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Boost Event Success with a Customized Event Website

An event website plays a crucial role in driving event success by serving as the central hub for all event-related information. Often the first point of contact for prospective attendees, exhibitors, sponsors, and other stakeholders, a well-designed, user-friendly website boosts visibility while enhancing the attendee experience from registration through post-event follow-up. In this blog post, we’ll discuss the importance of an event website, highlight industry best practices, and show how eShow’s custom website solutions can help organizers build a dynamic online presence.

Why an Event Website Is Crucial to Success

1. Centralized Information Hub

An event website acts as the go-to source for all important details, such as event dates, venue information, session schedules, speaker bios, and exhibitor listings. Attendees no longer need to sift through various communications to find essential information. With a well-structured website, you can consolidate everything in one place, making it easy for visitors to stay informed.

2. Enhance Attendee Engagement

A professionally built custom event website allows you to engage with your audience long before the event starts. With features such as event updates, FAQ sections, and relevant content such as speaker bios and session details, an event website helps create buzz and fosters engagement with your audience.

Best Practice: Use multimedia elements like videos, photo galleries, and social media integration to give potential attendees a sneak peek of what they can expect. This can build excitement and encourage more registrations.

3. Boost Event Visibility and Marketing

An event website is a powerful marketing tool that boosts visibility and outreach. It can be optimized for search engines (SEO), making it easier for potential attendees to find the event online. An optimized website also supports digital marketing campaigns by providing a landing page for paid ads, email campaigns, and social media promotions.

Best Practice: Incorporate targeted keywords into your event website content, meta descriptions, and titles to improve SEO. This makes your event more discoverable on search engines like Google.

4. Flexible and Customizable Website Management

A key advantage of a customizable event website is the control it offers organizers to make updates and changes in real time. Rather than relying on third-party developers for every update, event planners can take charge of their website, ensuring that important information—like schedule changes or registration deadlines—is updated instantly. This level of flexibility allows for more efficient management and a website that evolves alongside the event’s needs.

Best Practice: Choose a customizable platform that allows you to easily update themes, images, and content as needed. Having this flexibility helps ensure that the website stays relevant and aligned with the event’s branding and goals. Platforms like eShow’s customizable website builder offer user-friendly templates that event organizers can modify on their own, providing greater control and reducing the dependency on external teams for simple updates.

5. Real-Time Updates and Communication

Events often face last-minute changes, whether it’s a schedule adjustment or a speaker replacement. An event website allows you to provide real-time updates and communicate these changes to attendees instantly. This reduces confusion and ensures that attendees have the most current information.

Best Practice: Enable a section within your event website to post important updates to attendees. You can also use the event site to manage FAQs, reducing attendee inquiries and providing a self-serve option for information.

6. Strengthen Sponsorship and Exhibitor Visibility

For sponsors and exhibitors, an event website is a great platform to showcase their presence. Many event websites include dedicated pages or sections where sponsors and exhibitors can display their logos, videos, product catalogs, or promotional content. This boosts their visibility and helps them reach a larger audience.

Example: eShow’s custom website solution allows for dedicated sponsor and exhibitor pages, giving them high visibility and better ROI. With this feature, sponsors can build awareness with attendees directly from the website, enhancing their event participation.

7. Facilitate Networking and Interaction

An event website can serve as a platform for attendees to connect with one another, speakers, and exhibitors even before the event begins. Adding features like attendee directories, discussion forums, or social networking integrations helps foster connections and enriches the overall event experience.

Best Practice: Use your event website to speaker bios, session topics, and session schedules so attendees can plan their time and meet with other participants or exhibitors.

8. Post-Event Engagement

The event website doesn’t stop being valuable after the event ends. It can be used to distribute post-event information, share content like presentations, key takeaways, and photo galleries, and future event information. This continues to engage your audience and provides added value, potentially turning attendees into long-term advocates for your future events.

Best Practice: Use the website to provide content like key takeaways, session recordings, and photos post-event. You can also drive future registrations by sharing upcoming event details and offering early-bird discounts to previous attendees.

eShow’s Custom Website Solution: Simplifying Event Management

Building an event website that checks all the boxes is no small task, but eShow’s Custom Event Website solution makes it easier for organizers to create dynamic, responsive, and SEO-optimized event websites. Here’s how eShow can help:

  • Customizable Design: Tailor the look and feel of your event website to align with your branding and messaging. From color schemes to page layouts, eShow’s platform allows for full customization.
  • SEO Optimization: Ensure your event site is discoverable online by optimizing it for search engines. eShow’s platform includes built-in SEO tools to improve visibility.
  • Mobile Responsiveness: With more attendees accessing websites via mobile devices, eShow ensures your event website is fully responsive and accessible on all devices.
  • Real-Time Updates: Post updates and changes directly to your event website to keep attendees informed of the latest developments in real-time.

