The BusyEvent Blog

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE:

No Longer A Secret – BusyEvent Announces Release of BeLinker On Mobile

St. Louis, MO – August 13, 2010

BusyEvent, the leader in live event solutions, has successfully launched the 3rd generation of its event communications system, BeLinker On Mobile.

“Right now technology developers are bringing out all kinds of ideas, hoping the market will accept them.  Those tools are typically good at doing one thing well, or require a download, or only work on a single phone system (like the iPhone) and that’s where BeLinker On Mobile is different” said BusyEvent CEO David Schenberg.

By providing tools that impact the business purposes for an event, BeLinker seamlessly integrates Audience Response, Lead Tracking, Document and Session Management and Social Networking from a single integrated system.

Developed for face-to-face and virtual events, BeLinker On Mobile enables a new level of connectivity, and engagement while generating increased profitability from new and existing revenue streams and provides every event participant using ANY internet connected device, real-time access to their personalized event information portal.

With nothing to download or install, event participants can collect and store their connections with people, products and information and access their Virtual Totebag using:

• ANY smart phone (iPhone, Android, Blackberry, Windows Mobile, Symbian, etc.),
• ANY internet connected device (iPad, laptops, desktops and Netbooks) as well as
• The original BeLinker Wireless Keypad introduced in 2008.

Decades of event experience have gone into the creation of BeLinker On Mobile.  By first looking at what event producers, corporate event professionals and attendees have been asking for, BusyEvent is providing a complete package of tools that no other single system offers today, which includes:

1. communication with their attendees in real-time
2. event adjustments on the fly
3. tapping into the secret conversations (social networking) at an event
4. voting, polling and audience response included
5. providing a lead management system that generates leads instead of just a list
6. ‘greening’ of the event with access to event materials, speaker presentations and exhibitor brochures in a “Virtual Totebag” system and
7. extending the event beyond the 3 days and 4 walls into the virtual and hybrid event space.

Most recently used by more than 5,000 attendees of the Domino’s Pizza 50th Anniversary Rally, BeLinker enhanced audience response, face-to-face social networking, lead management, document and session management. The Domino’s event team effectively managed thousands of event details in real time through the secure BusyEvent dashboard system.   Client Chris Brandon was quoted saying, “I was floored by how everything went all week – and considering record event attendance and a new property we’ve never worked at before, it really is a testament to the job you guys did.”



Information about the core BeLinker System and BeLinker On Keypad is available at: http://j.mp/BeLinkerOnKeypad

Information about the expanded BeLinker On Mobile Platform on:
- ANY smart phones (no applications to install or downloads required) and
- ANY internet connected device via cellular, wifi and hardwire is available at: http://j.mp/BeLinkerMobile

Haven’t had enough?  There’s even more . . . learn how to monetize your meetings and access the BeLinker System: Visit www.BusyEvent.com

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The Old Way is Broken.

We’ll Pay You to Fix It!

Tens of thousands of event attendees already use BeLinker, the most powerful, hand held, mobile and social media platform for events, worldwide!

Now, help your event attendees connect to people, products and information and create more profits for your event – at the press of a button!

Get your share of the $55,000 BusyEvent Stimulus Package and finally get what every event producer really wants, 1 – money in your pocket and 2 – the inside scoop on your event!

Calculate your event’s ROI and
get your share of BusyEvent’s $55,000 Giveaway

This week, Bob and Pat of the Startup Success Podcast interview friend of the show David Schenberg, CEO and co-founder of BusyEvent about new events technologies that change the equation both for organizers and attendees.

David shares his insights on why being first matters, not being afraid of creating a hardware-based barrier to entry for potential competitors and choosing a business that can scale.

We’d also like to thank Microsoft WebsiteSpark for being our first official show sponsor!  Microsoft WebsiteSpark and StartupToDo.com have free Microsoft software for designers and a six month scholarship to StartupToDo.com you may be interested in.

Download Show #68 or if you prefer, Subscribe to the podcast in Apple iTunes.

Bob Walsh is on Twitter at http://twitter.com/bobwalsh or you can email him at bob.walsh@47hats.com.

