Tag: event management

3 Technology Tips That Will Improve Your Next Award Ceremony

Posted on 26th June 201529th November 2018 by Eventsforce

If you’re running internal or external awards, conducting employee recognition programs, peer reviews or even awards evenings for clients, the chances are that this won’t be a one-off event, and is most likely repeated on an annual basis. View this repetition as an opportunity! It’s your chance to use your experiences to understand your previous events and programs better, and use what you learn to improve your future efforts.

If this seems like a daunting task, then help is at hand. Technology can be your best friend in creating cutting-edge award programs, fuelling your desire for continuous improvement and allowing you to streamline your processes in the future. We’ve outlined a few ideas below as to how you could benefit.

The idea: Look at the readily available data
The tech: Integrated systems

Registrations, entry forms submissions, the judging process, payments – each of these elements create a wealth of data, and so to be truly effective it’s important you take the time to really drill down into the information. This is potentially a lot of data to get your head around, so if it’s in silos and split across a number of different platforms you’re pretty quickly going to get cross eyed. The whole process will be made a lot simpler if you use a system that integrates each element, creating one centralised point from which you can run all the reports you need.

The idea: Source extra data
The tech: Online questionnaires

When event professionals say they are trying to improve their awards ceremony, what this often boils down to is trying to improve the experience for those taking part, whatever their role. And what better way to do this than to actually ask them what they liked, and more importantly what they thought could be improved.

An effective and cost-effective way of doing this is via an online survey. This will allow you to really understand what worked at your awards ceremony and what didn’t. For example, you’ll be able to find out if those attending found the registration process pain free, if judges found the judging process simple and easy-to-understand, and if people are likely to come back next year. If you don’t get the positive responses you expected, this is a great opportunity to improve. Forewarned is forearmed.

The idea: Listen!
The tech: Social media

Effective awards ceremonies now make excellent use of social media, both before and during the big day. Where many awards organisers go wrong is that once the event is over, the social media focus, monitoring of hashtags and relevant communications also comes to an abrupt halt. This is not the right way forward. Keep checking your social media accounts as they could be valuable sources of feedback. Even if people haven’t tweeted to you directly, keep an eye on those that are using your event hashtag as you may pick up some interesting insights that could help you shape next year’s event. (You don’t have an event hashtag? Well you should! Check out our post on social media and award ceremonies to learn more.)

The ultimate idea: Learn and grow
The tech: All of the above!

All of this seemingly tedious data analysis is done for a very good reason: you want to put on a ceremony that is even better next time round. This isn’t just about making sure delegates have a good time, it’s also commercially important. The feedback from stakeholders will be invaluable, so make sure you take on board what they tell you and make them aware that they have a number of ways to give you their feedback, and that their feedback is valued and will be acted upon.

To find out more about how Eventsforce Awards can help you meet and beat challenges like these please click here, or contact one of the team for a free demo.

Social Media: How Best to Use it Before, During and After an Event

Posted on 24th June 201517th December 2018 by Eventsforce

If you’re a conference or awards planner, then you’ll already know the nightmare…You have spent all year promoting the event’s brand, tirelessly drawing in new interest, consistently encouraging active participation, maintaining an engaged online community and now it’s finally over. You breathe a sigh of relief only to face that dreadful, jaw-dropping moment when you realise you have to do it all again next year.

Establishing a social media plan that starts on day one and continues until after the event is finished, one that has a jam-packed content plan of post-event resources, is critical to boosting ongoing delegate relationships and most importantly will make your life easier.

Why is Social Media Key to Delegate Relations?

Social media plays a key end-to-end role over the lifecycle of an event and is extremely helpful in engaging the audience’s attention on the day and in securing future interest immediately after.

Using Social Media to Engage Delegates Can Include:

Running a hashtag for the event
Including separate hashtags for topics and presentations
Running polls and instant votes on topics raised
Q&As
Sponsoring competitions

And lots more. Getting it right turns any fears over filling next year’s conference into excitement for new opportunities to engage with your delegates.

