Enable user-submitted calendar events in WordPress

Enable user-submitted calendar events in WordPress

User-submitted calendar events are one of the best ways to build and grow a community.

They create a sense of ownership and involvement in your users. This can help them feel included in your mission. On the other hand, users submitting calendar events to your WordPress website can help you promote local events that you are not associated with.

This creates a sense of belonging in both directions because it helps your users feel comfortable You are also part of the community. Additionally, since the events are stored in a calendar, management is easier and everyone can remember them.

In this article, we’ll show you how to allow users to submit calendar events in WordPress. We’ll walk you through step by step, so you don’t need expert help to set up this WordPress feature.

The importance of allowing users to submit calendar events

Now, allowing users to create their own events allows you to build different types of communities.

You can grow your community through social events like meetups, festivals, trade shows, and volunteering. You can enable your users to organize educational and informational events such as workshops, seminars, lectures, and more. Your users can set up networking events such as conferences, network meetups, and more.

Additionally, your users can showcase their charitable events on your website, which could help you be part of the solution to local community pain points.

The best part is that you literally don’t have to do much since your users set up the events themselves. Your job is to provide the platforms!

Here are more reasons to allow users to submit calendar events.

  • Diversity: Ensures a diverse range of events that meet the diverse interests and needs of your community.
  • Local knowledge: Users often have better insights into local or niche events that may not be on your radar.
  • Current information: Users can make updates and corrections in real time, ensuring the calendar is current and accurate.
  • Delegation: Spreads the workload of maintaining the calendar across a larger group, reducing the burden on you or your team.
  • Scalability: Makes it easier to manage large numbers of events, especially in dynamic or fast-growing communities.
  • Networking opportunities: You and your users can discover new things and socialize through events.
  • Visibility: Provides a platform to promote personal or community events, increasing your reach and participation.
  • Return message: Users can give you feedback on events, leading to improvements and better future planning.
  • Insights: Collecting data on user-submitted events can provide valuable insight into community interests and trends.
  • Creative input: Users can introduce innovative ideas and new types of events that you may not have thought of before.

Now that you have a better understanding of the importance of setting up community-led events, let’s show you how to add them to your WordPress site.

Here’s a quick look at the steps you need to take. You can select the links below to jump to the section you want to read.

Step 1: Install the Events Calendar plugin

the event calendar homepage

Events Calendar is one of the best WordPress event calendar plugins. It allows your users to create events from the frontend, so you don’t have to give them admin or editor access to your WordPress dashboard.

The event calendar also allows you to publish user events immediately or subject them to an approval process first. Additionally, you have more control over the events displayed on your WordPress website.

The best part is that you don’t need any coding experience to use this event plugin.

Check out the latest event calendar review here.

How do you set up the events calendar?

You can access the pro version of The Events Calendar by going to the official website and purchasing a plan. This premium plugin helps you with event management, recurring events, and more right in your WordPress dashboard.

But for this tutorial we’ll use the free version of the plugin. It allows us to set up user-submitted calendar events without incurring additional costs.

First go to Plugins » Add new plugin in WordPress to access your plugin repository. Use the search bar on this page to find the events calendar. Then install and activate it like any other plugin.

The event calendar installation plugin

If you encounter any problems, here is an article on how to install a plugin.

After you activate the plugin, you will be redirected Events » Settings. Here you can either agree to become part of the plugin community by selecting “Allow and Continue”. Or you can simply select “Skip” if you don’t want to receive community updates.

The event calendar installation is complete

Choose on the next page Configure the settings to go to the “Event Settings” where you can personalize the settings of your user events.

Configure the event calendar settings

On the next page, go to the “General” tab.

Then, in Show In the section of the page you can customize the event URL slug and single event URL slug as you wish. However, we recommend that you leave it as “Events” and “Event” to avoid confusion.