Patrick Foley is on Twitter at http://twitter.com/patrickfoley or you can email him at patrick.foley@microsoft.com

URLs mentioned/relevant to this show:

• The BusyEvent BeLinker System
• Demo competition for CEMA (Corporate Event Marketing Assn.) where BusyEvent won the Technology shootout against other event technologies.
• Microsoft Tag
• The BusyEvent Blog
• Get your share of the $55,000 BusyEvent Stimulus Package

#eventprofs #tradeshow Are We Still Complaining About That?

The value of tradeshows, relative to their costs, was the topic of a recent blog post by Chris Valentine of the T3 Expo.

In it, Chris overviews an article written by Thomas Powers of the Chicago Tribune who looks at a survey of 210 exhibitors at the National Food Processors show and found that 58% considered not exhibiting the following year, while 25% had already decided to drop out of subsequent events because of costs.

Sound familiar? Ironically this article was written on July 18….1971!

To Chris’ point, “Since then, the options for marketing dollars have expanded exponentially and here we are 38 years later hearing the same comments“.  And, if you click through the link above, you’ll get to participate in a short survey that asks which items you’d like to see improved to make tradeshows more valuable.

If Chris had asked us, which he didn’t, we’d add another ‘answer’; “Create real ROI“.

The real question then becomes, “How?” . . . here’s an example:

Recently, along with our partners at the Creative Producer’s Group, we completed an event for 3,200 attendees.  As part of the checkin process, each attendee was provided a beLinker.  Throughout the 3 day event, attendees beLinked each other, the exhibitor booths and the products they were interested in, participated in audience response and were able to beLink the sessions and have access to the information presented without having to carry home big bags of printed documents or scribbled notes on the back of business cards.

Here are some numbers:

• 3200 total attendees, 3 day event, covered 500,000 sf of meetings space using 12 bantennas (see what a beLinker Bantenna is – see that little grey thing on top, that’s the wireless transceiver, 9 feet off the ground).
• Number of messages processed by the beLinker system during the event: ~265,000
  • That means on average, each attendee sent 83 separate messages using their beLinker, to beLink a person, a product/exhibitor booth/breakout session materials and participate in ARS.
• Total number of beLinks between people (making social networking connections, person-to-person): ~153,000
• Total number of beLinks to companies (attendees beLinking acompany to access their information) : ~90,000
• Total number of audience response question votes: ~17,000
• The average attendee beLinked:
  • ~45 other people
  • ~28 companies and their products
  • Interacted with 9 breakout sessions (to download or have access to the presentation materials) and
  • Answered 22 questions
• The attendee with the most beLinks made ~1200 people-to-people connections.
• The average company was beLinked to by 424 people (that equates to 424 active and qualified leads for each and every company at the event).
  • The company with the most beLinks had ~1500 qualified leads.
• The session that used audience response most effectively had ~2200 ‘answers’ during their ARS.
• The dozen members of the Executive Team each had more than ~1700 beLinks to their profiles.

Now, post event, all of this information is now being accessed online and for the past 3 weeks, the beLinker System has seen:

• ~24,000 individual logins by more than
• 2,200 attendees leading to more than
• 15,000 individual downloads and links to products, presentations and other marketing materials with
• More than 800 secure messages sent by people through the system, to each other.
• More than 6,200 additional connections (this is after the event has concluded) to people, products or other information using their virtual beLinker tools.

So, what’s the ROI?:

• More than $50,000 in savings relative to printed materials.
• A massive reduction in the carbon foot print of the event.
• A private social network has been created so that attendees can continue to connect, share and communicate.
• The opportunity for exhibitors to generate a real ROI for their efforts.
• Active information, rather than passive, available in real-time, that allows event producers to act and improve their event as it occurs.
• Capturing event information that can be monetized both currently and into the future.
• More revenues to the event venue owner without more costs to the producer or attendees.
  
• Interaction and activation.
• Fun, Fun and more fun!

Interested in learning how to maximize your event ROI, reduce cost by up to 50% and produce a better event?

