Fork In The Road Blog

Events: Technology. Design. Strategy.

Mobile Ning on Steroids? The Latest on Mobile Apps and Social Networking Platforms for Events

This Thursday, March 25 at 9:30 a.m. CDT, I will be moderating a panel at the MTO Summit in Chicago on mobile apps for events. I was initially thinking that the discussion might center primarily around applications that bring the traditional attendee “needs” to life on a Smartphone but recent product releases pairing social networking and other capabilities with mobile phone access might bust this discussion wide open.

The first wave of mobile apps for events focused on bringing the event directory, agenda and floor plan onto the mobile screen and answering the primary questions of the attendee such as: Where am I going? Which exhibitors should I visit? What time is lunch?

In the current round of mobile innovation, social networking platform providers have introduced mobile iterations of their community-building tools. These extensions allow mobile phone users to access private networking platforms and perform other tasks such as agenda-setting, wireless information exchange, schedule sharing, etc.

Today, Zerista rolled out what they call the “World’s First Mobile Community Platform” at the Demo 2010 Conference in Palm Springs. Zerista’s new platform is mobile Ning on steroids as event organizers and other groups can create their own instant communities (like Ning) and incorporate features like Twitter, Foursquare and Eventbrite into one tool. It allows you to:

  • Build your own communities optimized for mobile use with any desktop computer or Smartphone
  • Utilize social networking features and communications through a private community channel, as well as external channels like Twitter
  • Allow users to “check in” from wherever they are, providing instant access to community-specific locations
  • Manage event invitations and issue tickets

Although Zerista is still in beta testing with this product, I can see the advantages for small or informal groups as well as large organizations hoping to appeal to the needs of their various customer segments (with customized communities for each group). Plus, since no one wants to carry his/her laptop around to use the platform, mobile phone access is a huge positive for keeping everyone on the same page especially during an event.

The Takeaway: Mobile accessibility and functionality is the newest and perhaps most exciting extension of social media platforms for events. As event organizers map their event objectives to the apps that are available, they need to look beyond satisfying the attendee’s basic needs and put community management on the list of goals. With the latest round of innovation, event organizers have a wide range of options to consider. How are these new mobile apps meeting your event objectives?

When Bundled Apps and Event Centric Social Networking Platforms Marry Mobile

social networks and mobile appsReviewing event technology options can be both invigorating and exhausting. The good news is that there are many different online and mobile productivity tools available for social networking, bookmarking, scheduling, mapping, messaging, lead retrieval and polling. The bad news is there are so many different tools available. If social networking is hot, mobile apps are hotter. What could be better than a marriage that brings many of the stand-alone apps and a social networking platform together under one roof with mobile access?

Conference and tradeshow organizers are challenged with having to choose among separate platforms and technology that offer consistent branding, user utility, added value and a potential revenue stream. Training users on separate platforms can be arduous. Budgeting for separate applications can be cost prohibitive. Keeping the applications online only can reduce participation and usage.

One way that technology providers are addressing these challenges is by bundling applications into one end-to-end solution and going mobile with it. The Social Collective is one example of a social networking and community platform that has partnered with mobile application developer DubMeNow to offer community access, networking, messaging, mapping, geo-synching, scheduling and lead retrieval from a Smartphone. Their latest version will be rolled out at SXSW this month in Austin, TX.

The Social Collective’s Clinton Bonner is a blogger, tweeter and observer of event industry technology. “2010 is the year to nudge and become more hyper-focused about social media infusion.  We are going well beyond ‘you need to be doing this’ [social media] and evolving to ‘here is a platform solution that allows you to do the following, all under one roof, all branded in your imagery, all metrics and data owned by you, on less spend than building a singular custom iPhone app,’” he says.

The Social Collective’s new bundled mobile app offers the following:

  • Customized branding that “wears” the look and feel of the event and offers options for sponsorship revenue
  • Scheduling and mapping capabilities allow users to build schedules from the conference agenda, share schedules with other users and map the tradeshow floor
  • Functionality across multiple Smartphone platforms including iPhone, Blackberry, Symbian and Android
  • One touch mobile-to-mobile exchange of e-business card information, social web contact info, links to marketing material, video and notes
  • Messaging synched with the customized event social networking platform and Twitter

Allowing access to event-centric social networking platforms from mobile devices helps event organizers grow their communities. With the appropriate community management, most networks function well before and after the event, but unless users are willing to carry their laptops around, the interaction during the event is diminished. With more opportunities to interact, community members will “feed” off of the experience and become more loyal to the community and the event.