Then switch to editing section of the page and use the checkbox to enable “Enable event block editor” so that you can customize the user event forms with Gutenberg blocks.

In this section, make sure that “Show metabox for custom fields” is also checked to ensure that you can map fields from form builder form templates.

The event calendar activates the block editor

Let’s go to the Display tab to see how to set up the appearance of the user events page on your website.

By default, the Monthly View Events per Day is set to 3 to ensure the calendar stays clean and easy to read. You can change this number to suit your website and your needs.

However, if you want to display all events without limit, you can set the value to -1. This means that all events scheduled for a day will be displayed, regardless of the number.

Next, under “Number of events to display per page,” enter the number of events you want to display on your events page.

Next, enable “Show Comments” to ensure you receive user-generated content that reinforces the legitimacy of the event and improves engagement and SEO.

Comments appear in the event calendar

Then go to Date and time Date and time format setup section. Finally, use the Currency section to set up the default currency symbol and code.

Date and currency of the event calendar

That’s it! You are ready to use the Calendar Events plugin to add user events to your website.

Step 2: Install WPForms and its add-on

Now, to allow users to submit calendar events, you need to create a form. And there is no better form builder than WPForms.

wpforms homepage

WPForms is the best form plugin because it can help you create any form with an easy-to-use drag-and-drop builder. It contains over 1800 templates that you can customize to suit your needs. You can then further edit any template you want using the drag-and-drop builder, making it ideal for beginners.

One of the reasons WPForms is so powerful is its many integration features.

You can add payment gateways like Stripe and PayPal to receive payments directly on your forms. You can also integrate it with many popular marketing and subscription tools to improve lead generation and conversion.

Most importantly, you can connect it with other plugins like The Events Calendar to display a user events calendar.

Check out the latest WPForms review here.

How to set up WPForms?

First, go to WPForms’ official website to sign up for a premium plan. Sure, this form builder plugin comes with one free version. However, to accept user-generated content from the frontend, you need the WPForms Pro plan or higher.

Once you have purchased a plan, go to Download Tab in your WPForms dashboard and download the plugin zip file. While you’re on this page, copy the too License key; You will need it later to activate the Pro plan.

wpforms-pro-license

Then go to your WordPress dashboard and navigate to Plugins » Add new plugin. Upload the WPForms ZIP file here and activate it. After that, the WPForms menu option should appear in your WordPress dashboard.

Now go to it WPForms » Settings and select the “General” tab. In the License key In the bar, paste the previously copied activation key and click “Confirm key”.

Check wpforms license

That’s it! You can now set up WPForms on your website.

However, to accept user events, you need the Post Submissions add-on.

This plugin add-on allows your users to send posts like events, guest posts, and more from the frontend.

You don’t need to log into your backend to create the content, which can lead to security issues. Everything you need to create a calendar event is conveniently placed on the front end of your website.

To get started, go to WPForms » Add-ons.

On this page, use the search bar to find the Post Submissions add-on. Install and activate it like any other plugin add-on and you’re done!

wpforms post submissions

You can now use the Post Submissions addon with WPForms to accept user submitted events.

Step 3: Create a form for user submitted events

With WPforms, WPForm Post Submissions add-on, and The Events Calendar plugin set up, it’s time to create a form for user-submitted events.

First go to WPForms » Add New in your WordPress dashboard to open the WPForms form builder. Here you will see all over 1800 form templates.

To help you quickly find the form you need, WPForms has organized the templates into categories on the left. You can also use the search bar to find the template you want.

For this tutorial, we’ll use the search bar to find the Blog Post Submission Form template. Remember that this particular template is tied to the Post Submission add-on. So you can only access this template after setting up the Post Submission add-on.

Next, select “Use Template” to go to the drag-and-drop form builder.

wpforms form for blog post submission

On this page, all field options are placed on the left, while the preview window is on the right. The fields are grouped into standard fields, fancy fields, and payment fields to further simplify the form creation process.

