In Vome, Categories and Opportunities serve two very different purposes — and understanding how they work together will help you manage your volunteers and programs more effectively.
An Opportunity in Vome represents a specific project, event, or volunteer shift that your team is organizing. Volunteers are assigned to opportunities — this is the primary way they get connected to your events or activities.
Each opportunity includes three main pillars of engagement:
Scheduling
Plan and manage event dates, times, and shifts.
Hour Tracking
Log and track the hours that volunteers contribute.
Communications
Share messages, updates, and important information related to the opportunity.
When you assign a volunteer to an opportunity, they are automatically linked to the associated Category through that opportunity — not directly to the category itself.
A Category in Vome acts as a simple folder that helps you organize your opportunities. You can use categories for:
Reporting — easily generate reports based on categories.
Marketing — showcase categories on your organization's public info page.
Categories help keep your opportunities organized and make it easier for potential volunteers or clients to discover your services.
Important: Categories do not have volunteers assigned to them directly. Volunteers are connected to categories only by being assigned to opportunities within those categories.
| Opportunity | Category | |
|---|---|---|
| Purpose | Manage volunteer projects, shifts, and events | Organize opportunities for reporting & marketing |
| Includes | Scheduling, Hour Tracking, Communications | No functionality — acts as a folder |
| Volunteer Assignment | Volunteers are assigned directly to opportunities | Volunteers are linked through assigned opportunities only |