Contact BusyEvent CEO David Schenberg
eMail: dschenberg -at- busyevent -dot- com
Direct Phone: 888.788.4896 x111

Changing the Tradeshow Industry with a New Breed of Apps #eventprofs #iaee

IAEE – the International Association of Exhibitions and Events – published a very intriguing article about the Changing Tradeshow Industry and a new breed of event applications.  As you may know, Expo! Expo! is coming up early December, so the timing for discussions about how the tradeshow and events industry is being improved is perfect.

In addition to a variety of tools that are ‘web only’, BusyEvent’s Event Bookmarking System and the use of beLinkers is broadly highlighted.

Enjoy!

• Changing the Tradeshow Industry with a New Breed of Apps (PDF)
• IAEE Exhibitions and Events Magazine for Expo! Expo!

Keep Doing That and You’re Going to Fail! #eventprofs #tradeshows #assnchat

That’s the message I woke up to this morning. . . I’m glad I work out on Thursday mornings!

As we continue promoting the Event Bookmarking tools and more people engage in the conversation, it’s a good sign that someone is going to disagree (based on the surface impressions) of what we’re doing and why.

And that’s what happened today.

The first Tweet came in last night: 2 be honest, your product seems too much like (name of failed product) to succeed.  Then, after responding we got this: ask urself how many similar single-application gadgets have succeeded & why can’t the functionality B ported 2 a cellphone?

And that’s when the problem became clear . . . he thought we were promoting a hardware solution – and we’re not.

Now, I’d like your opinion, based on what was sent to us on Twitter – how would you have responded?  Something stronger or do you think what I wrote will start a flame war?

More importantly, even though it’s a bit lengthy, does our response help clarify what the Event Bookmarking platform can do – and that it’s independent of hardware?  In other words, ‘do you get it’?

Hi there (name of Twitterer):

Thanks for reaching out on Twitter. It’s interesting you should latch on to the ‘device’ element of the Event Bookmarking system.  Since that’s not how we promote the web accessible Event Bookmarking SaaS platform, your perspective is an insightful one.

First, a little background and in advance, I apologize for the length of my response.

Event Bookmarking is a web-accessible communications system (think of it like a Facebook-for-Events) that allows people to tap into their passions, at events.

Based on our experience, those passions are:

• Connect with each other – via tag-based matchmaking, tapping into personal and professional networks and creating links between the people they meet at events.
• Learn about things – via the bookmarking of sessions, speakers, products, exhibitors and other people.
• Participate in the conversation – via audience response tools such as polling and surveying, LinkedIn, Twitter and Facebook feeds and
• Communicate pre, during and post event – with the people, products and ideas that they were exposed to and want to maintain a relationship with.

In addition to the above, Event Bookmarking (which is an embedded or stand-alone module of our Meeting Manager platform) has a significant “green” impact by allowing exhibitors, speakers, sponsors, attendees and the event producers to ‘leave the paper at home’ and instead, link to or upload their information into the Event Bookmarking system.

Other than the positive economic and ecological impact, content owners can also track (like a WebTrends tool) who clicked on or downloaded their information and clicked through to their LinkedIn, Facebook or Twitter feeds, which fosters lead management, connectedness and the tracking of a communication thread that other tools can’t provide.

As I’m sure you’ve noticed, none of the above mentions a specific hardware solution.

And as I’m sure you’ll agree the use of smart/mobile devices (although on Twitter you mentioned the use of cell phones which is a path we have already evaluated and rejected) offer a greater flexibility (with the inherent distractions – which create their own issues) than a single purpose device, which is why we offer smart device tools, as well.

If we were only an event management company running ‘tech focused’ events for 1000 or fewer attendees, then likely we’d only offer the BusyEvent LIVE ‘mobile device’ solution.  However, since we run corporate and association events of 500-5000 attendees (with1,000 exhibitor booths) and consumer events with up to 50,000 attendees (and 3,000 exhibitor booths), offering a ‘smart/mobile device’ solution alone would be short sighted.  To give you a greater insight to a specific event, I’m attaching a case study from the (name of client) event held mid-May.