Remember that the template we chose, the blog post submission form, is intended for blog post submissions.

WPForms post submission template

So our first task is to adapt it to event submissions.

The first section of this template is Information about the author. In this section, the event author provides user information such as name and email. This ensures that you have all the event author’s details in your database.

Below is that Short biography of the author Field. Here the user can provide information about themselves and their connection to the event or organization.

Since the “Author Biography” section is important for the credibility of the event, we will leave it as it is.

Author details section of wpforms

Now let’s move on to the “Event Text” section.

Keep in mind that you don’t have to use the exact changes from this tutorial to design your custom post type. You can customize this form to suit your specific needs.

First, go to the “Create Blog Post” field and select it to open Field options.

Change here label to something like “Create an event” to match the goal of the form. Below, edit the placeholder content in Description in the field “Please submit your events using the fields below.”

Next, go to the Single Line Text field labeled Post title and edit it to something like “Event Title”. Then continue with that Post extract and edit it to “Short Event Description”.

wpforms adjusts the field label

When you’re done, also change “Featured Image” to “Promotional Image” to ensure the event has a featured image.

wpforms edits the caption of the highlighted image

As mentioned, we now want to give users the ability to create a beautiful event without having to access the backend.

To this we add one Rich text Field.

To do this, first delete the “Post content” field in the form using the trash can symbol.

wpforms deletes the content field of the post

Then in Unusual fields In the section on the left, find the “Rich Text” box and move it to where “Post Content” was previously.

When you’re done, change the field’s label from “Rich Text” to something like “Event Description.”

Now Rich Texts can help your users add bold and italics, H tags, links, quotes, lists, links, media files and more. This can help your users shape their content to be more engaging to your audience and improve search engine optimization right on the front end of your website.

wpforms event description rich text

Next, add a start and end date for the event.

To do this, go to Unusual fields again and locate the “Date/Time” field. Drag and drop two of these date/time fields onto your form. Then edit one of these fields as “Start Date” and the other as “End Date”.

wpforms adds date field

Now select one of them Date/Time Fields in your preview window to open the “Field Options”.

Next, go to the Advanced tab and use the toggle key to enable “Disable past dates” to ensure your users only create events for future dates. When you’re done, select the other one Date/Time field and do the same.

wpforms disables past data

Remember that before submitting each form, users must complete certain sections to ensure that you or other users have all the information. And an events calendar form is no different.

WPForms allows you to make any field you want on the form mandatory.

All you need to do is enable the Required toggle button under Field Options in any field. For example, you can set the name, email address, event title, and event description as needed for this event calendar form.

Create required field in wpforms

Your users will see a small red star next to required fields, indicating that they must fill them out before submitting.

As a bonus, You can add additional fields such as phone, website/URL, and address to provide more information about the user submitting the event. You can also add a CAPTCHA field or a custom captcha field to increase form security and ensure you only receive real events.

However, you should remember not to add too many or unnecessary fields and to keep the form short and concise to avoid form abandonment.

wpforms form fields

Step 4: Connect event form to event calendar

As mentioned, WPForms works seamlessly with other tools like The Events Calendar plugin. To connect these two plugins, we will perform a simple process called mapping.

Mapping is the process of connecting data between different parts of a form and other applications or services.

In this case, we connect WPForms fields to the event calendar. This ensures that the data collected through the forms is accurately and efficiently transferred to the appropriate fields in the event calendar.

To get started, go to Settings » Post Submissions in your WPForms drag and drop builder. Next, enable “Enable post submissions” using the toggle key to expand the options.

With WPForms, mapping your forms is now very easy as you use drop-down options.

First, go to each drop-down option in the list and select the following.

  • Post title assigned to “event name”
  • Post content assigned to “event description”
  • Post extract assigned to “Short event description”
  • Post featured image assigned to “advertising image”
  • Post type assigned to “Events”
wpforms allow you to submit contributions

Then use the drop-down menu below Post status to select “Pending Review”. This gives you the opportunity to review each event before it goes live.

