Parking Lot Post: Planning Events in Online Express 03/22/2018

Rachel Nigro

Hi All, 


A big THANK YOU to everyone who attended our webinar this afternoon: Planning Events in Online Express. As always, you asked great questions and I wanted to use this space to provide some additional information around these thoughtful questions:

Can you talk more about what is required with a Blackbaud Merchant Account?

To process charges from online donors, Online Express uses Blackbaud Merchant Services—therefore your organization does need to set up a Blackbaud Merchant Services (BBMS) account in order to use Online Express forms. Setting up a BBMS account is quick, easy, and affordable—and best of all, will allow you to create your online donation and event registration forms! You can find a check list of what is needed to set up your BBMS Account here. 

Is there a character limit for the description fields beside price types?

Yes! According to our Knowledgebase Solution here, the character limit is 255 characters. Make sure to keep your descriptions short and sweet! 

Where are the participants emails stored?

Any information for event participants that aren't directly registering for the event (named guests) will be stored on the participant record for that guest. They will not have a constituent record when they come into The Raiser's Edge (unless you decide to create one for them later). If you choose to gather additional information for these participants on your form, you'll find that information by clicking to access their participant biographical information: 


You'll see the email address that was entered online on the Email Address tab: 


We also have a great solution available here to help you export these emails if you'd like to follow up in mass: How to export a guest's email address or phone number in a participant export. (It's worth noting that Online Express does not currently allow you to email participants directly using a participant query, so if you'd like to email these guests through Online Express, they will need to be constituents). 

Are there any best practices to use with testing purchases to make sure everything flows into Raisers Edge ok?

Yes! If you'd like to test your form, we have a two options in this solution: How to test Online Express forms with credit cards

Can you send a link to the downloading transactions webinar?

Yes! We'll be hosting a Downloading Transactions webinar on Thursday, April 5th at 2 p.m. ET where we'll discuss matching online donors to constituents and best practices for downloading transactions. This webinar focuses on donations, but many of those components are the same for event forms. We also have a recording of this webinar here and more specifically, a short video on how to download event registrations here.


I hope this information was helpful! Let us know if you have any additional questions and see you at the next webinar!