The Takeaway: The new bundled mobile solutions are user-driven—users get what they want when they want it. The synchronization of the event social networking platform with mobile helps event organizers grow their communities (more opportunities to engage others using mobile). Apps that function on a broader range of Smartphone platforms will drive adoption. All event apps MUST be easy to learn and use. And, now that bundled apps and event-centric social networking platforms have married mobile, event organizers may be able to reduce the number of technology offerings while increasing the value and usability for participants. Where’s the Kleenex?

What’s on the Menu and in the Pot: 2010 Technology Plans for Three Leading Event Organizations

Leading event organizations are utilizing technology in a variety of ways to keep up with the demands of the “new normal.” Whether it’s online or offline, new media or traditional media, SPE, Hanley Wood and Graph Expo are cooking up some tasty tech tidbits for 2010.

Enhancing the Exhibitor Experience

The Society of Petroleum Engineers (SPE) is focusing on the exhibitor experience in 2010. “We are looking for better exhibitor visibility and better matchmaking tools,” says Andrea Bahr, special projects manager at the association. SPE plans to add A2Z, Inc.’s matchmaking application to their existing suite of tools. “As an A2Z enterprise client we can easily add an additional module without having to change the user interface,” Bahr explains.

Part of Bahr’s responsibilities at SPE include researching new technologies for use at the association’s events. She admits to being impressed by the digital signage and content strategies offered by Prism Technologies. Their touch screen kiosks that Bahr describes as looking like “a really large iPhone,” work with A2Z applications and the Map Your Show App, for example. Prism can also develop a content strategy that includes exhibitor and sponsor advertising. The SPE Board is due to make a decision on the Prism purchase sometime soon.

Boosting Lead Generation

Hanley Wood will approach lead generation from two fronts this coming year. Shawn Pierce, executive vice president, is planning a major data infrastructure update. The Master Data Management upgrade will pull in data from all over Hanley Wood’s organization including the trade shows and publications. “We are trying to become a source of leads for our customers and to do that we need to have all of the leads in one place, Pierce says.

As the infrastructure upgrade is completed, Hanley Wood will launch nine virtual events, all but one of which will run before the corresponding live event in each vertical. The World of Concrete show will be the exception, as its virtual counterpart will run alongside the face-to-face show. In addition, they will boost the subscriber base for newsletters in each market segment using the newly enlarged database and feed specific show information dynamically into specially designed sections on each newsletter.

Making the Virtual Connection

In October of 2009, Chris Price, vice president of the Graphic Arts Show Company (GASC), Inc. attended a ConnexLive event. “ConnexLive uses a hosted-buyer model to facilitate targeted 30-minute face-to-face meetings in private settings between pre-screened guests and hosts,” according the web site. Price had an opportunity to learn more about matchmaking, hosted buyer events, white label social networking platforms and RFID (radio frequency identification). “We wanted to know what we don’t know,” he says. During the event, he was able to hear presentations from four virtual event companies and participated in a focus group organized by Freeman.

The focus group introduced Price to a partnership between Freeman and Maritz, the meetings, travel and incentive company. MaritzLive is their suite of virtual event solutions (offered through partnerships with other companies such as InXpo and VELOCITY Broadcasting). GASC will produce its first virtual trade show using MaritzLive’s strategic support and the InXpo platform sometime in August 2010., approximately two months before the live Graph Expo 2010 show.

The virtual show has two principal goals according to Price; to inform virtual attendees about the face-to-face show and help exhibitors introduce new products. Each of the eleven market segments that make up the Graph Expo community will provide content in the theatre at the virtual event. The hope is that the high level content will drive virtual attendees to the physical event. “The virtual event opens the door for us to share information with people. Our strategy is to use it as a marketing tool,” says Price.

In 2010 Graph Expo will also launch a social media platform designed exclusively for the eleven vertical market segments it represents. The platform will enlist the support of at least one media outlet and one trade association from each vertical. “We are creating a platform that allows each of the segments to interact with each other and have appointed thought leaders to start the conversations,” says Price.

