Aug 07 2017

Stop the Ad Hoc Agony Of Working With Event-Technology Companies

Event technology companies often tell me that there is no distinct event technology buyer role within event organizations. While many event planners love and respect new technology, most can’t do anything more than listen to a good pitch. Senior-level event managers and even the C-suite are hard to pin down no matter how the seller positions the technology.

The absence of a clear path for selling new technology into the organization underscores an even greater problem for event organizers. By making it difficult for new ideas to get through the front door or waiting until there’s a problem and looking through the technology haystack for a solution, organizers can’t react fast enough to the market forces impacting events.

Event organizers can handle this problem structurally. And while event technology companies aren’t completely off the hook (I’ll get into the complaints I hear from organizers about poorly trained vendor sales teams another time), this ball is in the event organizer’s court for now.

There are lots of reasons why event planners aren’t the best choice for managing the organization’s event-technology decisions.

The event lifecycle is a sales-opportunity killer. When an event is coming in hot, planners don’t have time to talk about new technology with a vendor. Getting a decision on an event app or platform purchase immediately before, during, or just after an event (or ever for a busy planner) is nearly impossible.

Understanding event technology isn’t a required skill for planners. Yes, there are tech-savvy planners in the business. They get apps. They understand the difference between an ISP and an API. But, the standard training, including the curriculum for meeting industry certifications (the Digital Event Strategist certification being the exception), doesn’t cover technology.

Most planners aren’t in a position to make decisions that impact the entire organization. So even if they like an event-management software platform, the more comprehensive the solution, and the more departments that are affected by it, the less able planners are to be the deciders.

The majority of planners operate at the event level and, consequently, can only buy technology budgeted for a specific event. That leaves planners and event-tech companies dependent on the event budget rather than how the technology fits into the strategy of the organization.

So if planners shouldn’t be responsible for event technology, who should be?

There is a solid case to be made for giving the job of purchasing and implementing event technology to IT were it not for the fact that they have lots of other responsibilities, not the least of which is keeping the organization up and running. Plus, they can’t always speak to the feature sets that get planners excited, attendees engaged, or sponsors buying.

The C-suite folks are likely candidates for taking on event technology providers, but except for the CTO (or, increasingly, the CMO), they’re not in a position to consistently monitor the tech landscape or make time for all the sales pitches from vendors. And it’s too costly for the organization to have them dealing with the day-to-day issues around procurement, implementation, and integration.

Some organizations make event technology adoption a team sport, asking multiple departments—operations, IT, marketing, and finance—to weigh in on decisions. But that approach can leave everyone and no one responsible for getting event tech adopted unless there is a decision-maker leading the discussion.

Not having someone whose job and expertise it is to evaluate and manage event technology at an organizational level is costing event organizers too. It means that the innovation setting other industries on fire can’t even generate a spark in meetings and trade shows.

It’s time for a new job function. Let’s call it the event technologist.

Event organizers have to begin taking the initiative to manage new and existing event-technology companies. To do so efficiently requires a person with the expertise and authority to manage this responsibility. Here’s what I think the job description for an event technologist should include:

You report to senior management.

You are available year round, i.e. you won’t be trotting off to every event in which the technology you select is being implemented or get sucked into the event timeline. You are a reliable resource even when chaos ensues at event time.

You take a strong role in purchasing decisions for new technology. You develop requests for proposal (if that’s what your organization uses) that speak specifically to the technology under consideration and you align your carefully considered recommendations with the pre-determined budget and strategy.

You take a rigorous approach to learning about new technologies through the various publications, resources, and events that are available to you.

You liaise with and take recommendations from multiple departments within the organization so you can map the technical needs of the users to the feature sets of the solutions. You also develop or manage an internal communications system to keep departments up to date on new technologies entering the market.

You hold regular “office hours” for event technology companies to learn about new solutions whether the organization is looking to purchase them or not.

You are in charge of a technology budget.

You maintain relationships with existing vendors, including making them accountable for sending data back to the organization in the appropriate format. You develop standards of performance and evaluate the vendors regularly against those criteria.

You negotiate service-level agreements and review and/or issue contracts to new technology vendors. You have the authority to cancel agreements for non-performance.

