How technology is transforming events
One of my speaking bureau just asked me to provide them with a few quick ideas on how technology is changing events, as one of their key clients is having an internal meeting to discuss their future use of technology in events.
I only had 10 minutes free to write something, so it’s far from comprehensive, but I thought worth sharing here.
Before events:
– Connecting with speakers and others attendees
– Identifying who you’d like to catch up with at the event
– Arranging meetings with sponsors or other attendees
– Voting on content to be covered
– Surveys to gain insights into participants and their experiences and views
– Sharing content relevant to the event
– Getting recommendations for people to meet with similar interests, projects etc., using tools such as introNetworks
During events:
– Interactive guide to schedule, including session recommendations based on profiles
– Sophisticated participant technologies such as SpotMe with features such as people radar, meeting recommendations, consensus maps etc.
– Voting and session feedback
– Questions and discussion during events
– Share photos, videos, and audio of the event, create collages and mashups
– Quizzes, competitions, prizes
– Sharing of insights generated
– Live translation
After events:
– Social networking and discussions among people attending the event
– Access to video and other event content
– Run and track initiatives generated from the event
– Suggestions for next events
As I was looking for the links above, I was interested to see that introNetworks has morphed from an events platform to an enterprise platform that helps employees to make useful internal connections, including integration into SocialText. I was also saddened to see that the excellent nTag meeting serendipity enhancer, that I first wrote about in 2002, is now defunct.
For those who are interested in the future of events, below are a couple other pieces I have written on the topic. I actually did a keynote at the Meetings Industry Association conference in 2004, in which I both spoke about and demonstrated technologies and facilitation structures that will create the future of events, however it looks like I didn’t write anything up from that. I will try to get to that.
