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Group & Department Pages

Group & Department Pages provide users with context around who is hosting your events! Using Group & Departments will add a directory to your calendar homepage so users can search via a particular Group or Department, or as a quick way to obtain extra information. Groups and Departments are used to bring disparate members of your audience together by highlighting events that happen at different places, but share a common host. Functionally, Group and Department Pages are the same, the information is simply hosted in separate directories.

Group Admin

Frequently Asked Questions

What’s the difference between Groups & Departments?

Groups and Departments are functionally the same, they just live in separate directories within Localist. We see a lot of Localist customers use Groups for student organizations or community clubs. While on the other hand, Departments are usually used for academic or internal departments.

What are Group Types?

If you have sizable directories, Group Types allow users to narrow down these lists to quickly browse the most relevant pages.

Benefits of Groups & Departments

Beyond just serving as another means to classify events, they’re a huge SEO boost! Here are some benefits of using Group & Department Pages:

Users can see both upcoming and recent events on one page.
Users can follow a Group or Department Page so that all events/upcoming events are added to their Localist calendar. Group Admins can decide whether or not to require follow requests by selecting skip officer approval in the Group or Department’s edit page.
Information like social media accounts, description, website links, etc. is available directly on the page.

Adding Group & Department Pages

To add a Group Page: Navigate to Classifications > Groups > + Add Group

To add a Department Page: Navigate to Classifications > Departments > + Add Department

If you’re not already using Department Pages and would like to turn them on, email Localist Support at support@localist.com

Group & Department Page Fields

Field	Details
Name	No character limit. This will be displayed as the Group/Department’s name in the directory listing, on the event list, and on Event Details Pages.
Description	No character limit, but only around 150 characters will be displayed before being truncated on the main listing.
Group (or Department) Website	This website will be linked under the Group or Department’s name on the landing page as View Group (or Department) Website.
Twitter Username	This will be linked in a Twitter icon next to the Follow and Facebook icons on the right side of the page.
Facebook Page	This will be linked in a Facebook icon beside the Follow and Twitter icons on the right side of the page.
Custom URL	This will give the group landing page a custom URL. For example “The Fine Arts Cooperative” will be .edu/the_fine_arts_cooperative, but it can be changed to .edu/fac, etc.
Group Type	Select all that apply. This refers to Group Type Filters that are assigned to Group Pages and live in the Groups directory.
News Feed RSS URL	This feed will be displayed under Upcoming Events on the Group or Department Page.
Skip Officer Approval	When checked, users who select Follow Group or Follow Department will automatically be added as a follower. This does not equate to official group membership.
Photo	This photo will be displayed on the listing and landing page for the Group or Department. It may be used as a part of the Fallback Chain when an event does not have a unique photo.

Assigning an Event to a Group or Department

When in an event’s edit/create form, you will see a section titled Classifications. Group/Departments are listed with a corresponding drop-down. The Upcoming Events section of the Group or Department Page displays the 5 closest future events, starting with the closest.

Managing Live Groups & Departments

Group Officers

Group Officer is a Localist permission level. It is not an administrator permission – which means the user will not be able to access the Admin Dashboard. That said, from the public-facing interface, the Group Officer permission allows the user to:

Use the Public Submission Form to submit events related to that Group or Department for approval
Edit the Group/Department description
Send messages to Group/Department members
Approve membership requests.

To view a complete list of all Group Officers and their respective Groups/Departments, navigate from the Admin Dashboard to Classifications > Groups (or Departments) > Officers.

Approving Group & Department Follow Requests

Platform Admins and Group Admins can manage follow requests in the Admin Dashboard. Navigate to Groups > Follow Requests OR Departments > Follow Requests.

This page displays a list of all pending requests and can be filtered per Group or Department by using the drop down.

Field	Details
Reject	This user will not be allowed to follow the Group.
Verify as Officer	This user will be allowed to follow the Group/Department and will be an officer for the Group/Department.
Verify	This user will be allowed to follow the Group/Department.

+ Bulk Adding Group & Department Pages

Navigate to Classifications > Groups (or Departments) > + Bulk Add Groups (or Departments). On this page you will see a link to download a CSV template. To populate a CSV, the field data will need to be entered the same way you would enter it manually in the edit/create form.

Populating a CSV

Field data will need to be entered the same way you would enter it manually in the edit/create forms. Available Fields for Groups and Departments:

Field	Details
Name	No character limit. This will be displayed as the Group/Department’s name in the directory listing, on the event list, and on Event Details Pages.
Description	No character limit, but only around 150 characters will be displayed before being truncated on the main listing.
Type*	This refers to Group Type Filters that are assigned to Group Pages and live in the Groups directory.
URL	This website will be linked under the Group or Department’s name on the landing page as View Group (or Department) Website.
Photo URL	To include a photo with the Group (or Department), you will reference it using a URL that is hosted by your organization.
Photo Caption	This is where you’ll note the photo’s alt text.
Skip Officer Approval	Enter 1/y/yes/true
Twitter	This will be linked in a Twitter icon next to the Follow and Facebook icons on the right side of the page.
Facebook URL	This will be linked in a Facebook icon beside the Follow and Twitter icons on the right side of the page.

*Type is referring to the default Group Type Filters. However, if you create a custom Filter to be applied to Groups then another column with the Filter’s name, such as “Campus,” will automatically be included when downloading your template. After you are finished building your spreadsheet you must export the file as a CSV. On the pages where you downloaded the templates you will see a file button to select your CSV.

Group Types are also assigned to Department Pages and live in the Group/Department directories. The Group Types will rearrange themselves in each directory based on the number of pages assigned to each Filter (i.e. the number in the parenthesis next to the Group Type).