Actual article date: Apr 15, 2014

We live in an interesting century where person to person technologies are thriving. Yet, nothing serious gets done if you don’t see faces, either through a webcam or physical meetings.

That is a reason why business events continue to thrive in this age: the unrivalled business networking values that are transacted during the span of an event. Or simply, the return on investment greatly outrivals it’s counterparts online.

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Let’s be frank: successful business events are all about making the most relevant and meaningful connections out of them. Furthermore, expect ROI from employee’s conference attendance.

So here are three small items which in my opinion, will fire up your next business event.

1. Do Structured Networking

When delegates attend a business event, most often than not, they have a time limit to network. In between contents or talks, there is just 15 minutes to 30 minutes of networking time which amounts to just enough time to speak to 2–3 prospects during the networking breaks. The thing is, leaving your delegates to ‘guerilla network’ brings low ROI. Just imagine walking to the next cocktail table and speaking to a random prospect without knowing if it’s going to be a hit or miss.

Try establishing the relevant connections/meetings before your event and allow these connections/meetings to mature during your event, making your event all the more valuable.

You would want to start suggestion unique others to each delegate to kick start a relevant connection. To do this, you will need to curate each delegate’s preferences to recommend the appropriate others instead of sending a list of 1000+ delegates for each person to sieve through.

Technology can facilitate. In Jublia, that is what we specialises in: streamlining your business meetings while making intelligent recommendations to each delegate.

By the way, structured networking can take a few forms: speed meetings, roundtable discussions and more.

2. Moderate sessions better

I have seen Twitter being used with much effectiveness during fireside chats or Q&As. Moderators could make sessions like these much more effective by connecting better with the ‘ground’ through facilitating the conversation between delegates and the panel. Live polls could also be a good tool to crowdsource opinions.

Many times, I have seen the panel of speakers getting to engrossed in their own exchanges during panel discussions thus creating a disconnect between the stage and the floor.

The point is, by facilitating better exchanges between your distinguished panel and the delegates, it will definitely make conference attendance far more valuable.

3. Start engaging your audiences and delegates pre-event

The communication channel with your clients have to be built from the onset, all the way in the early pre-event phase, where they could freely ask questions and receive the required support from your team. This is however, a labor (and cost) intensive endeavor if not done right.

The longevity, sustainability and scalability of your business event depends very much on your year round engagement strategy (pre, during and post event) by aligning the latter with what individual exhibitor/sponsors/delegates actually requires from your event.

There are various technologies that will potentially help you to engage your audiences better. This involve sending targeted EDMs that they actually want to read through intelligent and sustained marketing, as well as an established customer engagement system like Get Satisfaction. Of course, at Jublia we provide a personal Engagement Manager for your event.

Do not wait for your event day to ask ‘How can I help?’. Start early!

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