You oversee integration between your best-of-breed technology vendors with the goal of maintaining data integrity and functional efficiency.

You have a degree in information technology or computer science or the field-experience equivalent. You must be able to speak the language of digital with vendors.

Event organizers don’t have much choice at this point.

Digital transformation is no longer a nice-to-have objective for the event industry. Event technology is the critical ingredient needed to evolve. Someone in the organization (not the event planner) has to manage the day-to-day tasks associated with maintaining the event-technology stack, and a few organizations (like the Association of Equipment Manufacturers) have already created this job function. Event organizers have to stop the ad hoc agony of working with event-technology providers if they want in on the innovation and benefits of the Information Age.

If you’d like more information on the innovation impacting events, check out our sister publication eventtechbrief.com.

Mar 11 2015

When Millennials Take Over: Preparing for the Ridiculously Optimistic Future of Business

The below is a guest post from Jamie Notter and Maddie Grant as they launch their latest book on organizational culture.

A lot has been written about the Millennial generation in the last ten years or so, and to be frank, a lot of it is really not helpful, especially in a business context. So, why is the focus of our new book squarely on the Millennials and the way they might be changing just about every aspect of how we learn, lead and grow in organizations? They just happen to be at the right place at the right time. The Millennials are entering young adulthood at a unique point in our history, where society is poised for a tectonic shift, particularly around business, leadership, and management. There is a “perfect storm” of trends converging in a way that will generate an actual revolution in business – affecting organizations of all shapes and sizes.

Yes, a revolution. Our approach to management has been stuck in a rut—not just for the last few years, but also for the last several decades. We have been running our organizations like machines, and today’s lack of engagement and lack of agility to meet the shifting needs of customers, members and employees are indications of how our machine approach to management is crumbling. Add to this the shake-up that the social Internet has brought to business and society (that we wrote about in Humanize), and you’d think the revolution would have happened by now.

But it hasn’t. We needed another element, a catalyst that could connect the dots in a way that would bring a much needed management revolution to fruition. That catalyst is the third front in our perfect storm: the Millennial generation.

As the Millennials ascend into management positions over the next several years, they will simultaneously become the largest generation in the workforce. While the Millennials won’t formally “take over” (no single generation ever runs things on its own), they will serve as a kind of “secret decoder ring” for all of us, helping clarify what the future of business will look like, post revolution. Change is coming, and smart organizations will start making the necessary adjustments today to stay ahead.

Our newest book, When Millennials Take Over: Preparing for the Ridiculously Optimistic Future of Business, provides exactly that kind of guidance. We studied organizations with remarkably strong cultures and conducted interviews of Millennials who had been in the workforce for some time. What emerged from our research and feedback from our clients were four organizational capacities that we think will prepare organizations to be successful, both today and into the future: Digital, Clear, Fluid, and Fast.

The companies we found with ridiculously strong cultures had built these capacities into the heart of their operations and philosophies, and the Millennials we spoke to could not understand why these capacities were not woven into every organization to begin with.

Digital

Digital is about perpetual and exponential improvement of all facets of organizational life using both the tools and the mindsets of the digital world. Digital in the Millennial era has an unrelenting and disciplined focus on the customer or end user—including the employee. Millennials are the first generation to have only known a digital workplace, and they are used to being able to leverage that power on an individual basis. Digital organizations break through the assumed constraints of the previous approach to managing organizations, unlocking new value continuously in areas like internal collaboration and even human resource management.

Clear

Clear is about an increased and more intelligent flow of information and knowledge that supports innovation and problem solving inside organizations. Millennials have always had access to more information than they could possibly handle, and they are confused by organizations that control it tightly. Clear organizations make smarter decisions that generate better results. They will successfully build a transparency architecture that makes more information visible to more people to enable better decisions.

Fluid

Fluid is about expanding and distributing power in a dynamic and flexible way. Fluid in the Millennial era is about systems that enable an integrated process of thinking, acting, and learning at all levels of the organization. Since the social internet started distributing power across traditional lines, the Millennial generation now does not expect organizations to task the higher levels with the thinking and deciding, and the lower levels with the implementation. Fluid organizations serve customers more effectively and are more nimble in both strategy and execution. They may still have hierarchies, but they are created and maintained in a different way.