Then set the below Post author to “Current User”. This ensures that the event is published under the creator’s name.

wpforms post status

Now let’s map the time and date using the “Custom Post Meta”.

In this section, we will add a very simple code to tell the Event Calendar WordPress plugin the duration of the event.

Enter on the first line of the text bar “_EventStartDate” Then select Start Date from the drop-down menu next to it. Then click on the plus sign (+). Another text bar line will appear underneath. Enter here “_EventEndDate” Then select “End Date” from the drop-down menu next to it.

wpforms custom post meta, pending post

But what if you want the event to go live without your consent?

To do this, first change the Post status from “Pending Review” to “Published”. Then go back to the Custom post meta Area and add two more text bar lines.

Enter on the next line of text “_EventStartDateUTC” and select Start date in the drop down menu. After that, go to the last line of the text bar and type something “_EventEndDateUTC”

In summary, the assignment looks like this:

  • _EventStartDate assigned Start time
  • _EventEndDate assigned End times
  • _EventStartDateUTC assigned Start time
  • _EventEndDateUTC assigned End times
wpforms custom post meta published post

That’s it! You can now associate your WPForms with the events calendar.

Step 5: Set up confirmation and notification messages

With the connection between the form and the event calendar tool ready, it’s time to customize the confirmation and notification messages. These messages help both you and event creators understand the status of an event.

For example, they confirm to a user that their submission was received successfully. This eliminates any uncertainty or confusion as to whether the form was submitted correctly and prevents multiple submissions.

On the other hand, email notifications ensure that you, as a site administrator, are quickly notified of new submissions so that you can take immediate action when necessary.

This allows you to easily automate tasks like assigning submissions to team members or triggering workflows. This can save you time and reduce manual effort.

First, go to the “Notifications” tab in your WPForms form editor.

Here, Enable notifications Use the Shift key to open further options. Then you will find “Send to email address” in the text bar Smart tag {admin_email}which allows WPForms to send email notifications to your WordPress email address.

If you want to send the notification to one of your other email addresses, simply delete that Smart tag and enter the one you want.

If you want your user to receive a copy of the email, select that Show smart tags Button. From the Available Fields drop-down menu, select Email. This will send a copy of the email to the email address the user used to create their event form.

wpforms enable notifications

Next, switch to Email subject line Text box and customize it to reflect event submissions. You can use something like “New Entry: Event Submission”.

In the By nameEnter your company name, your name, or the name of the team member responsible for the process.

wpforms email subject line

Then enter the “From Email” field in the text bar {admin_email} Smart tag This also applies to avoid interruption to the email setup.

Now go to the Reply to Section to customize the message you want to send as part of the automatic notification message. This could be a thank you message to the user for submitting the event, a short marketing message, or additional steps to take after submitting the form.

wpforms sets up email notifications

Next, go to the “Confirmation” tab.

In the Standard confirmation In the “Confirmation” section, use the drop-down menu to select the “Confirmation Type” you want to use. Choose between Show Page, which allows you to redirect the user to another page on your website. You can also select “Go to URL (Redirect)” to redirect the user to an external URL outside of your website.

But for this tutorial we will select News from the Confirmation Type drop-down list to display a simple confirmation message. Next, enter the custom message to your users in the Confirm Message field.

wpforms creates a confirmation message

Then select “Show Smart Tags” underneath and click “Name” so that the message contains the user’s name.

Next, enable “Automatically scroll to confirmation message” using a toggle button. This ensures that your users don’t have to reload the event page or go to another WordPress page to see the confirmation message.

Once you’ve done this, you can also use the toggle key to enable “Show entry previews after confirmation message.” This will display the completed event form to the user so they can see if they made an error during submission.