So, where do you start with social media for events?

Create a Community

Use Twitter and Facebook to turn your audience into an active and engaged online community. By using social media right through your event-planning process, including on the day and afterwards, you can generate lasting relationships that will keep people coming back and sharing content. For example, Twitter can be great for sharing sponsor’s slides on the day, and your sponsors will appreciate the extra publicity, helpful when it comes to renewing next year!

If you organise awards, then you will already consider social media to be your best friend. If you aren’t used to creating communities for corporate events however, you may want to consider delegate relations in terms of creating online communities.

It’s best to give one person responsibility for social media management and you may even already have a community manager on your team or someone to take charge for enhancing your event’s outreach.

Promote an Interactive Audience

Fully interactive events are now the norm with around 70% of event planners using Twitter to promote events and just under 60% using social media right throughout the process. Carefully chosen hashtags can hugely increase interaction making your event active, lively and memorable. Giving people their say also massively increases the authority of the event and the compelling debate to return next year.

Think Different, Be Different!

Being different and experimental offers something new every time someone attends one of your events and builds your reputation.

If you have never considered experiential marketing during your events, perhaps now is the time to put aside those traditional options and do something crazy. Experiential marketing is about bringing the brand and the audience closer through fun and memorable experiences. Typically, it’s employed in a strategy for grand openings but easily lends itself to events.

Maybe you don’t have the budget to send a man into space like Red Bull’s Stratos jump or like Heineken’s Departure Roulette, which offered free flights to random destinations around the globe and grabbed three million views on YouTube. But there are lessons to be learnt from the experts and big-budget marketing firms. It’s about being daring and letting others see you (or your client) being daring, different and theatrical.

Be Mobile Friendly

Smart event hosts work hard to create a mobile-friendly event, using Twitter hashtags and Facebook posts to drive interaction. It’s particularly great for raising Q&As when someone may not want to stand up and will only then be posting about it later anyway.

People love to cast their votes and have their say on topics so let them vote in live polls. It will be a great icebreaker and generate buzz on the day.

Continue the Debate

Once your event is over, consider taking the major topics or key points raised in the debates and turning them into a post-event debate. You could host a panel debate on Google+ Hangouts with the speakers or event organisers fielding additional questions or counterpoints to the raised themes and discussion points.

Building delegate relationships during and after an event is about maintaining an amazing community of people and rewarding them for being active and engaged participants. It doesn’t have to be a nightmare if you can encourage active participants who share the value in what you are trying to create.

With the right approach and energy, you can keep communities alive and growing for future events.

For further guidance on how to do social media for events, take a look at the related content below, or why not check out our own social media channels?

Event Registration: 7 Tips to Successful Form Design

Posted on 16th June 201517th December 2018 by Eventsforce

Consider for a moment just how much time you spend convincing and persuading people to even register for an event. You should be putting just as much time and consideration into the design of your registration forms as you put into the process of getting clients to the registration page.

Understanding the psychology behind form design can help to significantly impact successful data collection, speed the registration process, and improve the overall experience for each user. Good form design will get you exactly the data you need quickly and without confusing or taking too much time from your attendees.

It’s All About Preventing ‘Form Fatigue’

When considering data collection, you’re facing two problems: you need specific information from the attendee and your attendee wants to complete the form with as little work as possible. In other words, you’re trying to gather as much data as you can while simultaneously trying to reduce the chances of attendees getting ‘form fatigue’ while completing registration.

‘Form Fatigue’ is a term for what happens when a person determines that the energy cost of filling out a form is not worth the benefit of completing the form. This is what often happens when a potential attendee begins registration but doesn’t complete it. Here are a few event registration tips to keep that from happening…

#1 – Ask only for what you need

Your user will quickly become discouraged if the moment they click on “Register” a long page with field after field appears before them. Simplification should be your main goal when it comes to your registration forms. Don’t ask for the same information twice (i.e. “Confirm your password”) and ask only for the data that you absolutely need. That extra data may be valuable for future upsells, but is it really worth potentially losing the attendee before they even register? If you want to ask for more data later, do it once the attendee has already registered.

