Sessionize is a popular tool for the call for speakers at community conferences. It does that job well, and many speakers already have a profile there. It does not sell tickets, run the door or give attendees an app with their ticket in it.
This guide shows how to keep Sessionize for what it does, and bring its result into the AttendBeacon event platform for the rest. It is not about replacing Sessionize.
Who does what
- Sessionize: the call for speakers, the review, and the speakers' own profiles.
- The event platform: tickets and payments, the agenda attendees see, the event app, emails, the door, sponsors and feedback.
There is no live link between the two. You import once, when your programme is close to final, and make later changes in the event workspace. Plan your timing around that.
Step 1: Finish your selection in Sessionize
Accept your sessions. If you schedule in Sessionize, give each session a room and a time. The import puts every time on the venue's clock.
A session without an end time ends at the next session in the same room, if that starts within two hours. Otherwise it ends after 45 minutes. The review step tells you where it did this, so you can correct it.
Step 2: Export from Sessionize
You have two options:
- Excel export. Export your accepted sessions and your speakers. The import recognises the Sessionize sessions sheet and speakers sheet by their columns.
- JSON. Save the answer of your event's Sessionize API as a file: the All view, or the Sessions and Speakers views.
Either way, you get the same programme. Use the one you find easier.
Step 3: Bring your event over
In the workspace, choose Bring your event over and drop in the files. You can add up to twenty files at once in CSV, Excel or JSON. If you have a ticket list or a sponsor sheet, add it too.
The import then:
- builds the agenda from the sessions, with their rooms, times, titles and descriptions
- builds the speakers with their bio, tagline and photo, and joins the speakers sheet to the sessions that name them
- shows you a review before anything is created: sessions, speakers, ticket types, any conflicts, and what it put right
Nothing goes live and nobody is emailed. The event is built as a draft. Your uploaded files are deleted once the event is built.
About photos: they are copied into the event platform when you build. Only keep photos your speakers gave you to use for this event.
Step 4: Add tickets
Now add what Sessionize does not do. Create your ticket types, each with a capacity and a sale window. For paid tickets, connect your own Mollie or Stripe account; the money goes straight to you.
Add a hidden ticket type for speakers and issue each speaker a ticket. Issued tickets are emailed with their QR code, and they do not take public places.
Step 5: Give speakers their own page
Every speaker gets a page in the agenda with their photo, bio and links. Their email address is never shown.
Send each speaker their own link. It opens a page where they keep their bio, job, company, links and photo up to date, and upload the slides for their sessions. They need no account. A new link ends the old one.
Step 6: Let speakers help you sell
Speakers are often your best marketing. The share kit draws a card for each speaker and session in your event's colours, in five sizes, from link previews to stories. Each speaker gets a personal link and a discount code made from their name.
A leaderboard shows visits, orders and revenue per person, without tracking anybody's device. Speakers can post on LinkedIn with a text that is ready to copy.
When the programme changes
It will. Once you have imported, make changes in the event workspace:
- Move a session by drag and drop. A warning shows when a room is already taken.
- If a room runs late, move every later session in that room at once. Attendees who saved those sessions get an urgent notification.
- If a speaker drops out, update the agenda here, and in Sessionize too if you keep it as your record.
Attendees who saved a session hear about changes to it.
Prefer one tool?
You can also run the call for speakers in the event platform itself. Speakers sign in with a code by email and write their proposal with a live preview of the agenda card. They can import a talk they gave at another event straight from that event's public Sessionize API. Your team votes, comments and selects on a board.
Both ways work. Pick the one your speakers and reviewers know.
Checklist
- Accept and schedule your sessions in Sessionize.
- Export sessions and speakers, as Excel or JSON.
- Import with Bring your event over, and read the review.
- Add tickets, a hidden speaker ticket type and your payment account.
- Send each speaker their own link.
- Make later changes in the event workspace.
For a free community day, see Free ticketing for user groups and community days.