Price sees the obvious advantages of the new platform. “It helps us as much as it helps the participants. We will be able to see all of the conversations in one place and we can learn things that will help us mold and shape the show,” he says.

The Takeaway: Although the approaches are different, some common themes are emerging among exhibition and conference organizers:

  • Renewed focus on the customer. Organizers realize that a passive approach toward attracting and servicing exhibitors and attendees is particularly ineffective in these recessionary times. Matchmaking, enhanced lead generation as well as hosted buyer programs and small focused one-on-one buyer/seller meetings are coming on strong in 2010.
  • Cultivation of the community. Organizers are stepping up efforts to understand who the community is, where they interact and how to enhance the conversation in an effort to drive attendance and participation in their live events.
  • Virtual events as lead generators. Virtual trade shows and conferences are being used as lead generators. We may not know until the end of the year whether that use yielded measurable results on a significant scale. Stay tuned.

Benchmarking Event-Driven Non-Profit Social Media Campaigns

As the lead blogger for the Donate Life Utah campaign that ended on October 24, 2009 (National Make a Difference Day), I had the opportunity to participate in, as well as observe, how social media platforms such as Facebook, Twitter and WordPress (blog) can be utilized to build an event-driven community.

Donate Life Utah was a campaign across Utah college campuses to generate the most organ donor registrations prior to the October 24 deadline. On the final day, campaign organizers held a 9K Race and .9K Walk to raise awareness and attempt a Guinness Book world record for the most organ donors to register in one day. The schools were each given $1,000 by the Quest for the Gift of Life Foundation to fund recruitment efforts. The winning school received $9,000 in scholarship money.

Our campaign kicked off on September 9. Our first blog was posted September 11. We posted daily (using a team of 4 individuals) and every post was tweeted via Twitter. A master tweeter tweeted several times daily. We also created a Facebook fan page.

In a campaign that lasted six weeks and started from 0 (0 blog readers, 0 Twitter followers, 0 Facebook fans), the final stats were as follows:

  • Twitter account reached almost 200 followers
  • Facebook page reached almost 600 fans
  • The blog had more than 50 posts, almost 1,000 unique visits, with over 350 of those in the final week alone.

The campaign steadily built momentum, reaching a crescendo during the final week. The deadline date, race and Guinness Book world record attempt helped to drive social media buy-in as volunteers and potential donors “tuned in” to social media platforms to get event details, check their school standings and obtain donor registration information.

The Takeaway: As event-based social media campaigns emerge, benchmarking among organizations and campaigns will be critical to gauging average vs. exceptional results. While all results are relative to the organization’s goals and incentives, the numbers of followers, fans and subscribers generated are less relevant than the rates of conversion (from Twitter followers to organ donors, Facebook fans to attendees, etc.). Live events and social media campaigns work well in combination. The sense of urgency created by a live event drives participation in social media platforms and is a critical component for community building.

Cloud Computing and Crowdsourcing from MTO Summit

The MTO Summit, October 21-22 in San Francisco was the hub for discussions on event industry technology. Much of the discussion focused on social media and social networking applications and integration. Two interesting technology providers, Fantail Consulting and The Social Collective were on hand to offer new perspectives and solutions for social media pains.

Michael J. Hatch, president, Fantail Consulting (formerly with A2Z, Inc.) discusses the cloud computing consultancy services that his new company is offering. This technology holds promise for event organizers looking to provide remote applications and networking capabilities to its community of stakeholders such as attendees, (both face-to-face and virtual), exhibitors, sponsors and others that could overload a conventional Web server. In the above video, Hatch talks about lowering costs and increasing operational efficiency using cloud computing resources.

Clinton Bonner of The Social Collective discusses the capabilities of his company’s crowdsourcing application called Crowd Campaign. All you need is a good contest idea, a few hundred dollars, at least six weeks lead time and 500 or more Twitter followers. Event organizers benefit in three ways–the tweets generate a viral effect (i.e. information about your event is passed along as contest prizes stimulate participation), users contribute valuable content (opinions, case studies, YouTube videos, etc.) in exchange for a chance to win and revenue streams emerge (as sponsors hitch their logos to the Web landing page).

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