General FAQ - Managing Profiles

Profiles

Profiles may be potential attendees, previous attendees, existing customers or members, exhibitors, sponsors, etc.

A new profile is created automatically with every new registration entered into the database. Each account has its own database of profiles, enabling you to separate the contact information of different companies or divisions into different accounts.

The Difference Between Profiles and Registrations

A profile contains the information about an individual that does not change from one event to the next.

A registration contains information about an attendee that is specific to one event.

If your account's customers or members attend more than one of your events, then you should use the profile database to collect and store information from one event to the next. You should use profile database information rather than asking the attendee to re-enter that information with each new registration.

Setting up Custom Profile Information for an Account

Since each account has its own profiles database, the account structure must be established prior to setting up custom profile questions for an account.

See Planning the account structure for your business.

After the account structure is finalized, determine what profiling information to collect for each account. Remember that profile information should be independent of any event.

If you have a Technical Group account and a Marketing Group account, then sample custom profile questions might be:

• Technical Group Account
• Select job classification (IT, developer, webmaster, other)
• Select areas of interest (Software, hardware, networks, other)
• Marketing Group Account
• Years of experience (>20, 15-20, 10-15, 5-10, <5)
• Media used (TV, radio, newspaper, magazines, email, other)

In the above cases, the answers to each custom question provide more detailed information about a specific profile. That detailed information is independent of any single event.

• Are you bringing a guest?
• Will you attend the pre-event dinner function?

The answers to those example questions are event-specific. The answers to those example questions may change from one event to the next. Create event-specific questions as custom registration questions. Create event-specific questions rather than creating profile custom questions.

Once you decide what questions should be stored with profiles, create up to 30 questions of any type for your account. The questions may include pre-defined answer options. The custom profile questions are created in Account Settings > Custom Profile Data.

Managing Profile Information

The profile database can be managed independently of a single event.

Click the Profiles tab to search for an individual profile record.

Use QuickSearch or Query Profiles to search for an individual profile record.

Select a record to view or modify.

Profiles contain the following information:

• Contact information
• Other information (custom profile questions)
• Alternate address
• History

Sending Messages to Profiles

A user can send email messages to individual or groups of profiles.

Common messages include:

• Invitations to an event
• Solicitations to exhibit or sponsor an event
• Reminders to potential attendees who have not registered yet
• Routine communication (newsletters, etc.)

Allowing Profiles to Access Information Online

Profiles can use their username and password to access their personal information online.

Profiles use online access to make modifications to their profile record.

Profiles use online access to register for an event.

The username and password combination must be unique.

The username and password combination is created in one of these ways:

• The planner sets up the online registration form to collect a username and password. In this case, Certain validates that the username is unique in the database. Certain accepts the username request after validation.
• The planner assigns the username and password when creating the registration. The planner may assign the username and password manually or via data import.
• The planner has Certain automatically generate a username and password when the profile is created.

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