VenueDB follows a booking from the first inquiry to the final payment. If you learn these concepts, every screen will make sense.
The big picture
Lead → Event (with Functions) → Contract → Invoice & payments → Completed- A lead is someone who has asked about your space. You track them through a sales pipeline.
- When they book, the lead becomes an event. An event holds everything shared about the booking: the client, status, contract, invoices and documents. It has no date or time of its own.
- The dates and times come from its functions. A function is one booked block of time in one room on one day. A wedding is usually one function — say 9 AM to 11 PM in the ballroom — and if there's a rehearsal the day before, that's a second function. A five-day training is five functions.
- A contract is generated from a template, sent to the client and signed. Signing starts the payment schedule.
- Payments come in against the invoice. When the event is over, it is marked completed.
The pieces
| Concept | What it is | Where |
|---|---|---|
| Company | Your business account. Settings, team and billing live here. | Settings |
| Venue | A physical location you host events at. | Settings → Venues & Spaces |
| Space (room) | A bookable room inside a venue, with capacities and rates. | Settings → Venues & Spaces |
| Lead | A prospective booking, moving through your pipeline stages. | Leads |
| Client | A person you book events for. Can belong to an account. | Clients |
| Account | An organization (a school district, a company, a church) that books repeatedly. Can be tax exempt. | Accounts |
| Event | The booking itself. | Events |
| Function | One booked block of time — a single day, in one room, with a start and end. This is where an event's dates and times live. Carries its own room rental fee and services. | Event → Functions |
| Lifecycle | The stages an event moves through (New → Inquiry → … → Closed), with tasks and a payment schedule. | Settings → Lifecycles |
| Report | A saved question about your data — revenue, balances, service charges, a printable calendar. | Reports |
Event status vs. lifecycle stage
These are two views of the same progress:
- Status is coarse and fixed:
INQUIRY,HOLD,TENTATIVE,CONFIRMED,COMPLETED,CANCELED,NO_SHOW. The calendar, reports and the API use it. - Stage is detailed and yours to customize (for example Proposal, Definite, Guaranteed). Each stage maps to one status, so moving an event to a stage updates its status for you.
Where to go next
- Learn how leads become bookings: Leads and the pipeline.
- Set up how you charge: Pricing, fees and taxes.
- Connect your website: API introduction.
- Learn the top bar, recent items and phone layouts: Finding your way around.
- Answer "how much did we make?": Reports.
- Set up your own profile and email signature: Your account and email signature.