Today, we once again find ourselves in the public sector. We have Nicole Osman from the State Gazette of Baden-Württemberg as a guest. She is responsible for conducting the annual symposium on digitalization in public administration.

She tells you more about the first steps with an event app and what difficulties you can expect. Have fun while reading. ?

LineUpr: Hello Nicole. Thank you for taking the time to do this interview. Please introduce yourself and the State Gazette of Baden-Württemberg. What are your goals and what role do events play in achieving them?

Nicole: Hello, I’m Nicole. In our congresses department, I am responsible for the organization, the participant management and the on-site implementation of our training and congress offers. The State Gazette is very diverse and sees itself primarily as an all-round service provider for public administration. Since 2009 we have our congress area, which does both the symposium, as well as staff fairs in Ludwigsburg, Kehl and Speyer and offers specially tailored training for local councils in the state of Baden-Württemberg.

LineUpr: Let’s get to your event “#Amt @SocialMedia”. What is this about? Which target group did you want to reach with it?

Nicole: Our event “#Amt @SocialMedia” was aimed primarily at all press spokespersons in public administration. The highlight of this year was certainly the presence of Mayor Boris Palmer, who used the example of his own person to explain how to deal with a “shit storm” in social media. The topic of social media is fast-paced, explosive and highly interesting, especially for press relations. Our symposium is an annual event. It always offers current topics and their handling in practice. It is a very popular event with nice returning participants.

LineUpr: Which channels and tools do you use for marketing and presentation?

Nicole: We advertise all our events through as many channels as possible. From classic letter mailing to Facebook, Twitter, and Xing. Of course not to forget our homepage and newspaper. This is how we reach the target group to whom we offer our program.

LineUpr: How did you learn about LineUpr and what was the decisive argument for you to use an event app?

Nicole: The special social media topic at this year’s symposium literally screamed for a digital accompaniment. To which topic can you otherwise “try out”, whether your audience is ready for the digital world and can save time by not having to pack folders because everything is digitally available? So in the vast expanses of the internet, we went in search of something suitable and met you. Trying out the creation of pages was a joy because it is self-explanatory and simply structured. If you are looking for a quick digital accompaniment to your event, then this is the place for you!

LineUpr: Have you already used event apps? If so, what are your experiences and why did you choose LineUpr for this event? If not, what has been against it so far?

Nicole: No, so far we did not use an event app because it did not fit.

LineUpr: How did you use the app before, during and after the event?

Nicole: We inserted the entire event, as seen on our website, into the app. Location including directions, speaker presentation with short CV and contact information, daily routine, etc. There are no limits to your own design options here. I really liked the pop-up news feature. This was also filled in advance by us.

We changed the visibility of each message during the day as needed. This feature was especially great as a reminder of the lectures parallel to the press kit check which we were offering at the symposium or to wish the participants a good meal shortly before the meal.

Of course, we have also linked the lectures of our speakers and referred to them.

LineUpr: How did your visitors react to the app?

Nicole: In an information e-mail shortly before the event, we made our participants aware of the app and explained the usage to them a bit. By having selectable forums, everyone could save their chosen favorites and view them in the app. Anyone who registered was also asked if he needed paper documents. In advance, there were just a few. Unfortunately, you cannot write notes on a program point within the app, which is why some persons wanted to have the document folders again. Maybe a small suggestion for you? The response to the app was still low, but it’s usually so in most first attempts. Sometimes it takes a while to get established. But the participants who used the app found it to be excellent.

LineUpr: We will take this suggestion with us. Promised. ? You also used surveys about the app during the event. What did you want to achieve and how did you convince your guests to participate in these surveys?

Nicole: First of all, we wanted to find out how many people are using the app at all. Since we want to work more sustainably, we also consider how we can save paper. We hope that our participants will use the app even more actively in the future so that we can get rid of paper and still be able to communicate all the information about the events.

With a nice pop-up notification, we asked our participants to rate their impressions with the simple star system fresh after the program points!

LineUpr: Thank you for the lovely interview, Nicole. We always find it very interesting to be at the forefront of digitalizing events. We see that there is still much to learn about the digital hurdles in the transition from analog to digital.

We are looking forward to helping you again. ?

The post Event Apps for Symposia – Experiences from the State Gazette for Baden-Württemberg first appeared on LineUpr Blog.

The digitalization of our everyday life is unstoppable. Even for events, this development does not stop. And that’s good so. Technology helps you to save costs, to integrate your participants more in your events, to create more interactivity, to connect participants and to protect your wallet. For event organizers, the event planning, the marketing, the registration/sale of tickets and the communication of the event both on-site and online are of particular interest in digitalization. There are a ton of products for this. As an organizer, you can almost feel like you are in paradise.

We have 6 examples to show you why you too should digitalize your events.