Our goal is to assure that everyone at any event has access to the information and communications channels that matters most to them.  Event Bookmarking allows every event participant to contribute to, participate in and access all of the information streams available at an event via whatever hardware they carry and if they don’t want to use their personal hardware, they can use ours; the BeLinkers.

Thanks again for reaching out . . . I look forward to continuing our conversation about how these tools can impact the events you are involved with.

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So, based on what was sent to us on Twitter – how would you have responded?  Something stronger or do you think what I wrote will start a flame war?

More importantly, even though it’s a bit lengthy, does the above help clarify what the Event Bookmarking platform can do – and that it’s independent of hardware?

If you’re interested, let me know (via comments) and I’ll let you know what his response is.

Tradeshows . . . Where Good Leads (no longer have to) Go To Die. Almost a year ago we wrote a series of articles on the challenges that tradeshow attendees face: Tradeshows, Where Good Leads go to Die (Part 1 & Part 2), our version of a Jerry Maguire document.  Taken as a whole, it outlines the problems in the tradeshow and events industry and describes a set of solutions.

So today, as part of the solution, we are launching BeLinker, a proprietary software and integrated hardware system designed to improve audience response, face-to-face social networking, lead management and data-based revenue creation for events.

What is BeLinker and the BusyEvent Event Bookmarking software platform?  Among other things it solves the “We don’t do trade shows because there’s no value in them” problem, for exhibitors.  Everyday, we talk with event managers, vendors sponsors, speakers and attendees discussing the good, the bad and the ugly about their events.  One of the core issues we discuss is the pressure for a return on investment in the expo or booth area.

In any economy, participation in an expo is dependent upon the amount of qualified leads a vendor received for their time, money and efforts. But simply agreeing to invest in a show is only half the battle because traditional lead management only produces a list of who was “scanned”; a list of a list, if you will.  It can’t produce a list of truly ‘qualified leads’.

The follow up on these lists can be daunting and is typically done by placing those new leads into the sales pipeline for eBlasting or even worse “dialing for dollars” phone calls made by the newest sales trainees or more expensively, top sales talent.

After a busy show, attendees get pounded with junk mail and emails and phone calls thanking them for stopping by and ‘pitching’ the product or service.  As a result, little list qualification occurs and they simply become part of the database going forward.  Solving that problem is what generated the lead management component of BeLinker (PDF Download).

And now the story that started it all… Years ago, we attended one of the tradeshows about tradeshows. We happened across one of the dozen or so ‘event management’ companies (translation – event registration software), ate the candy, took a brochure out of guilt, and thanked them for their time.  We learned a lot from that experience.  We were two people in a show full of several thousand attendees. We came, we saw, we talked and then we left . . . For us, that was that.

And that’s when the emails and the phone calls and the invitations started coming.  “We’re having a webinar!”, “We’re doing a luncheon in your town!”, “We’re offering new modules that we’ve stacked on top of the other ones… it’s all shiny and new and you MUST BE THERE to see it!!!”

Since we were relatively unimpressed with what we saw and were already well into the development of the BusyEvent Event Management Platform, we opted-out and took this one-time experience as a good dose of what not to do.  Our event management clients were telling us what they wanted, didn’t like, wished they could have and we had already been building tools like this for over a decade as one-off software. The time was right for us to build an event platform.

But the lunch invitations kept coming.  Even as we were launching Version 1 of BusyEvent and made no secret to who we were, nobody at the “we’ll invite you to a luncheon and show you our stuff” company had any tools or information to know if we were a qualified lead or not – so we’re still on the list today.

Last week, we received another email (the 4th in a period of 6 months) about another lunch and demo of their tools and that’s when we sat down and started doing some math.  What did this one unqualified lead cost them and how many unqualified thousands more are rattling around in their system?