#2 – Be Clear & Unambiguous

Make sure that the labels you apply to your form fields are clear and unambiguous. You can cut down on the amount of cognitive work a user has to do by providing clear labels and simple questions. You don’t want attendees to have to think any more than they have to. Remember that people have limits and aren’t good at multi-tasking. By asking complex questions, you’re potentially creating a situation where the user has to not only answer the questions but they also have to do the work of interpreting them.

#3 – Utilize Gestalt Principles

Gestalt principles describe the way that our brains tend to assume that items that are grouped together must be related to one another. Placing specific question fields together (such as Name and Username information; credit card information; and company information) in their own specific groupings can help to make the form feel more organized and easier to scan. This cuts down on the complexity of the form and makes it easy for the attendee to scan it so they can quickly get an idea of what information they’ll need to enter.

#4 – Save Time with Defaults

You can also save the attendee time and frustration by providing defaults that demonstrate how the fields are meant to be completed. For example, if the field label says, “Date of Birth:” then the field itself should have an example of what the user is expected to respond with, “MM/DD/YYYY.” This also limits the potential for errors.

#5 – Make Errors Obvious

Setup your form to validate in real-time as the attendee is filling it out. This way, they don’t have to wait until after clicking “Submit” to find out that they’ve missed a required field or mistyped a date.

#6 – Provide Progressive Disclosure

Psychology has taught us that people want the power to control how much information we see at one time, however, we also want simplicity so we’re not overwhelmed by too much information at once. This is where progressive disclosure comes in. On a more complex form, you can use progressive disclosure to reveal specific form elements only when they are needed and in specific context. For example, if you require a text response when the attendee selects an “Other” option then that text field will only display when “Other” is selected.

#7 – Take the Time to Test

One of the greatest errors in form design is a failure to conduct usability testing. Testing your forms can help you to see where ambiguity or errors are most likely to arise. By taking this kind of precaution, you are able to prevent future issues and increase the likelihood that any attendees who use your registration form will actually complete it rather than dropping off and leaving you confused as to why.

Remember that a good registration form will not only get you the data you need, it can also be the start of an overall positive experience for your attendees. If you take the time to understand the psychology of properly designing your forms, it will be like you’re holding the attendee’s hand every step of the way.

For more event registration event tips take a look at the related posts below or get in contact with our friendly team by calling 0207 785 6997.

Crisis Management: Useful Tips For Event Planners

Posted on 29th May 201512th March 2020 by Eventsforce

It’s the biggest day in your calendar and t he venue suffers a power cut; it snows; the trains are delayed and there’s a pile-up on the motorway. Your morning speakers don’t show up and half of your delegates can’t get through. Your wonderful, perfectly planned event is a disaster before it even starts… You wake up in a cold sweat: it was just that same nightmare that every event organiser has before a big event.

The events sector is reckoned to be worth some £11bn to the UK economy, making effective crisis management an integral part of any event. A crisis plan can cover everything from what to do when a speaker doesn’t show up, or a microphone cuts out, to a gas leak or fire evacuation.

Of course you need to have a basic emergency plan in place as standard but the more detailed and effective this is the more your business is protected. So what should go into a good crisis plan?

Related reading: How to Handle a Crisis at Your Event

A clear chain of communication

Developing an effective crisis management plan is essential to ensuring everyone from delegates and speakers to venue support staff know exactly what to do in an emergency and are fully briefed on alternative arrangements or evacuation procedures. Whether it is a small workshop or a large annual conference, even the smallest disruption can impact the day and if not dealt with properly, can quickly escalate. Rumours can quickly spread amongst delegates that an event may be cancelled when the start has only been delayed, so you need a clear and confident process of delivering critical information right up to the moment everyone arrives.

