Yesterday, that report was finally published by Echelon Design. The report highlights several case studies that reflect the possibilities for enhancing and enriching any event strategy. There are thoughts and insights from many people including:
> Kenny Lauer, Executive Director of Digital Experience at George P. Johnson Company
> Dennis Shiao, VP Product Marketing for InXpo
> Jeff Hurt, Director of Education and Engagement, Velvet Chain Consulting
> John Jainschigg, Director of Internet and Community at Ziff-Davis Enterprise
> Eric Lukazewski, Marketing Director and Social Media Strategist, Echelon Design

Talking about the report, Eric Lukazewski said, “we’ll continue to see an evolving event world with accelerated change and technology will forevermore be one of these primary factors.” This report helps all event professionals understand the new opportunities that social media brings to the table for marketing and expanding their own events.

Download the Free Report: Social Media in the New Event World.

The post Are You Ready for Social Media in the New Event World? appeared first on Interactive Meeting Technology.

The report “Best Practices in Online Community Management” produced by Pathable reads like a secret decoder ring for first time event community managers.

While the report is loaded with with helpful advice, I thought these four things stood out:

Recruit the Stars

The report recommends that you go find “stars” to come hangout in your community and contribute to it. Just like in night clubs, these stars draw others into the conversations and to the community, etc. The report offers seven different tips for recruiting stars and engaging them.

Find A Champion

This is the internal leader that is committed to make sure that the online community succeeds. Based on my experience in corporate america, the stronger the champion the better the project result.

Control the Trolls

This report offers strategies to contain and mitigate negative actions by troublemakers (trolls or Wild Things) that want to pollute your event’s social network. Think about the tips in this section like “Rodent Killer.”

Cross-Pollinate

Most event communities allow attendees to connect their friends/contacts, status updates, etc with other social networks (think Linkedin or Twitter). This allows attendees to leverage their connections and engagement in other places with the event social network.

Bottom Line

If you find a champion that can bring the stars into your online event community and squash the trolls – then you will increase your odds of ending up with a rich thriving event community.

You can download the original report from Pathable directly here: Best Practices in Online Community Management (sorry, you must register with Pathable.)

What other resources would you recommend to first time community managers?

image via: fashionartiste

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This new mobile platform is a mashup of Ning, Eventbrite, Twitter and Foursquare for small groups. Plus, it has a self-service setup AND they are making it free for groups with less than 250 people.

Said another way: Zerista can do schedules, messaging, backchannel, take payments, support checkin, send invites, maps and browse member lists and probably other stuff, too.

Watch the video from the DEMO Conference last week to get an overview:

[vodpod id=ExternalVideo.931373&w=425&h=350&fv=]

Here is What I Like About Zerista:

When I think about what Zerista brings to small events, I see much more than a mobile social network. I see a mobile communication system for small groups. To me, most event social network’s seem to be fancy delegate lists. (Someone take me to task on that statement, please.) Zerista has created a mobile communication platform that gives attendees several different types of communication tools. Here are a couple of things that I think are worth your attention:

> No-Web-Enabled Phone Left Behind: Unlike iphone applications that only work on one mobile phone – the Zerista system will work on any web-enabled phone. While that limits some functionality in the short run (like uploading mobile pictures), it does ensure that everyone can participate and use the solution.

> Backchannel Capability: I like that the backchannel can be private or sent out on Twitter. In some cases, you will want to share things with everyone. But, you might only want to post GOOOOOAAAALLL! to the other parents. The only other company that I have seen with a similar backchannel capability is EventVue.

> Checkin Capability: When I went to Event Camp in February, most attendees tweeted that they had arrived at the hotel. If we would have had the Zerista platform, we could have “checked-in” and told other community members that we had arrived. Hitting a checkin button is easy. I think we are going to see more applications for “checkin” capability at events, because it could be used to tell people that you have arrived on-site, arrived at the plenary session, arrived at lunch or at a satellite event.

> Payment Processing: This might be the killer feature. How great would it be for a small event to collect payments for “add-on” items that are purchased onsite during the event? Or what if attendees asked the organizer to throw together a last minute dinner for 40 people. You could sell tickets to that dinner and collect payments online. It would be so easy to collect money and distribute tickets online.

> Freemium Pricing: The pricing model is free for small groups, but you can purchase add-on services to make your event community a little bit better than the basic format. I like this model because it allows event organizers to try out the basic version, see what works and then upgrade or customize as required.

