What's Keeping Global Event Planners Up At Night — Meetings Innovation Report
Photo Credit: Carnegie Mellon University in Pittsburgh will be one of the main venues for The White House Frontiers Conference in October, hosted by President Obama. Microsoft
Skift Take
Security, mobile device usage, the sharing economy, and positioning events as marketing vehicles are among the top challenges for event planners in 2016.
Skift's Meetings Innovation Report is a weekly newsletter defining the future of meetings and events by deciphering strategies that drive engagement and better business outcomes. Subscribe here.
The Future of Meetings & Events
The International Live Events Association (ILEA) and VisitScotland co-published a new paper following their first Global Summit earlier this year, highlighting the top challenges facing international event planners in 2016.
According to the ILEA and Scotland representatives I spoke with, and two event companies that participated in the summit, security is now a priority in everyone's mind, everywhere. "There's always been a discussion about security but we didn't really think we had to be a part of it," said David Merrell, CEO of AOO Events. "If you look at Orlando and Nice, this is something that is definitely impacting the event industry."
Other major themes included: Managing mobile device usage at events to achieve business outcomes; the sharing economy's impact on events; identifying the value proposition of events for CMOs; articulating the strategic role of event planners; and the need for different segments in the meetings and events industry to break out of their silos. Read the full story here.
— Greg Oates, Senior Editor
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Next Generation Event UX
Mobile Device Use and Security Among Top Challenges For Event Planners: The meetings and events industry desperately needs to break down all of its silos so members in all of the different segments have access to a greater breadth of industry insight at a global level. Read more at Skift
Five Predictions On How Pokemon Go Will Impact The Event Industry: If you think the Pokemon craze is super silly, you're half right. Sam Zuba, senior digital producer at Legacy Marketing Partners, describes the other half. The augmented reality tech underpinning the game is proving it can drive foot traffic to pop-up event sites and boost brand engagement. Read more at Event Marketer
Offline Summit 2016 – 20 Sessions From 23 Thought Leaders: We covered Event Farm's Offline Summit in Brooklyn in June, focusing on how planners are leveraging events better as experiential marketing platforms. The event tech company just posted all of the session videos online. View them at Event Farm
The Hype and Hope of Artificial Intelligence: Much like “the cloud,” “big data,” and “machine learning” before it, the term “artificial intelligence” has been hijacked by marketers and advertisers everywhere, but that doesn't mean that AI still isn't going to change everything, eventually. Read more at The New Yorker
How This Association Stays on Top of Event Tech Trends: The National Marine Manufacturers Association adopted a host of event technology strategies integrating virtual reality, augmented reality, beacons, and apps, which also provided data analytics on event engagement. Read more at BizBash
Smart Cities & Spaces
Why Brazil Was the Most Viewed Digital Games Ever: The volume of content streamed by global broadcasters during the first three days of the Rio 2016 Olympics exceeded that of the entire London 2012 Summer Games. Just one more proof point that event planners should include digital content creation in their program budgets. Read more at Akamai
Business Events Sydney Completes 6-Part Business Events Video Series: A lot of convention bureaus are unveiling new videos targeting meetings and events. Business Events Sydney launched six videos covering everything from the new convention infrastructure buildup to the regional knowledge economy. Watch the videos at BESydney
Event Of THe Week
The White House Frontiers Conference: President Obama will host the White House Frontiers Conference in Pittsburgh in October. The national convening of techies and scientists will be co-hosted with the University of Pittsburgh and Carnegie Mellon University to explore the future of innovation. Read more at The Frontiers Conference