Selling tickets for an event you're hosting is a great way to raise money for your cause.

If you haven't done so already, create an event page for your event. If you need instructions on how to do so, check out our HOWTO on Setting up an event.

Even if you already have a donation page, we recommend creating a separate one for ticket sales. Once you've created your new donation page, there are a few settings you may want to look over and change based on your needs. To set up your donation page specifically for ticket sales, there are a few settings you'll want to configure on the Donation Settings > Basic page.

1. Select the payment processor you wish to use to sell tickets.

2. Change the Donation frequency setting to One time.

3. Click Save settings.

Once your basic settings are saved, navigate to Donation settings > Advanced. Here, you can configure the rest of the settings such as designating what page they should land on after completing their purchase, selecting tags to add to the ticket purchaser, setting a tracking code, adding the purchaser to an existing membership, and more.

1. Enter the slug of the page you'd like them to land on after completing their purchase. This is important because if not set, the purchaser will land on the ticket purchase page again, causing them to believe their purchase did not go through, thus resulting in duplicate ticket purchases.

2. Click Save settings.

The remainder of the settings on this page are optional and can be configured if desired, but aren't required for tickets to be sold.

The ticket purchase page has an autoresponse email that is automatically sent when the purchase is complete. You'll want to edit this email to reflect the ticket purchase, add a logo or images, personalization, etc. The autoresponse email can be edited at Donation settings > Autoresponse.

⚠️ IMPORTANT: Be sure not to edit any of the text that has brackets {{ }} around it as this will cause your autoresponse to malfunction.

Once you are finished editing, click Save autoresponse email.

If you'd rather not have an automatic email sent out with ticket purchases, you can disable the autoresponse email by navigating to Donation settings > Autoresponse, and unchecking the box labeled Automatically send donors an email. Once this is unchecked, click Save autoresponse email.

⚠️ Note: Unless the autoresponse settings on the event or donation page are changed, a person buying a ticket will receive two autoresponse emails: one confirming their RSVP and one with their ticket purchase receipt.

Once your ticket sales donation page is complete, you'll need to go back to your event page and enable ticket sales. Navigate to Event settings > Basics, and check the box labeled Sell tickets.

Once the box is checked, two dropdown menus appear. First, select the donation page the purchaser will use to process the ticket payment.

The second menu allows you to select a tracking code for the transactions to track the amount of money you have collected through ticket purchases. For more information about tracking codes see our Understanding tracking codes article.

⚠️ Note: If both the event page and the payment pages have tracking codes, only the tracking code from the payment page will be added to the ticket sale.

Click the Save settings button at the bottom of the page.

Once your tickets are enabled and your donation page is connected to your event, navigate to Event settings > Tickets to set up each ticket level.

1. Name the ticket level in the Name text box, ie “Individual” or “VIP”.

2. Write a description of the ticket level in the Description text box. This will be displayed under the ticket price on the public event page. This step is optional.

3. Enter a ticket price. This must be a positive amount. If you'd like to create a free event, see step 6 in our Setting up an event HOWTO article.

4. Set a ticket level limit. This is the total number of tickets available for this ticket type. For example, if your event has a VIP section that can hold 50 people, you should set this to 50. If someone attempts to purchase more tickets than are remaining for that level, a pop-up will let them know that there are insufficient tickets available.

5. Indicate how many tickets this level purchases. This is best used when you are giving a discounted rate for couples or group tickets.

6. Click Save.

To delete any existing ticket levels, click on the small, downward arrow on the far right end, under Current Ticket Levels.

If you plan to sell tickets outside of your NationBuilder event page, you can accept RSVPs for your event on the event page, and then redirect them to a third party website to complete their ticket purchase. To do this, you'll want to go back and uncheck the box next to Sell tickets on the Event settings > Basics page. Once the Sell tickets box is unchecked, navigate to the Tickets tab, and enter the URL where your RSVP can purchase tickets. You can also enter the price for the tickets in the Ticket price text box.

That's it! You're ready to sell tickets!