Integrate a Zoom web conferencing account with ePly to create virtual meetings or webinars alongside your registration forms in ePly. Registrants’ check-in status will be updated if they join the meeting or webinar.
This integration does 3 things:
- Allows for the creation or assignment of a single or multiple Zoom meeting/webinar with an ePly form.
- Automatically creates Zoom participants for Primary Registrants in ePly
*Forms configured with additional/guest/group registrants not supported yet - Automatically changes ePly registrants’ check-in status and records a timestamp of when they join and leave the Zoom meeting/webinar.
Prerequisite
All Zoom plans are compatible. If you don’t have an account, you can sign up for the Basic plan for free at zoom.us/signup to test Zoom and this integration. Note that in most cases, you will want a Pro account or higher when planning an actual virtual event as the Basic plan limits meetings to 40 minutes. If you plan to conduct Zoom webinars you will need to add their Webinar add-on.
The main different between a Zoom meeting and a webinar is that meetings are more interactive where participants can control their video and audio and webinar participants are view-only but with access to chat. The full list of differences can be found on the Zoom website here.
Moving forward in this article, the term meeting will be used to reference both Zoom meetings and webinars.
Setup
You will need to create a JWT app in the Zoom Marketplace. Follow the steps below and input its API key and secret in your ePly account under Account Settings > General Information. Once added to your ePly account, you will be able to create or add a Zoom meeting on any ePly form. Note that these values are not from you regular Zoom account settings.
Zoom Marketplace JWT App API values, example:
Key: 1k4GUOG6FAegC7DwFUSG2s
Secret: HfFmivs01DaMINmSlzA26nLOQRu2d5bZ5IO9
Create a Zoom Marketplace JWT App:
- Visit https://marketplace.zoom.us/, login and accept the terms of service.
- Select Develop(top), select Build App and select Create under JWT App. This app will not be public and is only used by ePly to create or retrieve a Zoom meeting, create participants and retrieve a timestamp of when they join or leave a meeting.
- When asked for an app name, use a generic name like "[Your organization's name] JWT App”. The name doesn't matter but only a single JWT app can be created in your Zoom account.
- Complete the company name, name, email address fields and select Continue.
- Select Copy next to API key. Paste it in ePly under Account Settings > General Information. Repeat for API Secret. You do not need the IM Chat History Token or JWT Token. Select Continue.
- You should now be on the Feature tab. Ignore the Verification Token, toggle on Event Subscriptions and click Add new event subscription. Use “ePly Integration” for the subscription name and “https://events.eply.com/tools/webhooks.aspx?o=zoom” for the Event notification endpoint URL.
- Click Add events under Event Types. Check off the following options under both Meeting and Webinar.
- Participant/Host joined meeting
- Participant/Host left meeting
- Select Done to return to the previous page. Note that “4 events added” should appear under Event types. Select Save which will collapse the subscription settings and select Continue one last time.
- You should see a message that your app is activated. You can logout.
Create or Add a Zoom meeting(s) to an ePly form
If you are using multiple Zoom meetings for an event and you want to collect attendance for each meeting in ePly, you need to create separate form fields for each meeting and select e
Zoom meetings can be created or assigned to an ePly form at any time.
- If the Zoom meeting is added before the form is open, registrants will receive an email from Zoom with join information at the same time as the ePly form confirmation. If you are collecting event fees via credit card on the form, the zoom email will go out after payment is complete.
- If the Zoom meeting is added after the form is open, any registrants that have already submitted the form will immediately receive the Zoom email.
Open an ePly form and navigate to Advanced Settings > Integrations.
- Click Create New Meeting and complete the list of fields to create it or click Add Existing Meeting to input an ID you've already created in Zoom. (You will be prompted to select whether or not your meeting will be used with Virtual Venue if it is enabled on your account)
- If adding an existing meeting, check these settings in Zoom:
- Registration must be required. (Registration must not be required if using Virtual Venue)
- Require authentication to join cannot be enabled
- Approval type must be Manually Approve* Note: this is configured after the meeting is created (Skip this setting if using Virtual Venue)
- ePly registrants will still be automatically approved for the Zoom meeting but any guests trying to access the meeting with only the Zoom link would need to be approved in Zoom. This can prevent against "Zoombooming".
a)
b)
- ePly registrants will still be automatically approved for the Zoom meeting but any guests trying to access the meeting with only the Zoom link would need to be approved in Zoom. This can prevent against "Zoombooming".
- Questions other than First Name, Last Name, Email, Company & Phone cannot be checked-off as required*
- Clicking Delete Meeting will delete the meeting in ePly AND Zoom. This button is disabled after the host ends the meeting.
Note the following in-ePly Zoom settings:
- Zoom Account Email Address field must match your the email address for your Zoom account.
- Contact name and email are used as the From information of the Zoom email.
- Topic will be used as the subject of the Zoom email.
- Meeting Access can be used to register everyone in Zoom regardless of their registration selections or only register those who select a specific registration field. Use the latter for restricting access and/or recording attendance of individual sessions. Be sure to enable check-in for each session's registration field if recording attendance.
The meeting will be created upon saving this page. You can edit the meeting in ePly or Zoom at any time and registrants will receive an updated Zoom email. You can delete and recreate the meeting in ePly at any time before the meeting has started and registrants will get a new Zoom email.
Attendance tracking
Registrants should add the meeting to their calendars upon receiving the Zoom email to ensure they have easy access when the meeting occurs(not applicable for Virtual Venue as direct Zoom join emails are not send to registrants). Important: The join link in the Zoom email is unique to the registrant and should not be shared with another person. The registrant’s attendance will be recorded in ePly when anyone uses their link to join the meeting.
Attendance is tracked in ePly using 3 elements: The Attended Status, Check-In Status and Check In Activity. All 3 are shown on a registrant's details page.
When a registrant joins the Zoom meeting, their check-in status is checked and their attended status changed from Did Not Attend to Attended. The attended status cannot change again. When they leave the meeting, their check-in status will be unchecked. Each time they join or leave the meeting, their check-in status will change and a new record will be added to their check in activity log.
Note that the checked-in by username is shown as "Zoom Attendance Retrieval" here and on the Check-in report. You can manually change the check-in status if needed but the checked-in by username will be recorded as yours.
Reporting of the attended status across all registrants is not available yet. Please contact help@eply.com and a report can be created to you.
