Creating your Registration Categories
Categories are the foundation of your event’s registration process. They are the process your registrants go through to become attendees. This article will walk you through the purpose of Categories as well as how to create and test them.
Knowing how to use Registration Categories is vital for hassle-free management experience. A proper setup will easily allow for information collection, group registrations, enforcing ticket availability, and much more.
When testing out the registration process, the default categories available for selection are: "Attendee" and "Virtual Attendee."
These default categories are not required to be used and can be removed or renamed depending on your organization's needs.
Our team sees many examples of unique Registration Categories, such as:
- Member and Non-Member categorizations
- VIP
- In-Person Attendance
- Virtual Attendance
Each Registration Category includes one or more Tickets, and Tickets can be shared across Categories. For example, if a registrant selects the “Attendee” Category, they will see the Tickets assigned to it. Since Tickets can belong to multiple Categories, registrants may encounter the same Ticket option in different Categories.
Contents
- Step 1 - Create A Registration Category
- Step 2 - Check your Registration Categories
- Quick Tips
- Conclusion
Step 1 - Create A Registration Category
When you have decided on what registration categories to use for your event, you can create them in the Event Dashboard. Each category comes with individual settings so you can customize each based on your needs. While there are many different settings available for categories, we will go over some of the essential ones you should be aware of when creating them.
Category Types
When creating a category, the first setting you’ll see is the Category Type field. Depending on what you choose in this dropdown, the category will either accept or reject multiple ticket holders in the same registration or bypass the ticket selection step entirely.
Category Type |
What It Does |
When to Use |
|---|---|---|
| Ticketed (Group) | Allows multiple ticket holders in one registration | Group registrations (teams, companies, families) |
| Ticketed (Individual) | Allows only one ticket holder per registration | Standard individual sign-ups |
| No Ticket (Individual) | Skips ticket selection entirely | Free events, RSVP-only registrations |
Payments
Categories can be configured to accept credit card payments, accept an alternative payment method at a later date, or both. To accept credit card payments, you will need to connect your dashboard with a compatible finance integration, typically Stripe. For more information, please refer to our Configure your Payment Processor for Registration to Collect Money from Credit Card Transactions article.
Creating a Registration Category
1.1 - From the Event Dashboard, navigate to Registration > Categories and select the Create button
1.2 - Under the Category Type field, select the type that applies to your category
1.3 - Ensure the Active checkbox is toggled on; otherwise, the category will not be available on the Event Website
1.4 - Under the Name field and the Description field, enter the name and description of your category
1.5 - Under the Thumbnail Image field, select Choose File to upload a personalized image for the category. The recommended size is 150 x 150 pixels. This will replace the default image for the category on the Event Website.
1.6 - Navigate to Details and toggle on the following checkboxes based on what sort of additional information you would like from registrants:
Field |
Optional or Required |
Purpose |
|---|---|---|
| Collect Secondary Contact Email | Optional | Sends notifications to a backup email |
| Collect Organization/Require Organization | Optional/Required | Collects the registrant’s company info |
| Collect Title and Require Title | Optional/Required | Collects the registrant’s job title |
| Collect Address and Require Address | Optional/Required | Collects physical address. Use the Collect Address Fields Override and Required Address Fields Override fields to customize what information is collected/required. Toggle on Require Valid Mailing Address to let registrants quickly look up and autofill their address through search. |
| Collect Designations | Optional | Collects professional designations |
| Collect Pronouns | Optional | Allows registrants to enter pronouns |
| Collect Dietary Restrictions | Optional | Identifies meal preferences |
| Collect Accessibility Requirements | Optional | Notes accommodations needed |
1.7 - Navigate to Payment and determine the payment options you wish to make available
- Allow Card Payments: Toggle this option on to allow credit card payments for registrations. IMPORTANT - you must have Stripe or other payment processor connected to your event to recieve credit card payments. For more information, please refer to our Configure your Payment Processor for Registration to Collect Money from Credit Card Transactions article.
- Allow Other Payments: Enabling this option lets registrants complete their payment at a later time using alternative methods such as cheques, wire transfers, or invoices. Please note that it is the responsibility of the event organization to track and manage these payments. PheedLoop can only provide analytics for ongoing payments and cannot assist with collection or reconciliation.
1.8 - (Optional) Emails can be sent to recipients whenever a registration has been completed. Navigate to the Notification Emails field under the Other section. Add any email addresses that should receive email notifications each time a registrant completes their registration under this category. Use commas to separate multiple emails.
1.9 - Select Save Changes
Once you’ve selected Save Changes, your first registration category will be created. You can repeat the above steps to set up the remaining Registration Categories.
Step 2 - Test your Registration Categories
If you have not set up your tickets yet, please do so before proceeding. For instructions on Tickets, please review our Creating your Registration Ticket Types article.
Once your registration categories and tickets are set up, it is time to check your work and view them from the perspective of a registrant. We strongly recommend conducting a few test registrations on the Event Website to confirm everything is working as intended.
2.1 - From the Event Dashboard, navigate to Event Portals > Event Website > Register Now
2.2 - Select the desired Registration Category and note any Category descriptions and thumbnail images that were added.
2.3 - Input your email address and proceed to the next step. Please note that if your email address has already been inputted into PheedLoop you will be prompted to verify your email address via a one time code.
2.4 - Proceed with the registration process and note any discrepancies you may encounter.
Quick Tips
For registration processes with only one registration category: Smaller and/or simpler events oftentimes group all of their Tickets together, meaning that they don’t necessarily need multiple Registration Categories. In this case, you can create only one Registration Category and link all of your Tickets to it. The registration process will be the same, except the category selection page will be skipped to avoid redundancy.
Multiple registration categories can be created simultaneously for convenience. For instructions, please review our How can I create multiple Registration Categories at once? article.
Conclusion
After reading this article, you should now understand the purpose of Registration Categories as well as how to create and test them in your event.