Fast

Fast is about taking action at the precise moment when action is needed. Fast in the Millennial era is about systems that can learn and adapt while still maintaining the efficiency and productivity of the previous era. Beta testing has become normal and expanded outside of the realm of software. We may call the Millennials “entitled” for wanting things right away or expecting more authority, but remember: That’s all they’ve ever known. Fast organizations leap ahead of the competition by releasing control in a way that does not increase risk. They go beyond efficiency and productivity to find the key variables that unlock true speed.

What This Means For You

This is not speculative, theoretical content—this is happening in the world today. One of the case studies in the book is the American Society for Surgery of the Hand, an association in Chicago that has embraced the digital mindset fully, not only investing more in technology than some for-profit companies its size but also redesigning its workspace around the needs of the employees. ASSH and the other companies that we profile are all tremendously successful by traditional measures, and their cultures are so strong that nearly all of the employees we spoke with could not even imagine working somewhere else. These are the positive deviants. They are role models that are showing us that the management revolution is indeed possible.

It is up to you now to continue leading this revolution in business. If you want to become more digital, clear, fluid, and/or fast, then take a hard look at your organization, particularly your culture. You’ll need to make a solid connection between what drives the success of your organization and what is truly valued internally—not the fluffy values statements, but what gets the attention, what gets the resources, what gets people rewards. When you can align what’s valued at that level to what drives your success, you have a better chance of creating a culture that makes sense in this new, Millennial era.

The above is a guest post from Jamie Notter and Maddie Grant as they launch their latest book on organizational culture.

Nov 13 2014

Four Reasons Why Selling Tickets Through Your Own Website is A Better Option

By Sean Hurley

Most event organizers outsource ticket sales to a third-party ecommerce platform. In doing so, they send buyers to a separate website to make the purchase. There are excellent reasons why they should keep would-be attendees on the main event website, from the first visit to the confirmation page. Sending buyers offsite to finalize their purchase transactions can cost organizers ticket sales and revenue.

Some buyers fall through the cracks

Studies have shown that redirects—when a user clicks a link and is moved to another domain—lose up to 5% of interested customers. These customers have already clicked on the “Buy” button but drop out of the sales process, costing organizers money.

Users are easily distracted

The jump from one website to another—especially one with a completely different look and feel—interrupts the buyer’s train of thought and can result in lost sales. Plus, keeping the buyer on one site helps organizers control the entire User Experience (UX).

Once buyers are gone, they’re gone

It’s unlikely that customers will return to the main website after they purchased their tickets elsewhere. Sending buyers away is a lost opportunity for organizers to deliver other information, engagement, and experiences, such as videos, photos, sponsor messages, and upcoming events to buyers.

Dwell time impacts SEO

Keeping visitors on a website for as long as possible impacts search engine results. The more time they spend viewing content (dwell time), the higher the website is ranked by Google. Ranking highly on Google (organically) is difficult. Event producers need every SEO boost they can get.

Despite the benefits, many event organizers still don’t sell tickets directly from their websites. They’re worried it’s too expensive or that they’ll need a dedicated IT guy to work on the website full time. Previous solutions have been clunky and expensive, opening the door to some new startup companies. Finding a service that works doesn’t have to be as difficult as it seems.

Let me know on Twitter or in the comments whether you’ve thought about this option for online ticket sales and what’s working for you.

Sean Hurley is the Inbound Growth Manager at Uniiverse, an event-ticketing platform. His focus is on event marketing and creating tools to help event organizers sell more tickets and engage their audiences. He is the leader of Event Organizers & EventProfs SF and an avid Jeopardy fan.

Jun 24 2014

Why Reed’s Decision to Scale Back AIBTM is Brilliant

Recently, Reed Exhibitions announced plans to change the format of its America Incentives, Travel and Meetings Expo (AIBTM) from a “traditional” trade show to an “exclusive, private” scaled-back event.

In the proposed plan, the number of hosted buyers and exhibitors will be reduced to 250 each. Turnkey “pods” will replace raw exhibit space and attendees—carefully screened buyers—will be required to keep a schedule of thirty appointments.