Time-critical responses

Whilst the UK is thankfully spared the likes of tornadoes and earthquakes, overnight heavy snowfall in winter and broken air conditioning in summer can still threaten to cancel events at very short notice. Great communication through email, SMS, Twitter etc. is critical to quickly update delegates as events unfold. A time-critical plan covering responses from the first hour onwards ensures delegates and sponsors are kept in the loop with clear, concise reports. Whether it’s a faulty fire alarm or a bomb threat, frequent and clear communication will be appreciated and protects reputations. Social media can easily be leveraged to help with this.

Media response package

Communicating your plan to the media and keeping them updated is also critical. If you have invited journalists or photographers to the event, keep them informed. Do not treat them like second-class citizens just because they haven’t paid to be there. Keep them in the loop as much as anyone else and be helpful. This will help in deflecting any negative focus away from the event.

Event insurance

Proper insurance cover can mitigate some of the risk but reputations are not so easily recovered and are far more precious, and harder to mend. According to Hiscox some 45% of event organisers do not carry specific insurance although 40% have been forced to cancel events. Usually venues expect a public liability limit of indemnity of a minimum of £2m in any one occurrence, so make sure your insurance covers all of your needs.

Contingency plans and simulation

Stopping a small setback from becoming more serious is a critical component of crisis planning. Every time an event experiences difficulties, if a delegate is taken sick or a fire alarm disrupts the day etc. event planners need to add to their individual contingency plans and venue inspection checklists. Crisis simulation can range from running through likely and dramatic scenarios to actually training client employees before the event on how to handle everything from a heart attack to a gun threat.

Great planning mitigates against a damaged reputation, not only to the event itself but to the venue, the host, your business, the event’s sponsors, local partners and even subcontractors. Take the time to create a great crisis management plan and filter it down to everyone involved.

If you want to find out more, or learn more about how Eventsforce can help solve your event headaches please call us on 020 7785 7040 or contact one of the team.

Image source:

https://www.york.ac.uk/communications/internal/

https://crenshawcomm.com/pr-disaster-averted-7-cases-of-good-crisis-management/#.VMoSRWisWmx

Associations: Top Tips for Introducing Technology To Your Events

Posted on 21st April 201517th December 2018 by Eventsforce

Thinking of introducing technology to your association events? Here are some things to consider

At Eventsforce, we’re big advocates of using whatever tools are available to improve events for both attendees and planners alike and a big part of this involves making the most of the technology readily available right now.

Corporate events have traditionally led the way when it comes to using technology, but association events can be just as suitable – planners simply need to have a slightly different mind-set. Here we’ve outlined some points to consider when you’re looking to introduce technology to your association events.

Generation game

In the events world, and indeed the wider marketing world, there’s a lot of discussion about the generational group referred to as millennials. This year they will become the largest generation by population, growing larger than the previously leading baby boomer generation, and they have their own set of expectations when it comes to events. They are the connected generation and have been raised in a world where technology is not a gimmick, but a natural part of their existence. It’s important that planners understand this generation and take the time to learn how they like to experience events, because it is radically different to previous generations and technology will play a big part.

That being said, don’t be dragged into the millennial discussion if it isn’t relevant to your association membership. Think carefully about your membership base – what are they expecting from your events?

Don’t just meet expectations

Technology can still have a part to play, even for those sections of your membership that don’t necessarily expect to engage with tech at events. It is about getting the mix right and communicating the benefits of getting involved with the technology from an early stage in the pre-event marketing. This could be as subtle as encouraging delegates to complete their registration process online and use an email on their phone as their ticket, rather than printing it (highlighting the positive environmental impact) or as bold as encouraging use of the event app and all the benefits this will bring. This needs to be done carefully, as pushing the technology too hard may alienate those that don’t want to use it all. Let them mould their own experience.