If they had just been able to sift through the thousands of contacts they gathered at the event we attended to find the 50-100 good and qualifiable leads it would have been more useful to them.  What they do with the other 900 is up to them . . . so, here’s what we do:

1. First, everyone doesn’t get a color glossy brochure that will sooner-than-later find its way into a landfill.  Instead, had that original event had the BeLinkers (PDF Download) in use, every contact could be filtered and the qualified leads would get more attention.
2. Then, we track who downloaded our PDF brochure, clicked on the link to our site, blog, Twitter, LinkedIn, Facebook, etc… and expressed ANY follow-on interest.
3. By self-identifying as ‘interested’ each of those more-qualified leads would get a call from us about the real actions that occurred (we met, we talked, you clicked a link, etc…) and as appropriate, those qualified-leads would continue through the sales funnel until a more expensive contact, such as a meeting, a lunch, or demo, etc…made sense.
4. The others would all get an invite to a webinar, links to downloads and perhaps a quick 3 question survey about what they’re interested in.  And they’d remain in the ‘more qualifications needed’ list.

Before Event Bookmarking, Sales and Marketing would have no way to measure a successful show other than the number of contacts they gathered – qualified or not, “just get me names”.  Those really aren’t leads, but rather, names on a list.  Then inside sales is incentivized to get people to come to the luncheon no matter what their level of interest.  This occurs over and over until nobody knows where the leads came from or what money is best spent on Marketing.  It’s the “brute force approach” and we believe that budgets will never be there for that, ever again.

What you’ll see by watching the 5-minute LIVE BeLinker Presentation is what we’ll address for every attendee; the actual measurement of ROI and the identification of which contacts are worth spending time and money on and converting into leads.

That’s why . . . rather than continuing to be part of the problem, we’re offering part of the solution.

What is BeLinker and the Event Bookmarking Software Platform?

Among other things, BeLinker solves the “We don’t do trade shows because there’s no value in them” problem, for exhibitors.

It’s a software and purpose-built hardware platform that combines Lead Management with Audience Response, Face-to-Face Social Networking and an online information source to extend a 3-5 day event into a 365 day year-round connection between attendees, vendors, speakers, sponsors and event managers.

So, feel free to download our ‘Green Friendly’ brochure and call us to discuss how to cut the cost of event management in half while getting quality event information as it happens.

From Trees To Tradeshows . . . To Trashcans

What’s it going to really take to go GREEN at events?

It’s more than the ‘cloud’ and it’s more than ‘mobile devices’ and it’s more than ‘cool interactive applications’.

We think part of the answer is “The Thing” . . . remember that?

Well, it’s almost here and this is going to get good!

As more and more people utilize BusyEvent Express, it’s always valuable to gain their experience and learn about our tools from someone else’s perspective.

One of the things we’re learning quickly is that crowd sourcing is a great way to “learn what sucks so you can know what’s good” (thanks Beavis).

This past week, Marc DeWalle from the NCStartUp Blog (Twitter) began using Express and his experience pointed to an issue we had with how Paypal was returning payment clearances.

Things were working the way they were supposed to, but sometimes the information presented was confusing ticket purchaser (you can read more by reading “That’s What Beta Means“).  So, with Marc’s help, we were able to get things fixed quickly and now we’ve got a better product because of it.

You can read more about what happened and also the national program that Marc is putting together to support startups at his blog: The North Carolina Startup Blog, part of the nationwide Springstage network of startups.

Thanks Marc!!!

Building the “THING” . . . It’s a lot of fun and we’re about ready to share it with the world . . . which is why we’re so excited.

Event management systems are generally built around solid, stable core code that has been tested over and over from every angle by all kinds of people. At least, that’s the way we’ve built BusyEvent.Today, our Chief Architect, Director of Systems Development and all around good guy ran into my office and declared “WE’RE BUILDING THE THING!”. And from what I hear, that’s a pretty rare thing since most systems like ours are built incrementally, not by gigantic leaps and bounds ahead in thinking and capabilities.

With our investors fully behind what we’re doing, they’re encouraging us to continue pursuing our vision of what event management systems can be and so, “WE’VE BEEN BUILDING THE THING!”

This THING-building started in early 2008 when we began concepting and bringing to life our vision of what a better event on-site experience should be; one that is rich with opportunities, interaction, networking and information.

Since then, we’ve devoted a significant amount of time and effort to planning, concepting, preparing for and starting to code ‘The THING’ . . . and now, we’re almost ready to roll out the public beta.

