Vendor Spotlights in VendorHearth Pro help organizers turn vendor information already stored in the system into promotional content for upcoming events.
Instead of manually creating every vendor feature from scratch, VendorHearth can generate WordPress posts using information from confirmed vendors.
What Is a Vendor Spotlight? #
A Vendor Spotlight is a promotional WordPress post featuring a vendor participating in one of your events.
VendorHearth can use information already provided by the vendor, such as:
- Business name
- Business description
- Product information
- Vendor logo
- Social information
- Event information
This reduces the amount of content organizers need to recreate manually.
Spotlights Use Confirmed Vendor Information #
Vendor Spotlights are designed around vendors who are participating in the event.
Keeping vendor profiles accurate improves the quality of the generated spotlight content.
Before creating spotlights, review important vendor information such as the business name, description, and logo.
WordPress Posts #
VendorHearth creates Vendor Spotlights as WordPress posts.
This means the spotlight can use WordPress features such as:
- Draft status
- Scheduled publishing
- Published posts
- Featured images
- Social sharing integrations
Organizers can review the generated post before publication when needed.
Vendor Logos #
When appropriate vendor logo information is available, VendorHearth can use the logo as the featured image for the spotlight post.
Encouraging vendors to maintain a good-quality logo can improve the appearance of generated spotlights.
Draft, Scheduled, and Published Spotlights #
Vendor Spotlights may exist in different WordPress states.
Draft
The spotlight exists but is not publicly published.
Scheduled
The spotlight is scheduled to publish at a future date and time.
Published
The spotlight is publicly available on the website.
VendorHearth respects these existing states when managing spotlight schedules.
Automatic Spotlight Scheduling #
VendorHearth can automatically build a promotional schedule for an event.
By default, the spotlight scheduler can schedule:
2 Vendor Spotlights per day
at approximately:
10:00 AM
and
6:00 PM
beginning approximately:
30 days before the event
These scheduling options can be adjusted for an event when a different promotional schedule is preferred.
Existing Spotlights Are Preserved #
When rebuilding or working with the spotlight schedule, VendorHearth preserves existing spotlight posts that are already:
- Drafted
- Scheduled
- Published
This helps prevent the system from unnecessarily recreating promotional content that already exists.
Events With TBA Dates #
Automatic scheduling depends on having an event date.
Events marked TBA are excluded from date-based automatic spotlight scheduling until an appropriate event date is available.
Test Spotlights #
VendorHearth includes a Create Test Spotlight option.
A test spotlight creates a labeled WordPress draft so organizers can see how the feature behaves before using it with actual promotional content.
Test spotlights:
- Are clearly identified as tests
- Do not create real VendorHearth vendor records
- Remain drafts
- Are not automatically published
This makes them useful when initially configuring or demonstrating the spotlight system.
Social Media Auto-Posting #
Because Vendor Spotlights are WordPress posts, they can also work with supported WordPress social-sharing tools.
For automatic posting to connected social accounts such as Facebook or Instagram, your WordPress site must have the appropriate social-sharing integration configured.
One option is Jetpack, connected to the social accounts you want WordPress to share posts to.
VendorHearth does not independently log into your Facebook or Instagram account.
The social connection is handled through your WordPress site’s social-sharing configuration.
Test Social Sharing Before Relying on It #
Before assuming scheduled spotlights will automatically appear on social media:
- Verify your WordPress social-sharing integration is active.
- Verify the correct social accounts are connected.
- Confirm normal WordPress posts can be shared successfully.
- Test your setup before beginning the full VendorHearth spotlight schedule.
A VendorHearth spotlight can publish successfully on your website even if the separate social-sharing connection fails.
Why Use Vendor Spotlights? #
Vendor Spotlights can turn information already collected during vendor registration into useful promotional content.
For organizers with dozens of vendors, automated scheduling can significantly reduce the amount of repetitive work required to create and schedule individual vendor features before an event.
Next Step #
Continue to Creating Vendor Spotlights to learn how VendorHearth generates spotlight posts from confirmed vendor information.
