A Blueprint For Socially Augmented Events: The Seven Stages Recap

On June 15, at the PCMA Education Conference 2010, I saw Scott Klososky present how to use social technologies in the seven stages of event planning.  The title of his presentation was “A Blueprint For Socially Augmented Events.”

Scott’s presentation was mind boggling, thought-provoking and progressive. He laid it all on the line and challenged meeting professionals everywhere to get involved with social technologies in all aspects of the event planning and implementation or risk becoming stale, outdated and obsolete. In his own words, “Stop saying your attendee’s don’t use social media. They do!”

Image from Scott Klososky’s presentation. He emphasized to stop saying “My attendees are not using social media!”

Here are my notes from Scott Klososky’s presentation.

Why People Attend Conferences & Use Social Technology
Most people attend conferences and events for two critical reasons:

1. Networking and
2. Information flow (education)

Amazingly, these are the same two reasons social technology is important.

Some Social Definitions For Clarity
Social Technology is an umbrella term encompassing all things social.

Picture by Scott Klososky from PCMA Education Conference 2010 presentation.

1. Social Relevancy is your online credentials, your reputation and value. (Socialmention, twinfluence)
2. Social Media is online media transfer. (Slideshare, YouTube)
3. Social Networking is online networking.  (Facebook, LinkedIn)
4. Social Enabled Tech is your online operational value. (CRM, Recruiting)

The Social Stuff We Should Care About For Our Events

Download your own version of the above chart.

The Social Technology Concepts Event Organizers Need To Address

• Organizational Voice (blog, Twitter, Facebook)
• eWord of Mouth
• Real Time Collaboration
• Online Reputation Management
• Rivers Of Information
• Location Based Marketing
• Crowdsourcing

Seven Stages Of Socially Augmented Events
Conference and meeting organizers must think about adding more value to their face-to-face events. Many attendees can get free content online.  The face-to-face experience must be immersive, inclusive and provide a unique experience along with additional value than just reading the content online after the event

Social technology provides a way for event organizers to use inexpensive, if not free, tools that can be integrated into all aspects of the event, create a standard to follow, allow for comprehensive data tracking and are portable.

1. Pre-Event Marketing (at least three to six months out from event)

• Viral videos (Example: create a YouTube event channel, not just a YouTube organizational profile)
• Collaboration Site where all team and association volunteers can collaborate together in real time. (Google Wave, Basecamp)
• Event (organization) Voice (Use social media tools to start talking about the event. Don’t make all communication purchase driven only. Share content, resources and helpful information. Also, add human element to event org profile. Show pictures of those sharing the information on background profiles. Use initials of those sharing information so that readers know who posted the information.
• Leverage Speaker Content – (videos, white papers, blogs, twitter streams). Scott asked, “Why do meeting professionals hire speakers, pay them a lot of money and have them only fly in to speak and then fly out? That’s a disservice to the attendees. Ask and expect speakers to provide more before, during and after the event.”
• Create eWOM campaigns
• Crowdsourcing (crowdsource topics, issues, authors for book chats, etc.)

2. Pre-Event Networking (start at least three months before the event, not two to three weeks!)

• Secure an eCommunity Platform (use one that has an itinerary module, allow people to schedule private meetings with others-especially exhibitors and sponsors, open it early and begin seeding it with content from speakers and the event)
• Create a custom iPhone/Android app (can be done very inexpensively these days.)
• Make sure your eCommunity Platform has calendering connected to attendee list
• Seed Speaker Interaction
• Invite attendee questions and requests early (Uservoice.com for crowdsourcing event ideas)

3. Sponsor Support

• Electronic Coupons – Distribute electronic sponsor coupons to event attendees (twtQpon)
• iPhone/Android App
• Collaboration technology
• Provide social contact
• Access to eCommunity calendering
• Foursquare integration

4. Event Networking

• Connect with presenters (text or Twitter Q & A during presentations)
• Location based marketing and gaming for events, tradeshow floor, city venues (Foursquare, Gowalla)
• Community contributed reviews for business professionals (GetUnvarnished.com It’s like LinkedIn meets Yelp meets Wikipedia This is really cool!)

• Publish social addresses
• Public or private micro-networking (Yammer example of private site, Twitter, public )
• Aggregation of all event-related feeds (Almost.at – real time page aggregating everything related to conference, Paper.li is a recap of some tweets using a specific hashtag–not all– from past 24 hours–reads like a show daily)

5. Presentation Delivery

• Skype in experts and speakers
• Text message Q&A with speakers (can be done with iPads now!)
• Hybrid events with simultaneous delivery from face-to-face event
• TED model (10 minute presentations video recorded and released throughout the year after the event)
• Second Life is making a resurrgence

6. Content Distribution

• Post to YouTube Channel (not organization page, create a YouTube Channel!)
• Post to SlideShare Channel
• Scribd & Flickr
• iPhone/Android app requests
• Create link library for distribution for six months or longer (the 360 day or perpetual conference)

7. Post Event Follow Up

• Measurements & analytics
• Complete social connections
• 180 Day River Of Information to include links to channels, abbreviated videos, links to speaker content

Listen to Scott Klososky’s full presentation. For a copy of his slide deck, (which is totally awesomesauce), contact Lori McKanna, tell her you read about Scott’s presentation on this blog and ask her to send you a link to Scott’s slide deck. It’s a large document you will be sent a YouSendIt link to download from the Internet.

What’s missing from Scott’s use of social technologies for events? What concerns you most about this list? What excites you?