How to create and manage a floor plan

Learn how to create and manage floor plans—an essential event tool that empowers organizers to design venue layouts, set pricing details, and enable exhibitors to select and reserve booth spaces.

Summary

The floorplan builder tool provides users with the ability to effortlessly add, remove, and rearrange booths and event specific elements along with making real-time updates to the plan. They can personalize their plan by incorporating brand-specific images, elements, fonts, and backgrounds. The platform allows organizers to seamlessly connect spaces to their preferred sessions and booths, and generate revenue by offering spaces for sale to exhibitors.

This guide covers the step-by-step process to set up floor plans, enabling a seamless experience for both organizers, exhibitors, and attendees when managing spot reservations and navigating around the floor plan.

 

STEPS FOLLOWED BY EVENT ORGANIZERS

Floor Plan Builder Tool

1. First step is to ensure that the “Enable Venue Builder” toggle has been configured for the event for users to accordingly see the “Venue Builder” option in the main navigation section of the event and the associated “Seat Plan” sub-heading.

 

2. Upon clicking the “Floor Plan” button from the menu section, the users will be redirected to the floor plan listing section which involves options to add a new plan, edit any of the existing plans, and search for the desired floor plan.

 

3.  For adding a new plan, click on the “Add Floor Plan” button and it will redirect users to a pop up that asks them to design the plan from scratch or pick up a predefined template and edit it as per an event’s requirement along with naming the plan. 

 

4. The next step involves designing the floor plan according to the event's requirements. Users can adjust various components of the plan through the options that appear in the top menu section.

 

Canvas: This can be used by organizers to upload the venue image within the builder and accordingly mark hotspots over the image through elements and booths selection section of the floorplan.

Elements: This section includes various shapes that can be added to the floorplan to direct users about different areas. For example: Addition of an arrow element to highlight that users are supposed to proceed in a specific direction on the venue.

Text: The text input section allows organizers to add headings and other text elements, like "session titles," to emphasize specific areas where activities will take place at the venue.

Line: The line option is to add line separators while building up the venue on the canvas and can be added in different formats.

Booth: This is one of the important sections, where booths associated with the event can be added to the floor plan, they can be named and pricing elements can be associated with them for the exhibitors to later on purchase them.

 

Pricing Mechanism of Booths:

• Free reservation leads to no price association and exhibitors proceed with reservation of spots on the floorplan only.
• Paid aspect involves payment of the amount associated with the booth spot.
• Reserve Noe, Pay Later option lets exhibitors hold the spots and pay the amount associated with the spot to the event organizers at a later point of time through external payment mechanism (outside of vfairs)

 

Upload: The upload section can be used to add images or logos to highlight sponsorships or other such aspects of the venue.

Settings: The settings section allows organizers to update the floorplan title and toggle the integration of the floorplan with the booth creation form. This enables exhibitors to be redirected to the floorplan after completing the booth creation form, allowing them to make booth purchases as needed.

 

5. Event organizers can also make adjustments to the plan from the options available at the bottom of the builder tool. The purpose of each of those is highlighted below:

 

 

Zoom in/out: This helps organizers as by zooming in, they can view finer details or make precise adjustments, whereas upon zooming out, they can get an overview of the entire layout, aiding in overall planning and navigation.

Highlight Multiple Booths: The highlight multiple booths tool at the bottom right hand side enables the organizer to highlight the set of booth spaces added to the plan and make collective adjustments.

Adjust Transparency: The drop shaped icon next to the highlighting feature is to adjust the transparency of the elements added on the canvas. It allows users to control the visibility of elements within a layout or design, making it easier to layer items and highlight specific areas without completely hiding others

Lock: The lock option is to ensure that the items such as elements, booth spaces, lines are locked on the canvas and cannot be edited further.

Duplicate: The duplication icon next to lock allows organizers to duplicate different elements on the canvas along with their associated settings.

Delete: This icon lets the user delete any of the elements on the canvas.

 

6. Upon completion of the entire floorplan design, event organizers have to ensure that they click on the “Save & Publish” button for the plan to be saved up in the event.