17:03
    Kim,
    Attendees are not automatically added.

    You need to manually move someone off of the waitlist by modifying their registration.
    Unless there is another way I haven't found. :)

    ------------------------------
    Steven Schlossman
    Jack of all trades. Master of none.
    BMW Car Club of America
    ------------------------------



  • 13.  RE: Waitlist Refresher

    Posted 07-02-2021 03:23
    Hi Danni, One question: 
    What if you have used session capacity, waitlist capacity and an advanced rule to get people to select a min of 1 session & max of 1 session, the system does not consider joining the waitlist as selecting a session, so you cannot complete your registration as you get a error based on the advanced rule. One option is to remove advanced rule min sessions; however in this specific case, we want to avoid any attendees completing their registration without selecting any sessions. Any solve for this?

    ------------------------------
    Lynette Vankeken
    Event Manager
    NIKE, Inc.
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  • 14.  RE: Waitlist Refresher

    Posted 07-06-2021 11:21
    Hi Lynette,

    That's a great question, and unfortunately I don't believe there is a solve aside from what you mentioned - removing the minimum session in the Advanced Rule to prevent the error. You could use additional instructional text on the various pages to make it clear that it is required to select at least 1 session, and can also consider using reports to see which registrants may not have sessions added to their registration, then send them an email requiring them to do so.

    I'll let the other users on this thread chime in if they have any ideas - @Steven Schlossman any thoughts on Lynette's question about advanced rules and session waitlists?

    Best,

    Danni ​​

    ------------------------------
    Danni Czark
    Senior Associate, Online Community Marketing
    Cvent
    ------------------------------



  • 15.  RE: Waitlist Refresher

    Community MVP
    Posted 07-06-2021 12:54
    Edited by Steven Schlossman 07-06-2021 12:56
    @Lynette Vankeken  Interesting. I just had a chat with support yesterday on something very similar. My admission item requires selecting at least 1 session of 3. My question to support was would a waitlisted session satisfy that requirement. The answer was yes.

    Evidentially advanced rules work differently.​ Are you able to use the minimum sessions in the advanced settings of the admission item?

    ------------------------------
    Steven Schlossman
    Jack of all trades. Master of none.
    BMW Car Club of America
    ------------------------------



  • 16.  RE: Waitlist Refresher

    User Group Member
    Posted 07-06-2021 16:10
    Hi Lynette,

    I'm not sure what your Advanced Rule is for this example, but we typically utilize the 'yes/no' toggle for the waitlisted sessions under the Advanced Settings of the Admission Item. This way, as long as there is at least one available session (based on the caps) at a particular time, within a session group, or throughout an entire event's session listing, the 'No' setting will enforce a registrant selecting the minimum of '1' session while completing their registration. This avoids the erring and need to comb through registrations later to seek out those who 'registered for nothing'.
    Count waitlisted sessions towards these limits:


    ------------------------------
    Jeremy Houser
    Program Coordinator
    Duke University
    ------------------------------