Your conference was a smashing success with an excellent turnout. The attendees watched your awesome PowerPoint presentation, viewed all your relevant graphs and pie charts, and the infographics you shared conveyed your information clearly and effectively.
Most businesses utilize these types of events and conferences to gain a bigger audience and increase their clientele through exposure and education. This is a powerful method for expansion and growth, but we can do more.
As technology grows, it also changes. Desktop computers are being replaced with laptops, and those are giving way to tablets, and now smartphones are ruling the online marketplace. In fact, smartphones are now replacing plastic and paper currency with Apple’s new mobile payment system, Apple Pay.
Using today’s advances in technology, we can keep our audiences engaged well beyond the time our event is over. Utilizing a variety of methods available to us, we can keep that valuable information at the fingertips of our attendees.
Here are six ways that event technology can benefit both you and your attendees:
1. Record and repurpose
By saving and recording all the information from your event you can continue to hand out this valuable data to your audience. Now that you have saved all your images and information, it is time to take it to the next level, one step further and on to number two.
2. Care and share
There is no better way to thank your attendees for their presence than with continued contact and the availability to still use your materials and data. Give them access to all of this online. Whether it is posted on your website or by utilizing cloud technology, you are offering your audience continuous access to your materials and data regardless of where they are. Using cloud software also increases your chances of reaching an audience on a more global scale.
3. Marketing genius
Those who give unto themselves, also give unto others. Now that your attendees not only have the ability to view your data, they can easily pass it on to others. Whether that person is a business colleague or their potential client, your materials will circulate to others without you lifting a finger in the process.
4. Tag and snag
Utilizing RFID (Radio Frequency Identification) and/or NFC (Near Field Communication) technology, you can keep tabs and continue to interact with your audience. For example, applying one of these devices onto a name badge or wristband from your event, you can then integrate that with a mobile app, staying engaged with them through contact on social media. This may sound confusing, but it is worth investigating.
5. Don’t die hard, live on
Although your event is over, it doesn’t mean that your message shouldn’t live on. Use today’s technology, you can ensure your conference wasn’t just a memory. You can update the information given at your seminar as needs and trends continue to grow and change. What you shared last week may have changed this month. Share these updates with your guests.
6. Is there an app for that?
There are many available choices for businesses today to make their own, customizable app to suit a particular purpose. Is there something from your event that can continue to be conveyed through the use of a mobile app? Can your data be somehow continuously available through a handheld device such as a smartphone? Examine your options carefully and deploy whatever strategy necessary to keep your audience engaged.
Take advantage of everything today’s technology has to offer us and keep your attendees interested in your event long after the doors have closed.
This is a guest blog by Megan M. Ritter. Megan is a business journalist and entrepreneur in Southern California. As a writer, she enjoys covering how technology has impacted business communications, the process of globalization, and social media strategies. Connect with her on Twitter today!
“Image source – Flickr , usage under Creative Commons license (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/)”