The Essential Role of an Event Website

An event website is far more than just a landing page. It’s a powerful tool that serves as the central hub for event information, marketing, registration, and post-event engagement. By offering a seamless experience for attendees and providing a platform to share information about sponsors, exhibitors, and speakers, an event website plays a critical role in ensuring event success.

With eShow’s custom website solutions, event organizers can build an engaging, fully integrated, and SEO-optimized website that enhances the attendee experience and streamlines event management.To learn more about how eShow can help you create a custom event website, book a demo.

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Increasing Registration Count: Proven Strategies with eShow’s Registration Management System

Boosting registration numbers is a critical goal for any event organizer, as it directly impacts attendee engagement, sponsorship value, and overall event success. eShow’s Registration Management System offers a comprehensive suite of tools designed to simplify the registration process and encourage more attendees to sign up for events. This blog post explores proven strategies to increase registration counts, supported by best practices and success stories using eShow’s platform.

The Importance of Effective Registration Management

Effective registration management is vital to the success of any event. It serves as the first touchpoint with attendees and can significantly impact their perception of the event. A streamlined registration process leads to higher conversion rates, better attendee data accuracy, and improved overall experience.

Benefits of Increasing Registration Count

  1. Higher Revenue: More registrations translate to increased ticket sales, sponsorship revenue, and ancillary income (e.g., merchandise or special sessions).
  2. Enhanced Engagement: A larger pool of attendees can lead to more dynamic interactions, richer networking opportunities, and higher overall engagement.
  3. Improved Data Insights: A robust registration count provides more data, allowing for better insights into attendee preferences and behavior.

Proven Strategies to Boost Registration Count

1. Simplify the Registration Process

A complicated registration process can deter potential attendees. To maximize registrations, it’s essential to make the process as simple and intuitive as possible.

Example: eShow’s Registration Management System allows event organizers to create user-friendly registration forms with customizable fields, which can be tailored to the specific needs of the event. By minimizing the amount of information required upfront and allowing for easy form navigation, eShow’s platform ensures a frictionless experience that encourages more attendees to complete their registration.

2. Offer Flexible Payment Options

Flexibility in payment options can reduce barriers to registration. Offering multiple payment methods and tiered pricing, can cater to different attendee preferences and increase conversion rates.

Example: eShow’s Registration Management System offers secure financial transactions, ensuring a seamless transaction experience for attendees. Payment flexibility allows attendees to choose their preferred payment method and pricing, making it easier for them to commit to the event.

3. Integrate Housing and Travel Management

Simplifying logistics is a significant factor in encouraging registrations. By integrating housing management directly into your registration form, you offer a one-stop-shop solution that makes it easy for attendees, exhibitors, and speakers to secure accommodations. This integration streamlines the process, providing attendees with a seamless experience from registration to travel planning.

Example: eShow’s platform allows event organizers to manage individual and group reservations directly within the registration form. It includes features such as single-source confirmations, waitlisting, and attrition management workflows, making it easier to monitor room blocks, track attrition levels, and maintain quality control. Additionally, eShow supports the creation and submission of Requests for Proposals (RFPs) to hotels, facilitating negotiations on rates and concessions. This all-in-one solution ensures attendees have everything they need in one place, reducing friction and encouraging more to register.

4. Utilize Registration Paths Based on Attendee Type

Creating customized registration paths based on attendee type (e.g., speakers, exhibitors, general attendees) can simplify the process for each group, ensuring they provide only the necessary information relevant to their role.

Example: eShow’s Registration Management System allows event organizers to set up different workflows for various attendee types, enhancing the user experience and ensuring a smooth registration process.

5. Enhance Customer Support with Data Entry and Call Center Services

Providing exceptional customer support is crucial for increasing registration counts. A dedicated data entry and call center team can help address attendee concerns promptly, ensuring a smooth registration process and enhancing overall satisfaction.

Example: eShow offers high-level customer service through its data entry and call center teams, staffed with troubleshooting agents who are experts in eShow products and event management. These agents are equipped to handle attendee inquiries, resolve issues, and provide real-time support. Additionally, eShow’s data entry services manage reconciliations, process refunds, handle substitutions and cancellations, and correct incomplete forms, ensuring that every registration is processed accurately and efficiently. This comprehensive support system reduces friction during the registration process, encouraging more attendees to complete their registration.