Don’t be everything to everyone

The likelihood is that your association membership is made up of a variety of generations and a variety of technological capabilities. Creating events that work for them all is tricky, but by no means impossible. If the tech-uptake at events seems relatively low, talk to your members. Ask them what their reservations are about using technology at events so that you can see where the problems are. If they are worried about security or privacy, amend your communication for your next event to put them at ease. If they are concerned about how complicated the tech is, make sure you highlight how the tech will improve their experience and make the event more successful for them.

How have you successfully introduced technology to your association events? Are you seeing millennials impact the way you run your events? Let us know!

Organising Awards? Why Social Media Should Be Your Best Friend…

Posted on 23rd February 201517th December 2018 by Eventsforce

The importance of social media during live events is well established. According to Event Manager Blog, almost 70% of Event Planners use Twitter for their events, with just under 60% stating that they use social media for marketing activities before, during and after events. When it comes to awards, where interaction between the organisers and the delegates is integral to the ultimate success of the event, social media becomes increasingly influential and important.

Whether you’re planning internal company awards or large-scale industry awards, ultimately the goal is the same: create a great engaging experience. Social media can help you do just that:

Before The Event

As with any event, if you start building a buzz long before the big day, you’ll help drive attendance. Your social media effort, therefore, should begin as soon as you have the date confirmed.

It’s at this stage that you should decide on an event hashtag. Far too many events, including award ceremonies, get to one week before kick-off and realise they’ve forgotten to use a hashtag. As soon as you have one in mind, (you can use services such as TweetReach to make sure no one else is using it) apply it to all relevant communications. Don’t just use it on Twitter; add it to emails, registration pages, wherever you can to make sure people will see it.

The nature of awards gives organisers some great opportunities to have fun on social media. Something that we’ve seen growing over recent years in the inclusion of a ‘social vote’ category, where the winner is decided by the largest number of votes received on social media. This might not work for all types of awards, but it can be a nice way to involve delegates pre-event and tap into their competitive sides. They’ll naturally want to share the voting info as much as possible, so it could extend your reach exponentially.

During The Event

The real fun can start on the day of your ceremony. It’s important to be clear about who in your team will be managing the social media stream. It may be possible to have more than one person doing this, so long as your efforts don’t crossover. There are a whole host of tools available to make social media monitoring and posting that little bit easier. Two of the most widely used are TweetDeck (for Twitter only) and HootSuite (for Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn etc.). Both tools are free, with HootSuite offering a premium option should you need to add more accounts or functionality.

Research carried out by Buffer showed that Tweets with images get 18% more clicks, 89% more favourites and 150% more retweets. This goes to show how important it is to include a visual element to your social media content, so if possible it is worth appointing one of your team as social photographer for the day. With Twitter’s recent addition of video support you could even take some short clips of the festivities.

Twitter Walls at events can receive some mixed responses. Some love to be able to see all the social media content from the day displayed, while it could make others reluctant to tweet. If you do go for a Twitter Wall, make sure you have someone moderating the posts before they go live to avoid any unflattering content being displayed!

Of course, being an award ceremony the most important thing you can be doing is sharing the names of the winners and, where possible, @mentioning them directly – this will encourage them to share the news too.

After The Event

Just because the awards are over, doesn’t mean you can stop with the social media posting! This is especially important if you’re planning to attract delegates to another event later in the year – you want as many people as possible to see what a success it was.

Tools like Storify will let you summarise the social ‘story’ following your event, based on the hashtag. This will give a breakdown of the top tweets from the day and highlight key moments. This can then be shared with your network as a neat summary. Make sure you shout about the statistics from your ceremony too – the number of attendees, number of winners – all of this is great content to share.

Finally, make sure you take the time to drill down into the social media analytics. Visiting www.analytics.twitter.com will give you a detailed view of how each tweet has performed, meaning you can improve and grow next time round.