1.   More Time for the Important Tasks

Document the entire event concept on paper and adapt it to changes. Complete all team meetings in one place. Send marketing emails by hand. Receive and reply to registrations and questions by phone. How was it even possible to organize big events in the past? It needed a horde of employees, right?

Thanks to technical possibilities, now anyone can organize an event for 1,000 or more participants with a five-person team. Planning is done online and everyone always has access to the latest information. Thanks to bots and online chats, customer communication can be significantly optimized. Registrations and ticket sales are made online through standardized systems, as well as billing and shipping.

Thanks to a thousand little helpers, you can focus on the essentials and save a lot of time and stress.

2. More Networking at Your Event

It is omnipresent in the B2B sector. Why do people visit B2B events? Exactly, they want to expand their professional network. Whether potential customers, partners or service providers, most participants want to meet new contacts.

Sure, networking was possible even before the invention of the computer. Many successful networking professionals still swear by the direct approach with a friendly hello, but why make life difficult, when it can be easy. The trickiest part of networking is approaching an unknown person. There are now countless digital tools that make it easy for your participants to take that first step. The keyword is matchmaking. These tools will give your attendees suggestions on which other people at the event will suit them, based on interests, requirements, and contact requests. So the first step, the announcement, is made via such a tool. Usually one can then also arrange for a meeting on the spot. So no more cold dialogues and there is always a perfect topic for both sides as a conversation starter.

3. Fewer Costs

To be honest, whether digitalization will result in less cost to your event is entirely up to you. Basically, digital products and services offer you a lot of possibilities to save on time and, therefore, also on staff. At the same time, you can set specific goals, such as for example, promoting your event within a defined target group, with significantly more effective reach through online marketing, for example on Facebook or LinkedIn, instead of hanging up your event posters around the world.

Both ultimately lead to a massive cost reduction. At the same time, digitalization offers you a massive selection of new possibilities and instruments. Many organizers tend to invest in freed-up budgets directly into new strategies and products. If this leads to more success and higher sales, then nothing is against it. But you should make sure that you do not get caught up in the whole clutter and lose sight of your primary goal.

4. More Participant Interactivity

In terms of interactivity and personalization, many events have taken a giant leap forward thanks to digital tools. I still remember it from my grandfather’s stories. The good old days, when study results and new ideas were thrown on the wall with a slide projector, the participants had to endure hours of frontal presentations without being able to somehow influence the content. Times when one had to go to the information desk to get answers about the schedule or consult a thick paper booklet for the schedule. Or everyone could bravely come forward and then scream across the room to ask a question to the speaker.

Under these conditions, it is clear why the interactivity of the events was the way it was. Thank God that’s over. Today, organizers can ask their target group for their interests long before the event and tailor the event individually. Thanks to apps and websites, participants can easily ask anonymous or non-anonymous individual questions to the speakers. Lecturers can integrate the opinions and interests of their audience directly into the presentation thanks to living polls, and respond to each participant. And, and, and. A paradise of possibilities.

5. Better Customer Service

As we have already mentioned. In the past, large events almost required a small call center to answer all the questions about the event and to be able to carry out the ticketing or registration of participants. Thanks to new digital channels such as websites and email support, a small team is enough for today.

In addition to the cost savings, the efficiency and quality of your customer service also increase. Firstly, your participants can answer many questions on your mobile platforms, such as your website, themselves. Secondly, you can document frequent questions and develop optimal answers, so your service staff is prepared and can provide better answers. Thirdly, your participants do not always have to call if they have a little question. There are several contact channels available, and the younger generation prefers to chat over Facebook or Whatsapp rather than to call or send e-mail.

6. Viral Marketing – Word of Mouth Propaganda

It has never been easier to make your event famous overnight. Organizers used to have to print flyers and distribute posters throughout cities. Whoever has a bit bigger budget also used TV and radio advertising. What do these formats have in common? Participants cannot interact with it and increase the distribution through their own actions.

The situation with digital advertising looks completely different. When organizers publish interesting concepts, graphics, and videos online on platforms like YouTube, Facebook, or Instagram, anyone can interact with that content. You can like, comment, share, retweet and so much more. Firstly, as an event organizer, you get feedback on your campaigns much faster, and secondly, you can dramatically expand the reach of your content so quickly and cost-effectively. In traditional marketing, word of mouth meant that an enthusiastic participant may tell a few people in their immediate surroundings about you and your event. Today, they can reach hundreds of contacts via Facebook and Twitter with much less effort.

What You Should Have Learned

The digitalization of events has some challenges for event organizers, but at the same time, it offers you huge possibilities to optimize the planning and execution of events. With a clear focus and the knowledge of how to use the new products and services efficiently, the added value very clearly outweighs the effort. So get on the internet and start step by step to find digital helpers to provide participants with better service and content at your events.

“digitalized” Icon created by priyanka from “the Noun Project“.

The post Why Organizers Should Digitalize Their Events – 6 Arguments first appeared on LineUpr Blog.