6. Monitor and Analyze Registration Data in Real-Time

Regularly monitoring registration metrics and analyzing trends can help identify what’s working and where improvements are needed. Adjusting strategies based on data insights can lead to more effective registration campaigns.

Example: eShow’s Registration Management tool provides detailed analytics on various aspects of the event, including session attendance, speaker performance, and attendee engagement. Planners can access real-time data during the event to identify trends and address issues promptly. Post-event, these analytics offer valuable insights into what worked well and what could be improved, such as generating reports on which sessions had the highest attendance and engagement. This allows planners to optimize future session planning and make data-driven decisions that enhance the overall quality and impact of their events.

Success Stories Using eShow’s Registration Management System

eShow has helped numerous organizations boost their registration counts through its comprehensive and user-friendly Registration Management System. Clients are able to increase early registrations by utilizing eShow’s customizable registration forms, mobile-friendly app, and self-service registration kiosks. Additionally, organizations can improve their onsite registration process, by reducing check-in times thanks to eShow’s remote kiosks and dedicated onsite support staff.

Maximize Registration with eShow’s Comprehensive Solutions

Increasing registration count is vital to the success of any event. By adopting these best practices and leveraging the capabilities of eShow’s Registration Management System, event organizers can create a streamlined, user-friendly registration process that encourages more attendees to sign up. From simplifying the registration process to utilizing multi-channel marketing and optimizing for mobile, eShow provides the tools needed to drive higher registration numbers and ensure a successful event.

Find out how eShow’s Registration Management System can help you increase your event registration count. 

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The Importance of Exhibitor Marketing

Exhibitor Marketing is a surefire way to generate quality leads and increase brand awareness if done effectively. These industry-specific events allow you to showcase and promote your products to an audience that may have little knowledge of your services. Our industry experts at eShow offer a strategic guide on how to make your next exhibitor marketing campaign one of success.

Lead Retrieval

Lead retrieval is one of the most effective ways to share contact information and network on the event floor that in turn, transitions into qualifying leads. We recommend using a fully integrated lead retrieval system that offers both exhibitors and attendees a universal experience. Our on-the-ground experts equip you with all you need to know for attendee detail tracking, Excel reporting, CEU verification, and more. Self-powered and easy to use, our compact and portable units will help you take entrepreneurship to the next level. 

Show Organizers

Set your next tradeshow up for success with a show organizer designed to optimize your tech stack. Lay the groundwork for long-term growth and expansion by developing a comprehensive strategy and plan of action. Look for a show organizer that provides you with the necessary tools to promote, sell, and manage your next exhibition or trade show. Utilize services like partnership outreach, market research, and more.

Exhibit Sales Management
Exhibitors want technology services that are straightforward and set them apart from the competition. With Exhibit Sales Management, users can easily select booths, add sponsors, and smoothly manage all functions of shopping and finances; they even get access to VEM Exhibitor Analytics for a smart, enhanced experience. Utilize our administrative tools to manage your exhibitors financially (and beyond) with reporting, eBlasts, invoicing, and more.

Attendees

Connecting to your target audience has become more crucial than ever. Engagement and exposure are at the forefront of exhibitor marketing, and we want to help you incorporate new opportunities for growth and ROI. Gamification has become more prominent over the last few years, and we don’t see it going away anytime soon. Gamification is known to spark engagement and increase lead capture more so than exhibiting booths that do not have activation or gaming features. Get ahead of the curve and integrate SmartMatch technology that will ‘wow’ your audience.

A few steps to ensure success from both exhibitor marketing expenditures and sales success:

  • To ensure your company’s business objectives are incorporated into your trade show sales messages, collateral, product positioning, etc., it’s essential to establish specific, quantifiable goals that you want to achieve. Whether the show is online, in-person, or hybrid, the goals should be measurable and achievable.
  • Once you have established your goals, write and design product and company brochures as well as any other necessary collateral. However, hold off on printing them for now as you may need to update them before the show.
  • Create a pre-show email marketing campaign to inform prospects and customers that you will be exhibiting. Offer them a discount registration code if you have one, and let them know what products or services you will be showcasing at the event. This will help generate interest before the event even starts.
  • After the show, create a post-show email marketing campaign to thank participants for attending and provide them with additional information on your company and products. This is an excellent opportunity to convert leads into customers by offering promotions, discounts or free trials.
  • You should work with your sales team to determine what constitutes a qualified lead and come to an agreement on how the leads will be turned over to sales for immediate follow-up after the show.
  •  Establish clear protocols on how and when leads will be distributed to each salesperson as well as the follow-up process. By doing so, you will ensure that your sales team can effectively convert leads from prospects to customers.