A Word of Caution

> This product has not launched, yet: Until I get to play with the system, I am making assumptions about how it will work based on my previous experiences with similar tech tools. (Like I did with the iPad)

> Clash of the Non-Joiners: I can see the baby-boomers cringing at the thought of joining a bunch of micro-communities. My response to them is that these “disposable communities” are temporary communication platforms that should make it easier for them to be a part of an event. Also, I imagine that Zerista will use Facebook Connect or Twitter Login to reduce the number of logins/passwords.

Bottom Line

When it comes down to it – the Zerista mobile community is more of a communication platform than a private social network. It allows you to form “disposable communities” and help them communicate, collaborate and share – while they are on the go.

What do you think? Will this Zerista mobile platform be a game changer for small events?  What additional strengths or shortcomings do you see with this idea?

Note: I don’t accept any money, gifts or commissions for writing product reviews.

The post Game Changer For Small Events: Zerista’s Mobile Community Platform appeared first on Interactive Meeting Technology.

You ask them to go to some website that they have never heard of – register for a username and password, enter some personal information, wait for an email verification, click a link to validate the email address, fill out a profile, upload a picture (after they find a descent one), etc.

For some people this is a hassle that they don’t want. And while YOU argue that the benefits of joining are worth it – they argue that it is too hard, has too many steps and takes too much time.

It doesn’t have to be this way. It doesn’t have to be this hard.

Here are some simple ways for you to make it easy for attendees to join your event social network.

1. Integrate with Your Registration System

By integrating your event social network with your registration system, joining your social network becomes one small step in the process of registering for the event. You catch attendees while they are thinking about the event. Plus, you can automatically load some of the data into their profiles for them.

“We saw our adoption numbers leap when we integrated with the registration systems. Completions of the final registration page, which asks people to join the community, jumped, catching people in the work flow and addressing their needs when they were already thinking about them.” – Jordan Schwartz, Pathable

2. Use Facebook Connect or Twitter for Login

All of us have too many login ids and passwords to remember. The one for your event social network is just another problem for your participant.

One thing that you can do is choose an event social networking platform that allows your participants to login with their Facebook, TwitterID or OpenID. This secure login allows people to connect to your event social network without needing to remember another login ID and password.

“We allow login via Facebook, Twitter, and OpenID. That way attendees don’t need to create and remember another password.” – Tony Stubblebine, Crowdvine

3. Populate Profile Information From Other Social Sites

The more information that is included in a participant profile, the better it is for networking. However, it can be a nuisance to have to retype all of that information and upload pictures, etc.

You can save your attendees time and energy by allowing them to connect to their Facebook, Twitter, Linkedin, Flickr and blog accounts and automatically populate information into their profile. While you are at it – why not setup your social network to pull profile pictures from one of these sites?

“We actually automatically pull in pictures from LinkedIn, Facebook, & Twitter for you to select and use as your profile picture.” – Rob Johnson, Eventvue

4. Automatically Reconnect Friends, Contacts and Peeps

Another nuisance for attendees is going through the participant list to make connections with their existing friends or contacts that are also attending your event.

To save them time, you can setup your event social network to do “third party address import” (there has to be a sexier name than this) and automatically reconnect all of their friends. Essentially it means can attendees find which of their Linked-in, Facebook, MSN, Google and Yahoo contacts are attending this event. Sometimes, the process is simpler than others.

“The user can click one button and pull in their friends from facebook and Twitter who are also attending the event they are attending.  Why rebuild your connections when you can carry them over?” – Clinton Bonner, The Social Collective

5. Hook my Flickr up to my Twitter and Facebook it!

Some of your participants are going to have accounts on Facebook, Linkedin, Twitter, YouTube, and many, many other social websites. They may want to integrate their social presence from these other sites into your event social network.

To help them, setup your event social network to include their Blog posts, Flickr photos, tweets from twitter, status updates, etc. from these other sites.

Bottom Line

You want your event social network to be a communication hub for your event before and after the event. You want attendees to spend time networking, sharing ideas, connecting with other attendees and discussing hot topics.

The easier it is to join your event social network – the more attendees will do it. So, work with your technology vendor to make your social network as easy as possible to join.

Is it easy to join your event social network? or is it like climbing a mountain?

photo credit: jimbowen0306

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