Exhibitor Directory
This video and tutorial will cover how exhibitors are added, displayed, and edited within an event.
Setting up an Exhibitor Directory
Attendees > Directories
Create a new directory, and in the Type dropdown, select Exhibitor. This will give you some advantages over the regular Contact List directory that will be helpful for an expo booth section set up. Namely:
- Displaying the Organization name instead of First Name Last Name
- Ability to sort the exhibitors by categories, including things like sponsorship level
- Ability to add a featured exhibitors section
- Drag and drop customizable profile page template build, including ability to display videos and images
Group: As with any directory type, the group will dictate which users get displayed in this directory. The recommendation is to add all exhibitors with the default "exhibitor" attendee type, and create a dynamic group filtered by attendee type = exhibitor
Featured Attendees: If you elect to have a featured attendee section, you will select another group to let the system know who your featured exhibitors are in this directory. Note that if your featured exhibitor group contains an exhibitor record that also exists in your main group, they will show up both in the featured section as well as under their respective category or with all the rest of the exhibitors below.
Categories: Categories allow you to separate your exhibitors into different categories or levels. You will select an attendee field. For each exhibitor, whatever value they have in the field you selected will show up as a category header. For example, if I have industry chosen as my categorization field, and my "Eventfinity" exhibitor record has "Events" in the industry field, Eventfinity will show up under the Events category on the exhibitor directory list page. If there are other exhibitors also with "Events" in their industry field, they will all be grouped together under the "Events" category heading. If turned off, the exhibitors will just be listed uncategorized, in the sort order set.
Sort Order: This allows you to set what order your exhibitors will be displayed in, based on an attendee field. By default, the Organization field is set, so exhibitors are listed in alpha order by their Organization name. If you wanted a totally custom order, you could create a custom field for ordering, and number your exhibitors in the order you want them shown in.
Exhibitor Page Build Template
The second tab of the exhibitor directory edit allows you to build the template for the exhibitor profile pages. By default, it will be populated with some fields such as the logo, organization name, bio aka description, and resource links. You can drag additional field blocks over, and reorder/remove fields as needed.
Column layout: The builder provides you also with the default option for a one column or two column layout of the page. In the two column layout, there is 1 skinnier column and 1 wider column, which you can reverse sides for if you want by hovering over the center divide of the two columns.
Text field: Use this block for displaying any attendee fields.
Images & Video: When building the form where exhibitors upload their image and video files, the tags set on the asset uploader blocks will be selectable here so it knows which assets to pull into the template. More on this in the exhibitor info collection article. Note that this only works with files that are uploaded, not with embed links or URLs.
Link & Button: Both these field block types will pull from Link type custom fields. The only difference between the blocks is how it appears on the front end. Links will just be simple links and buttons will create default buttons.
HTML: The HTML blocks allow you to add whatever custom elements you want to the template. You can also use HTML blocks to pull in and wrap certain attendee fields. Shortcodes can be used here, but unlike other locations, the shortcodes used here will apply to the exhibitor record, and not to the user who is viewing the profile.
Networking Fields: Equivalent to turning on these options in the regular directory. Allow you to add request to chat, scheduled meetings, or enrollable agenda items to exhibitor directories. For more information on how to pair/set up enrollable agenda items, see this article.
As with the regular attendee directory, if a given exhibitor is missing any pieces of information that are in the template, including a main logo, that section will simply be omitted from their profile page. It will never 'save space' for the missing item, so it will not actually look like anything is missing.