Learn more about how eShow can help level up your exhibitor marketing with a personal demo. Our expert team is ready to find a customizable solution that fits your needs and ensures success at your next show.

For additional helpful resources, check out some industry partners we highly reccomend!

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Experiential Marketing To Liven Up Your Event

Today’s consumers are exposed to thousands of advertisements every day – and they’re getting burned out. The constant influx of marketing messages has led people to simply ignore the bulk of them. This makes it incredibly difficult for brands to get through the defenses consumers have built up and influence their buying decisions.

Marketers and event planners striving to make an impact must step outside the box and find creative ways to engage their target customers. Experiential Marketing is one approach that can bring exceptional results. Incorporating this concept into your events can make them both more exciting and more effective.

Ready to learn more? Stick with us as we break down precisely what experiential marketing is and how you can use it to liven up your future events.

What is Experiential Marketing?

Experiential marketing involves using immersive experiences to market a product or a brand. It allows brands to go beyond telling consumers why they should buy a product and instead create an intimate, personal experience with it. This gives consumers the chance to feel the emotions that come with actually using a product and makes them feel like they’re a part of your brand. It also gives the brand a chance to build a stronger relationship with the consumer and demonstrate value.   

It’s common for clips of experiential marketing to go viral, thanks to the excitement it creates. These events should be fun, social, and always keep the consumer experience front and center. Using your creativity to weave experiential marketing into your events will help you truly “Wow” your clients and keep you a step ahead of your competitors.

Examples of Experiential Marketing Done Right

Still not clear on what experiential marketing is and how to incorporate it into your next event? Take a look at these three show-stopping examples.

HBO’s Escape Room

Most people are familiar with escape room games. These interactive rooms require you to solve puzzles and find clues so you can “escape” the room within the set time limit. In 2017, HBO made a splash with its own set of escape rooms, which they set up at the South by Southwest® (SXSW) event.

The company created three separate escape rooms based on their popular shows Veep, Silicon Valley, and Game of Thrones. The event was incredibly successful because it required participants to be fully engaged, brought some of their most popular fictional shows to life, and allowed fans to literally become a part of them.

Disney’s CoCo Live Mobile App

When Disney’s event CoCo Live showed at Los Angeles’ Hollywood Bowl, patrons were asked to download a smartphone app before the show. Then, during the show, they were able to watch close-ups of characters on stage, receive exciting still clips, and interact in other ways during key performance moments. Based on the success of these types of broadcasts, event planners may consider using their own mobile apps to enhance their experiences in exciting new ways.

Asics “Support Your Marathoner” Campaign

During the NYC Marathon, shoe company Asics used RFID tags embedded in runners’ bibs to project messages from loved ones on big screens as participants passed them. The screens showed texts, still photos, and videos to give the runners the encouragement they needed to finish out their race. 

Since the NYC Marathon is one of the largest in the world, this gave the company an incredible amount of exposure in a way that didn’t feel like advertising. Rather than blocking the images out because they were highly personalized, participants and viewers went out of their way to pay attention to them. 

Tips for Planning Your Experiential Marketing Event

As you start to plan your next experiential marketing event, there are a few basics you need to know. Be sure to consider the following vital tips.

1. Creativity is Critical

The best experiential marketing campaigns are new and exciting. This means you’ll have to use your creativity to develop an experience that hasn’t been done before. It’s important to note that you don’t have to have a huge budget to pull this off. You’ll need to use your imagination and find a way to make the crowd stop and say, “Wow.”

2. Make it a Sensory Experience

Try to make sure your experience uses all of a person’s five senses – sight, touch, smell, taste, and hearing. This is the best way to create vivid memories that will stick with your audience well after they’ve gone home.

3. Find Creative Sample Opportunities

It’s important not to be too “sales-y” when creating these experiences. However, if you can find ways to creatively get the product in people’s hands, then you’ll definitely want to do it. This might include a pop-up tasting, free samples, or on-the-spot free trials. Not only will this help get people interested in your brand, but it will also make them more engaged.

4. Don’t Be Afraid to Go Big

When planning your experience, do your best to create something shocking. Remember, the point is to get people to pay attention. That’s not always easy to do, so be prepared to go big.

5. Remember Your Call to Action

You don’t want to get people all excited about your brand and then leave them wondering what to do. While you’ve got their attention and their goodwill, be sure to prompt them to take some sort of action.

Experiment with Confidence

Experimenting with new marketing methods is easy when you have the right partners by your side. At eShow, we provide event organizers and planners with all the tools they need to flawlessly plan, execute, and follow up on their events. This gives you the ability to incorporate exciting new ideas and still feel confident that everything will go as smoothly as it should. Contact us today to learn more and request a personal demo!

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