This conversion is sheer madness or, as I believe, absolute brilliance. Here’s why.

First, the obvious. The slimmed-down event addresses two major pain points for exhibitors: the inconvenience and cost to exhibit. It also speaks to the supreme time deficit of most VIP planners.

The proposed exhibit pods will level the playing field for exhibitors. By removing the perceived requirement to build elaborate custom booths in order to differentiate, exhibitors can focus on the mission of selling and educating prospects instead.

The one-to-one format distills the trade show form factor down to its simplest form and highest value proposition. It epitomizes the value of meeting face to face and the intimate setting allows participants to forge and renew relationships in a way that cannot be replicated online.

The proposed IBTM incarnation is the perfect scenario for justifying to management the time and expense to attend. The perception of decision-makers that such events are fun-filled junkets for an employee is virtually eliminated.

The funds that were previously spent by exhibitors on building exhibits, renting large spaces, labor, and drayage, for example, can be claimed by Reed as compensation for drastically reducing the number and improving the quality of the buyers. As a friend once told me, “it’s easier to sell one locomotive than a hundred ice cream cones.”

The smaller event has the potential to dramatically improve the attendee experience. With such a small group of buyers, Reed can pinpoint and address the educational needs and desires of every single attendee.

Reed staff will be able to focus on identifying power buyers rather than administering to crowds.

The reduced strain on WiFi could make it possible to deliver content, images and information digitally (to compensate for the lack of exhibit real estate to tell the exhibitors’ stories) at a lower cost, as well as enable location and mobile technologies to function flawlessly.

Hosted buyer matchmaking software can focus more on divining optimal mutual matches rather than giving every exhibitor and attendee a certain number of appointments.

On one hand, there will be implications for the IBTM Americas ecosystem and others who attempt similar transitions:

In the absence of elaborate booth constructions, exhibit sales staff will have to be brilliant storytellers rather than name takers.
The convention center will rent less space.
The general service contractor will receive less revenue.
The registration system will become an RSVP system

On the other hand, it’s an opportunity for stakeholders to embrace a new reality: alternative marketing mediums are strong competition for some trade shows. It’s better to devise new strategies and service offerings now, rather than wait for something truly disruptive to disable a line of business.

The oft-repeated mantra of our industry—nothing can replace meeting face-to-face—isn’t completely true. In fact, we are pushing our exhibitors and attendees into the arms of less than optimum selling and buying environments because the pain of participating in some trade shows often far outweighs the benefits.

What Reed has announced is truly disruptive and instructive for the entire industry. There are many ways to compete and it’s far better to create disruption than to be victimized by it.

Jan 19 2014

DoubleDutch Paves the Way for Contextual Computing with iOS7 Redesign

Event mobile app provider, DoubleDutch, announced a total redesign of its application to leverage the new features and functionality of the iOS7 operating system. In addition to a completely new user interface, enhanced offline performance and more speed, the app “gets to the promise of contextual computing—delivering the right experience at the right time,” says Lawrence Coburn, DoubleDutch CEO and the company’s co-founder.

The update has immediate implications for attendees. For example, now, if an attendee visits the in-app conference schedule before a session begins, he will be able to add the session to his personal agenda. If he looks at the agenda while the presentation is being delivered, he is advised that it is in progress. If he visits the schedule after the session has concluded, he can access an evaluation to complete.

In the near future, Coburn says, “a lot more is possible.” The company is experimenting with Amazon-style recommendations for attendees—what Coburn refers to as an “event concierge” scenario—based on user behaviors within the app. They’ve also begun work on building applications for the iBeacon, Apple’s micro-location technology, including the ability to serve up personalized content to visitors based on their physical locations.

While the update is based on iOS7 capabilities, the enhancements are also built into the app’s Android and HTML5 apps as well. It’s clear that the company’s origin and Coburn’s background in social networks are guiding the strategy at the company. “Engagement rules all. Social rules all. These events are mini social networks,” Coburn says.

Read the full media release here.

Digital

Clear

Fluid

Fast

What This Means For You

Be Notified of New Posts via Email