What’s Hot in The Event Industry: Tech Stuff For Events
For the past four years working in this industry, I can see many types of technology can be applied to suit to any kind of events. With the availability of internet connection and smartphones, these two alone open up to many kind of possibilities for technology to thrive within the event industry. I’ll share with you of some technologies that I know many events are deploying them to add ‘WOW’ factor to their attendees.
1) NFC wristband
A small and programmable wristband at your hand can enable information sharing between the exhibitors and attendees, or among the conference attendees. No more you stuck in awkward situation where you run out of name card to give to people. You can also just tap the NFC wristband to your new found friend’s smartphone to initiate information sharing. That could be an ice breaker in a networking event, right? And quite frankly, exchanging name card can be quite boring too and out of style these days.
2) QR code
Most events right now are issuing QR code when they deliver the e-tickets or confirmation email to the attendees. QR code speeds up the registration process by retrieving the personal information of the attendees within fraction of seconds. That would definitely help to reduce the que at the registration counter.
3) Polling apps
Attendees now can ask questions or survey about the event through mobile apps. Apps like Pigeonhole promotes interactivity between the event organizer and the attendees in real time. The attendees not only can answer question, but they also can post questions or vote for their favorite questions. This helps event organizer to deliver high quality content and speed up the Q&A session at the event.
4) Networking Apps
The number one reason why people come to an event is because they want to get connected with people within the industry. Offline interaction can be intimidating to some people. But if they can view the profile of people which they like to connect with before coming to the event, that certainly will bring some comfort to them. Some apps like Bizzabo enables user to view the LinkedIn profile beforehand. At least the attendees get to have sneak peak of the people who will show up during the event.
5) Apps to measure mood at the event
Okay, this one is totally new to us. There is an app to measure mood for people at the event. Its name is The Moodies. It is a mobile app where its technology has been tested with 100,000 participants globally. The developer of this apps, Beyond Verbal, demystified the technology in front of 700 participants during the market research conference in Atlanta.
All of these technologies are very exciting ones. Although some of the technologies mentioned here require some upfront cost, we are sure the return will be worth the money paid.