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Every message an import can show, what caused it and the fix — written from the importer's own rules.
Most surprises in a WebMobi import come from three rules. An import never deletes. Existing rows are matched — sessions by title and start time, speakers by email, sponsors by company name, exhibitors by booth, attendees by email — and matched rows are skipped, except speakers, which are updated. And a column heading WebMobi does not recognise is ignored. The sections below take each message in turn.
New to importing? Start with Bulk import: what it does and never does. Error rows are numbered like your spreadsheet: “Row 2” is the first row under the headings.
| You see | Meaning |
|---|---|
| Nothing new to import — every row already exists | Every row matched a record on the event. Correct and complete — nothing was lost. |
| Already present (skipped): N | N rows matched and were left alone. The line Matched existing rows by: … names the key. |
| Edits in the file did not appear | Sessions, sponsors and attendees that already exist are never changed by an import. Edit them on screen. Only speakers are updated from a file. |
| Symptom | Cause and fix |
|---|---|
| Two copies of a session after re-importing | The title or start time differs from the original, so the row looked new. Remove the extra copy on the Sessions page. Change titles and times on screen, not by re-importing. |
| Two copies of a speaker | The rows had different emails, or no email. A speaker without an email is added as new every time. Remove the duplicate on screen and always include the same email. |
| A speaker's bio, photo or title disappeared after re-importing | A matched speaker is updated with every column in the row, including empty cells. Re-import with the full row. |
| Two copies of a session imported by two people at the same moment | Two imports running at once can both add the same row. Import one file at a time. |
To see what an import added, open the event's History and set Any change to Added with the date of the import. Imports from these pages are listed record by record, attributed to The system.
A speaker in WebMobi is one record per email address, shared by every event that uses them. When a teammate has already imported a speaker, your import of the same email:
Row N: a speaker with email … is used by another organization's events — use a different email
The email belongs to a speaker who appears only on events of an organization you cannot manage. WebMobi never links or changes another organization's speaker. Use a different address for this speaker in your file — the speaker's work or personal address, for example — or, if the other events are your colleagues', ask a manager of one of them to add you to the event.
Row N: no speaker on this event matches “…” — import the speaker first, then re-import this session
The session was created, but the name or email in speaker_emails / speaker_names matched nobody on the event. Session rows only link speakers who are already on the event, by exact email or by “First Last” ignoring capitals.
| Symptom | Cause and fix |
|---|---|
| Every session is off by the same number of hours | The event's time zone was not set, or was wrong, when you imported. Times in the file are read in the event's time zone. Set it in the event's settings, then fix the times on screen — re-importing would add second copies. |
| An .xlsx file's times are off by your time zone's offset from UTC | The time cells were formatted as Excel dates, which reach WebMobi as UTC. Format the start and end columns as text, typed like 2026-09-21T09:00, or save the sheet as CSV before importing. |
| invalid start_time/end_time (ISO-8601, e.g. 2026-03-15T09:00:00) | The cell is not a date and time WebMobi can read. Use the template's format. |
| start_time and end_time are required | One of the two is empty on that row. |
An agenda exported from WebMobi (Sessions → Export) is already in the right form: its times are the event's wall clock. See Exporting the agenda.
| You see | What to do |
|---|---|
| This does not look like a sessions file — the required column … is missing. | The file was uploaded on the wrong page, or a required heading was renamed. The message lists the columns expected and the ones found. Use the right page, or paste your data into the Template. |
| A column's data is simply not there | Its heading was not recognised and the column was ignored. Capitals, spaces and brackets don't matter (Venue Name = venue_name), but other words do (Venue is not venue_name). Match the template's headings. |
| missing required fields (company_name, tier) | Sponsors need both. Any tier wording is accepted. |
| missing required fields (company_name, category, booth_number) | Exhibitors need all three. |
| booth N already assigned | An exhibitor on this event already has that booth — including when you re-import the same exhibitors file. The existing exhibitor is unchanged. |
| invalid email format | The email cell is not a valid address. Fix it or leave it empty. |
| That file has no rows. | The first sheet is empty, or the headings are not in row 1. Only the first sheet of a workbook is read. |
| You see | What to do |
|---|---|
| File must be a .csv or .xlsx | Includes older .xls files. Open the file in Excel or Numbers and save as .xlsx or .csv. |
| The file is greyed out in the picker | Its type is not accepted (for example a .numbers file). Export as CSV. |
| File too large (max 10MB). | Remove unused columns or split the file. |
| Too many rows (max 500 per import) — split the file. | Split into files of up to 500 rows and import each; rows already imported are skipped. |
| File must have headers and at least one data row | Put headings in row 1 and data from row 2. |
| You see | What to do |
|---|---|
| Confirm Mapping stays greyed out | First Name, Last Name and Email must each be mapped to one of your columns. |
| Missing required fields (email, first_name, last_name) | That row has an empty required cell. Fix it, or import the valid rows and add the person by hand. |
| Invalid email format | Fix the address in the file. |
| Many rows counted as already registered | Someone with that email is already registered for the event (capitals ignored). They are left as they are. |
| Imported attendees have no ticket | The Ticket Type (matched by name) value must match a ticket's name on the event exactly, apart from capitals. |
| Could not read file. Please ensure it's a valid Excel or CSV file | Often an old .xls file. Save it as .xlsx or .csv. |
| Only the first 5000 rows will be imported. Split the file and upload the rest separately. | Import the rest in a second file. |
No. Every row matched something already on the event, so nothing needed adding. Sessions, sponsors and attendees that already exist are left as they are; speakers are updated from the file.
Sessions are matched on title and start time together. If either changed in the file, the row looks new and is added alongside the original. Remove the extra sessions on the Sessions page, and change times on screen rather than by re-importing.
Speakers are matched on email. A row with a different email, or with no email at all, is added as a new speaker. Include each speaker’s email in every file and keep it the same.
Yes, if you can manage an event those speakers are already on — for example as an admin of the same organization. Your import then updates the speaker and adds them to your event; the speaker is not duplicated.
That email belongs to a speaker who appears only on events of an organization you cannot manage. WebMobi does not link or change another organization’s speakers. Use another address for the speaker, or ask a manager of one of those events to add you.
No. Save it as .xlsx or .csv first. Numbers and Google Sheets files should be exported as CSV.
Times in the file are read in the event’s time zone, so set the time zone before importing. In an .xlsx file, also make sure start and end times are typed as text such as 2026-09-21T09:00 rather than formatted as Excel dates, or import a CSV.
There is no undo. Imports only add records (and update speakers), so remove unwanted records on screen. History lists each record the import added, which tells you what to remove.