Upload an ics file

[LSN]

Is there a way to upload an ics file? I'd like our readers to be able to click on a button entitled "Save the Date", which would then download an ics file for them to add to their calendar.  I have not been able to determine how to do this. Is it possible? (I do not want to create an event. This would just be in an e-mail).

Thanks, Stephanie

[Nate_M]

Hi @LSN

Thanks for bringing your question to the community! At this time, our library only allows images and documents to be uploaded. Other customers have requested the ability to add Calendar links to their emails, so I've opened up a support case and tracked your interest. If we receive enough traction on this request, our engineers will look into implementing this feature and you will receive a notification. If you have any other questions or suggestions, please let us know!

Nate M. 
Community Support

If you find my post helpful, and it answers your question, please mark it as an "Accepted Solution" by clicking the Accept as Solution button in the bottom right hand corner of this post.

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[3DEXCITEMarketingUS]

I agree! We need to be able to let people download an .ics file for calendar notices/reminders.

Thank you for your attention here.

[Frankie_P]

Hi @3DEXCITEMarketingUS

Thank you for reaching out to the Community with your feedback! I can definitely understand how helpful having this feature would be and apologize it is not currently available. I have tracked this request in your account and submitted it over to our engineers in the meantime. 

[CasaLatina]

I would also love to be able to upload an ics file! Please do get the engineers to work on this. Thanks!

[Tiago_R]

Hello @CasaLatina,

Thank you for reaching out to us. I apologize for the delay. Your feedback has been submitted to our Engineers for review. If you have any other requests or ideas that could potentially be of use for our system, feel free to pass them along and we will make sure to track them. Please let us know if there is anything else we can assist with today. 

[EpicIS]

But it shows up in the tutorial. How does it not work then?

[Briody_W]

Hello @EpicIS,

Thank you for reaching out to us.  We saw your other post on the matter, but I wanted to make sure we replied to you here as well.  We have updated the process for the RSVP block and the add to calendar link will no longer appear on the Thank You page.  Contacts will need to manually add the time and date to their own calendars when using an RSVP block.  We are absolutely collecting feedback and I will be glad to pass this along to the appropriate teams for review.  I apologize for the inconvenience.

[EpicIS]

I just got off the phone with customer support that said I can create my own ICS file. 

So which is it?

[Briody_W]

Hello @EpicIS,

Thanks for getting back to us.  I apologize for any confusion.  You would have to create and host the .ics file outside of Constant Contact.  You could then create a link to the location of the hosted file's URL and place that link in the body of the email.

[NexFirm]

Seriously? This should not be just a consideration. This is a must. 

[Zoe_H]

Hello @NexFirm,

I apologize for any inconvenience this has caused you, and we completely understand why you would want this. I would be more than happy to submit your feedback to our engineers for review. Thank you for letting us know and I hope you have a wonderful day. 

[luciah1]

Since there is no way to upload an ics file is there a way to use the ics file html in constant contact to use ?

[Alex_S]

Hello @luciah1

It's great to see you in the Community! I'm glad you asked this question as I'm sure other customers have this question too! 

The work-around would be that you could host the .ics file on the internet externally from Constant Contact and then you would simply use the public link for the file and you could link any text, pictures or buttons in your email campaings to the .ics file that way. 

Hope this helps!

[luciah1]

Thanks. 

I feel like this has been an issue for several years now.  I saw another post asking about calendar appointments dating back to 2012. 

The real work around is probably to use a different service for this kind of email.

Thank you.

~lucia

[Alex_S]

Hi @luciah1

You are welcome! I appreciate that you have come to the Community to provide your feedback. Please continue to reach out to us with suggestions on how we can improve our products. We will always track your feedback and provide it to the appropriate teams for review. 

Thanks again!

[KenE14]

Hi

I'd like to chime in. I see the dates on this thread as 2018. Today Sept 16 2019 I'm trying to find a solution to the same problem. It does not appear this issue has been implemented? 

This means I am unable to provide a link to an ical event to the workshop I'm promoting for $400/person. What's the hold up?

[Frankie_P]

Hi @KenE14 

Thank you for reaching out to the Community with your feedback on this feature. You are correct, this feature is not available. I apologize for any inconvenience caused from not having this feature. I can however see you add links to events hosted on Eventbrite. Though ICS functionality is not available through Constant Contact directly, it is functionality you can add to your Eventbrite registration flow. Have you tried our EventBrite action block? Through this block users can click the "Register" button to go to EventBrite's site, and click the "Add to Calendar" option there. You can also continue to create an ICS link outside of our system and including this link in your emails as you do with the ICS link for Gmail.

[KennethG763]

Yeah I don't get why we can't do this.  Seems like other email systems do let you link a calendar file in your email so recipients can save the date to their calendar.  This definitely seems like a no-brainer function and should definitely be implemented.  It's sad that there has been so much chatter on this and yet no action taken by CSCT to implement this.  I'm guess that, for all the time spent answering these inquiries, they could have actually implemented the feature...  😕

[Frankie_P]

Hi @KennethG763 

Thank you for sharing your feedback on this feature as well! Though the ability to upload an ICS file is not an available feature, both our Event Campaigns and RSVP Action Blocks offer your contacts the option to add it to their calendar. Have you tried either of these options as a workaround? Or even the workaround shared in this thread of create an calendar entry as an ICS file as a link in your email?

I apologize we do not have a timeline for when the option to upload a file like this directly into your library will be available. There are many factors that are used to decide what is added to or updated in our product. Us tracking feedback like this allows us to alert our engineers that users like yourself is looking for this as well.

[TonyB137]

Another vote for being able to upload .ics files