Finally, go to the preview style and use the drop-down menu to choose between “Basic”, “Compact”, “Table” and “Compact-Table”.

wpforms customizes the confirmation message

Great! Your user-submitted event form is ready to publish.

Step 6: Publish the user submitted event form

Now that your form is ready, it’s time to publish it to your website.

To do this, you must first “save” your form. Then select the Embed Click the button in the top right corner of your WPForms drag and drop form builder page.

Then select “Create a new page” in the pop-up window.

Embed wpforms form into new page

In the next popup, enter the desired page name for the events calendar page. Remember that this name serves as the page title and page URL slug.

wpforms creates a page with events

After that, WPForms will redirect you to the design of the page you just created. You can check if something is missing or if you have made any mistakes. When you’re happy with your form, click “Publish” and your events calendar page should go live.

wpforms publish event

Or you may want to add the form to an existing page. The good news is that WPForms allows you to add forms using the Gutenberg block and WordPress’ standard block editor.

wpforms block

You can also place the form virtually anywhere on your site using a shortcode, such as a widget, a sidebar, and more.

wpforms adds form with shortcode

You can also use an embed wizard, Elementor form modules, Divi Embed, etc Seed Prod Module.

Now that the events calendar page has gone live, you can review entries before they go live.

To do this, navigate to Events Menu option in your WordPress dashboard.

Navigate to the WordPress events calendar

Remember that all events submitted through your calendar form will appear as Pendingwhich indicates that they require your consent before being displayed.

So select the “Edit” button under the event title. This allows you to preview submission details, including images, using WPForms’ rich text field.

Edit pending events in the events calendar

Pay special attention Time and date section to ensure the event is correctly associated with your site’s time zone. Now that you have reviewed all the event details and made any necessary changes, click Publish.

The event page will then go live on your website and can be viewed via the URL created by The Events Calendar, e.g https://www.yoursite/events.

Below is an example of what the page would look like.

Event page preview

If you want to display the event on their page, the URL will look something like this: https://www.yoursite/event/single-post-name.

Below is an example of what a new event form calendar would look like.

Example of a wpforms event form

Congratulations! You can now allow users to submit calendar events in WordPress. If you have any further questions, check out our FAQs below.

FAQs: How to allow users to submit calendar events in WordPress

Can I connect Google Calendar to my WordPress calendar?

Yes, you can connect Google Calendar to your WordPress calendar using The Events Calendar Pro. It offers add-ons that enable syncing with Google Calendar, Eventbrite, iCalendar, Meetup, and more. This integration allows you to manage and display events from Google Calendar directly on your WordPress site, ensuring all events are updated and accessible from one place.

How can I send a calendar event?

To send a calendar event, you can use the Events Calendar plugin with WPForms. First, create an event submission form using WPForms. Once the form is set up and associated with the events calendar, users can submit events through the form. The events calendar then helps you manage events and display those events on your WordPress site.

Do I have to log in to submit a calendar event?

No. With Event Calendar, your users don’t have to log in to submit a calendar event. With the WordPress plugin you can create events directly from the frontend and do not need to be logged in as a user in your WordPress dashboard. However, you can choose to review submissions before publishing to maintain control over the content.

What is the best free plugin for user submitted events?

Events Calendar is the best free plugin for user-submitted events. It allows users to submit events directly from the frontend of your website. For better functionality, you can use it with WPForms to create customizable event submission forms. WPForms’ drag-and-drop builder and Post Submissions add-on make it easy to create and manage user-submitted event forms. This provides a user-friendly experience for both users and you.

That’s it! We hope you enjoyed reading about how to allow users to create events on your website. If you are looking for event plugin alternatives, read this article about the 9 best WordPress event plugins compared.

Additionally, here are other articles you may want to read.

The first article lists the 21+ best event and conference themes for WordPress. In the next post, you will learn how to use Sugar Calendar, one of the best event plugins, to manage and plan events. In the last article you will learn how to create a booking form.

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