So, what is this “THING”? It’s a software module that plug-and-plays with BusyEvent’s Core Platform enabling immediate and pertinent interaction between people, information and products.

• See a product you’re interested in? Bookmark it and review on your PURL.
• Meet a really interesting attendee or see a really good speaker and want to follow up? Bookmark them and review on your PURL.
• How about a product or if you’re a vendor, a lead? Using the Event Bookmarking system you’ll be able to view the product, see the person, download product PDFs and link to web sites and learn as much as you care to about the product – all from one place, your PURL.
  • And for the vendor . . . see which are the most target rich people you’ve met by observing which links they’re clicking on your PURL. . . and then tailor your follow up conversation to match their interests. Paper Brochures? . . . blech!  Leave them at the office and save the trees for making air.

By the end of March, we’re going to make our “THING” available for private beta testing to about 100 people.  If you’re interested in helping us bring the THING to market, send an email to THING@BusyEvent.com .

Chuck Zettle asked a really good question today, on LinkedIn.  What got me to stop and read it was the title: Ahh, Linked in . . Oh, and Facebook . . . Plaxo? No wait Twitter! Um, Myspace? YouTube! Naymz, Xing – AHHHHH!!!! Seems a bit overwhelming – what works for you?

And below, our response:
Chuck . . . what a GREAT title, about fell off my chair!

As a general philosophy, we look at all of these as communications channels which have their own strengths. And, much like I’ve heard all of my life, “pick something and pour your energies into it”, we’ve done that with the tools we use.

So, since this discussion is occurring on LinkedIn, I’ll share with you what our company does related to our social media focus and why we’re following the path I’ll describe, below.

Regarding general communications and out reach, we have two blogs:
1 – www.busyevent.com/blog focuses almost exclusively on items specific to our company. New product rollouts, “we’re hiring” announcements, general ideas, etc…
2 – http://busyevent.blogspot.com focuses on the events industry in general, and our general observations about it, the people in it and other industry specific topics. There may be some overlap from our company blog, but we try to keep them separated.

In both instances, our blogs are the ‘official and professional’ voice of the company. It’s written in a particular tone and focuses on specific items.

Our general outreach tool is Twitter. It’s the short blasting communications system that also is used to RSS the blogs plus, we have a Picture Of The Day (POTD) typically photos from events we’re running or clients we’re working with or sometimes a picture of the sunset. It’s definitely a more ‘personal and personality’ driven communications channel and offers immediate feedback unlike the blogs do.

Taken together, these two tools form the core platform of our social media outreach. But, as you’ll note, this is ‘outreach’ based and that then leads us to the ‘bidirectional’ tools we use.

LIVE Video streams are occurring at almost every event we manage as well as in our offices and even while we’re traveling from place-to-place. Sometimes these are password secured but usually, we’re live streaming in the open. Because the streaming video service we use has a chat feature, it’s fun to be able to share an event and get immediate conversations going. For some events, we’ve had as many as 200 people ‘viewing’ at once and the conversations were amazing. We also use video streaming when we conduct training as well as just turning on the cams and letting people ‘peer’ into our world on an any day basis.

Another 2-way system that we utilize are our Wiffiti tools but they’re more focused on at-event interactions. As such, while it’s a bidirectional’ tool, it’s only exposed to the people that are at an event and therefore has a limited audience. Take it for a spin at: http://www.tinyurl.com/busyevent-wiffiti

Finally, because of our industry, we participate in a variety of events industry specific networks, the best being Julius Solaris’ Events group on LinkedIn. Generally, this is a ‘push’ communications system for us, although, we’ve had good luck getting involved with conversations that have legs and we’ve learned alot from them.

So, because there are so many social networking tools out there, it’s easy to get lost in the menagerie but since we’re focused on a few and then really ‘work’ them, we’ve seen good general results.

Our next steps, and we’re actually in the process of hiring for that position right now, is to engage a PR/Writer/Social Media Pro ( http://www.busyevent.com/blog/?p=81 ) to increase our frequency and validity and perhaps spread our wings a bit into traditional media while keeping the core focus on the tools listed above.