If this post was useful, you’ll also like our ‘Top apps to help your event run smoothly’.

photo credit: SSJ100 Hunt: Clue #4 via photopin (license)

Association #Techsperts: Interview with Kerrin MacPhie – ICCA UK & Ireland Chapter Chair and Director of Sales at ACC Liverpool

Posted on 15th October 201414th September 2016 by Eventsforce

With an increasing number of associations seeking to leverage technology platforms to maximise event attendance, audience engagement and data, Eventsforce spoke to Kerrin MacPhie, ICCA UK & Ireland Chapter Chair and Director of Sales at ACC Liverpool regarding how associations are becoming more data savvy…

1. ICCA recently held a masterclass for its members which addressed the increasing trend towards digitisation. What does this mean to associations and how are they looking at digitising the events and communications?

Basically digitisation is making a huge difference to how associations promote their events and engage with delegates pre, post and during conferences and events. Through social media, key speakers can be announced to drum up attendees, focused content marketing campaigns can use this medium, along with segmented email, to target specific groups of members which ensures that the right message is getting to the right individuals at the right time. Twitter, if used alongside a comprehensive content strategy, can really measure reach and therefore the promotion of key conference messages. These are techniques that can be measured against ROI, for virtually nothing apart from staff time, the potential exposure is huge.

Associations, on the whole, have not exploited this opportunity in the past and I feel it is something that will grow rapidly over the next few years.

2. How important is data management for associations?

Data management is paramount on many levels for associations. There is the need to communicate with members on a regular basis in addition to maintaining a robust database of prospects who are contacts that engage with the association on a variety of levels, these are members of the future. Interestingly at the recent ICCA UK & Ireland Masterclass, Pauline Coulter, former Commercial Director of the Association of Corporate Treasures said that their annual conference was attended by many non-members, in fact these made up the greater percentage of attendees!

That leads me on to say that data in relation to meetings and the main annual conference is vital, the right information at the right time is paramount to the success of any event. If your data is not managed you are not maximising the opportunity to engage with delegates pre event and it is through engagement that relationships are developed leading ultimately to greater commitment.

3. In your experience, how are associations and PCOs gearing up to make the most of their data?

There is an emerging trend for PCOs to work with smaller associations to grow the annual conference. To do this you need to target new members/ attendees which means that data development is key and one way to develop this is through social media and content marketing.

Another developing trend is for different associations to work together and share the conference, giving real value to attendees as they can attend sessions across both events, costs are reduced for the association and data interaction offers wider content selection to delegates

4. What do you see as the key challenges for associations and PCOs when it comes to digitisation and data?

A key challenge is reversing old-school habits; many associations have been around for many years and are very successful, why reinvent the wheel? However, people are changing, the new millennial generation live their lives through digitisation and social media, emails are even seen as passé to this group. Immediate interaction is paramount so for the younger generations attending conferences, Twitter should be a staple ingredient. Not only at conferences but also social media platforms as a norm should be adopted in day to day comms for associations looking to grow.

5. What advantages are there for associations that become more ‘data savvy’?

Literally the world is their oyster. By being data savvy and trying all the platforms available, many at no cost, global reach is possible.

The advantage can be truly maximised by having a robust digital/ social media strategy and monitoring the results. While this does require some investment, particularly in terms of people time, the results will speak for themselves.

About ICCA UK & Ireland Chapter

The International Congress and Convention Association (ICCA) is the global community for the meetings industry consisting of specialists in handling, transporting and accommodating international events. The association has a network of over 950 suppliers in 88 countries.

The ICCA UK & Ireland Chapter has over 70 member organisations covering every area of conference management; from venues and convention bureaus, to hotels, airlines and PCOs. The association’s aim is to both represent its members in front of the ICCA Board, and to provide them with a variety of education and networking opportunities throughout the year.

The chapter also looks to support the development of the events industry either by working alongside other national associations to create quality education, or by supporting umbrella bodies such as the Business Visits and Events Partnership and the Britain for Events campaign to represent the industry in front of government and wider business audiences. Connect with the chapter on Twitter @ICCUKI.

Tag: event management

Event Registration: 7 Tips to Successful Form Design