8 - Adding app users to the workspace

The participants of your event, or app users, are referred to as "users" in the workspace.

It's important that you distinguish app users from Backstage users. The actual app users (event participants) will not have access to Backstage.

The first app user added to a workspace is automatically the Backstage user who creates the workspace. This is necessary, as the Backstage user creating the event will need to access the app to see and test the workspace as they build it. Additional Backstage team members (people who use Backstage) can also be added as app users in the workspace to allow them to work on the workspace.

To build your event audience, all the event participants need to be added to the user list in the workspace, via the Users module.

There are three ways of adding app users to a workspace:

• Bulk importing your app users
• Adding app users manually.
• Integrations from third party systems.

This article will take you through the steps needed to add app users manually and via imports.

To access the Users module, go to the Content category in the main menu to the left of the screen, then select Users.

Note: Additional information, including a description of all the fields present in the User view as well as managing the information that is visible or not in the user profile, is also available in the Managing the app users and their profiles article.

Bulk importing your app users

To add larger numbers of app users, we recommend that you upload all of the app users in a bulk operation, using an Excel spreadsheet.

This is typically done by:

1. Downloading the existing list of app users from the workspace via Backstage, as a spreadsheet.
2. Adding all the necessary app users to the spreadsheet.
3. Re-uploading the spreadsheet to Backstage to import the app users.

Follow the below steps to perform a bulk upload of app users into the workspace via Backstage.

1. Downloading the existing app user spreadsheet

1. In the Users tab, select Export XLS.
2. Click on Download export.
3. Save the spreadsheet locally, and open it in order to edit it.
4. The spreadsheet contains a list of the current app users. In the below example there are two users, Sabrina (the workspace creator/admin) and Bryan (the user added manually earlier in the article):
   

2. Adding the app users to the spreadsheet

The exported users spreadsheet is composed of multiple columns of data. Each column corresponds to a user metadata, including any custom user metadata that is created in the workspace. The columns present can therefore vary depending on the workspace metadata:

• fp_ext_id: This is the app user's identifier in the workspace in Backstage.
  In the screenshot above, Backstage has automatically assigned this ID to the users when they were created manually. As you add more app users to the spreadsheet, you can enter the IDs for the app users that can be based on records from your own (or a third party) system.
  
  
• fname: User's first name.
  
  
• lname: User's last name.
  
  
• email: User's email address. The email address is always the unique identifier for an attendee in the workspace. It is use to detect duplicates when you import users.
  
  
• phone: User's phone number.
  
  
• mobile: User's mobile phone number
  
  
• company: User's company.
  
  
• position: User's title in the company.
  
  
• address: User's address.
  
  
• self-registered: (if registration page enabled) Did the user register for the event via a public registration page.
  
  
• fp_status: What is the user's status in the workspace (active - hidden - cancelled - pending).
  IMPORTANT: If a private (RSVP) or a public/private combined registration page is enabled on the workspace, and users have a fp_rsvp_status that is not set or is set to "pending", please note that users are imported with their fp_status set "hidden".
  
  
• fp_rsvp_status: (if RSVP registration enabled). What is the users RSVP status (not invited - invited - attending - not attending)
  
  
• actcode: This is the activation code for the user (generated by the system).
  
  
• webappUrl: This is the URL the user can use to access the workspace via web app.
  This is visible in exports performed by Backstage users with "Manager" roles.
  
  
• is_invited: Has the use been invited to join the workspace? ("true" = yes / "false" = no).
  
  
• is_activated: Has the user activated the app? ("true" = yes / "false" = no).

Using the above information, you can directly add all the users that you need into this spreadsheet:

Note: Here, like when adding a user manually in Backstage, there are four mandatory columns that need to be filled in: fp_ext_id, fname, lname, and email. The rest are optional.

3. Importing the app users spreadsheet

Once you have added all the necessary information to the spreadsheet for all the app users you wish to add to the workspace, you can save the spreadsheet locally and then upload it to Backstage to perform the import:

1. In the Users tab, select Import XLS.
2. Click on Choose file, and select the updated user list spreadsheet.
3. Select Begin upload.
4. Verify that the system has selected the correct column headers in the spreadsheet, if necessary select the line with the correct headers:
   
5. Click on Next.
6. The system will now give you the option to confirm or modify the field mapping for the import. The field mapping is automatically assigned based on the previouss tep when you selected the column headers. Here, if needed you can select a Label (column header in the spreadsheet) and associate it to a specific metadata (field) in the user profile in he workspace:
   
   You also have the option of selecting "Import empty cells", however this will delete any existing data in a user's profile in Backstage if the spreadsheet contains corresponding empty fields for that user.
7. Click on Next.
8. Now, the system will verify that all data in the import matches the necessary requirements.
   If no errors are detected during the import, the following message is displayed:
   
   
   
9. Click on Next.
10. The system will provide a summary of the updates that will be made to the user list in Backstage.
    
    Clicking on Complete the import will finalize the import and the system will notify you when the import was successful:
    

The app users added to the spreadsheet have now been added to the workspace, as seen in the example below in Backstage:

Note: In addition to importing users as explained above, you can also use the bulk edit functionality directly in Backstage to make bulk changes.

How to avoid the "duplicate app users" error during imports?

While importing new users to your workspace or updating the information for existing users, you may come across a "Duplicate" error, like in our example above.

This occurs when a user with a unique email address already exists in the workspace, and you have the same user with the same unique email address in the list of users that you are trying to import.

To update the information for existing users, you should always: Export the XLS > Update the data for the existing users > Import the same XLS, with no new users added.

To add new users to the workspace, to be safe, simply make sure that you are importing a list of new users only, without duplicates.

Tip: Use VLOOKUP or Duplicate detection rules to compare the Backstage user list to the new user list you want to import, to see if any of the users in Backstage exist in your new list.

Adding an app user manually

In the Users module, click on the New user button, and add the necessary information for the app user.

Tip: There are three mandatory fields here that need to be filled in order to add a user:
First name, Last name, and Email address. The other fields are all optional.

Status

Here there are four options that are possible for users in the workspace.

• Active means that the app user will be active and visible in the workspace to other app users, this is the standard option that should be used for your workspace app users.
• Hidden means that the this user will not be visible to other app users.
  This option is selected by default for the workspace creator (or Backstage user) to make them invisible to other app users in the workspace.
• Cancelled means that the app user no longer has access to the workspace. This can be used to remove an app user from the workspace. Cancelled users will not receive any emails from the event.
• Pending means that the user registered via public registration page (without manual approval) but have not confirmed their email address.

Click on Save to finish adding the user. The Users tab will now open and you will see the app user added there:

When you select the app user in the user list in order to see their details, the User view page will be displayed, where you can see all information pertaining to that user, and make any necessary changes:

So how does this actually look in the app?

Here we'll take a look at how users are visible in the app, with the list of users and a user's profile.

This will allow you to better visualize how the information added to Backstage is seen in the app.

Participant list in the app

Below is an example of how a list of users can look in the app without pictures or additional information. You will see that the attendees do not have profile pictures, or any additional information such as organizations or job titles displayed:

Here is an example of the same list, with the attendee profile pictures, organizations and job titles:

Participant profile in the app

Below is an example of a how a user profile can look to an app user, before having exchanged business cards with them:

 Here is an example of a user profile, after having exchanged business cards with them. You'll notice that the available user's contact information is now visible:

 

NEXT STEP
Continue to the Adding sessions to the workspace agenda.