Tag Archive for: event management

Lead Liaison

Dear Show Organizers… Here’s What Exhibitors Need

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Dear Show Organizers… Here’s What Exhibitors Want Need

We speak with exhibitors daily and learn about their challenges and why some hesitate to invest in events. With virtual events having low satisfaction ratings and live event attendance being uncertain… exhibitors are carefully evaluating each event to decide:

  1. Which events they will or will not participate in (Top performers only, new markets, etc)
  2. In what way do they want to participate (Exhibit, Speaker, Attendee, other)
  3. How much they want to invest (Booth, staff, tech, marketing, sponsorships, private meetings, etc)
  4. With events now being virtual, live and hybrid, what should they change, improve, automate, streamline and make more efficient to set up their team to handle any type of event and get highest ROI

Exhibitors want SERVICE

Each exhibitor from every industry has their own story/experience to share. Some stories are amazing, about organizers who really understand the exhibitor and set them up for success. Other stories are about their frustrations of not being treated as the customer or getting the ROI they expected. Many will be making their decisions based on their relationships with each event organizer and how much they care to hear about their challenges and offer solutions that set them up for success.

Solution: Deliver concierge style service 

Exhibitors want EXPOSURE

Every exhibitor we speak to is asking organizers to make connecting to their target audience easier. They want their brand to be seen, their prospects to find them, and their new products or services to be showcased. Event organizers who build some basic brand exposure opportunities into their event will provide added value to exhibitors on the fence.

Solution: Offer unique engagement experiences that drive attendees to take action

Exhibitors want to STREAMLINE

With every event offering a different lead capture solution, how much time and energy does the exhibit manager spend on training their team for every single event to ensure no lead is missed and everything flows nicely into their sales process? How many leads are not captured because they have one scanner to share among their team? How many leads don’t receive follow up until days after the event or not at all? How does a company close deals if the next step of the sales & marketing process is not integrated into their lead capture workflow? The challenge is real!

Solution: Do not restrict their ability to capture leads. Now more than ever, exhibitors are seeking a Universal Lead Capture (ULC) provider so their sales team can use the same lead capture system with automated follow up and sales analytics everywhere they go. Event organizers who offer an option for exhibitors to plug into their Registration API will see exhibitor ROI soar and attrition decrease. Organizers who use unfriendly platforms that restrict API access for scanning badges will find push back from exhibitors who will find those events less valuable or friendly to their company.

Exhibitors want ENGAGEMENT

Ask any exhibitor…if you put them in front of a prospect…they will take care of the rest. That is why gamification has become so popular. Exhibitors who use an exciting activation or game in their booth are seeing up to 3x to 5x more leads captured than booths who do not. Plus, it is a known fact that attendees who engage in a memorable experience are 22% to 35% more likely to remember the brand and engage in a next step. Ask any marketing person, this is a dream for any brand and a goldmine for salespeople seeking to build new relationships.

 Exhibitors who know this are asking organizers for ways to promote their games and incorporate them into the event experience. Show organizers need to be prepared.  Exhibitors are on the hunt for engagement solutions and want to incorporate them into the event.

Solution: Organizers have an opportunity to make their event more exciting and engaging!  We suggest offering gamified lead capture as a premium option, or inviting exhibitors to “bring their own game” and plug it into your treasure hunt or other event engagement experience!

 

Exhibitors want ROI

If you were to speak to the CEO of any exhibiting company, they would tell you that ROI is their primary reason for exhibiting. Exhibiting at any event must contribute to the growth of their organization and move the needle forward. Exhibitors measure ROI in different ways depending on their goals. If brand exposure is the goal, they might track email and banner ad views, click thru’s, open rates, game plays, etc. to measure ROI. If lead capture is the goal they would track leads captured, quantity vs quality of leads, and sales generated to measure ROI. The more organizers understand the goals of the exhibitors, the better chance they have at meeting their expectations.

Solution: If show organizers want to improve their attrition year over year, they need to help exhibitors see the value and results your event delivers. Example: Instead of a paper scavenger hunt that cannot be truly measured, use a digital solution (Such as Waypoints or Hybrid Gamification) that can provide detailed analytics to both the show organizer and the exhibitor with a list of leads that supplement the lead capture their sales team is using in the booth.

 

In a nutshell, as we return to live events we cannot go back to the way things were. Events are forever changed, technology just took a huge leap forward, and hybrid is here to stay. The best thing organizers can do is to listen to exhibitors as they explain their challenges, enable them to be successful, and be open minded to doing things differently.

 

 A Message for Exhibitors!

Please keep in mind that event organizers need your help too. Their biggest challenges right now are re-negotiating contracts, managing logistics, and trying to organize speaker agendas and finalize floorplans when exhibitors and speakers are waiting until the last minute to confirm. Organizers have a lot on their plate trying to fill the exhibit hall, promote the event, make people feel safe, and bridge the gap between live and virtual. Now more than ever they are stressed to bring their event back to life on tight deadlines while trying to give you the service you need to ensure you return next year. Please work with them, confirm as early as you can, be patient if they can’t get back to you right away, offer suggestions and partner with them to put on a great show. The challenge of getting our industry up and running again is real and the best thing we can do is to help each other succeed.

Lead liaison is a multifunctional event platform that provides: Universal Lead Capture, User Customizable Gamification, Marketing Automation, CRM, Lead Management, Sales Enablement, Leader Boards, Point Rewards & e-Gift Cards, Waypoints for Sessions & Scavenger Hunts, Player Profiles, and more with over 3,000 integrations for all common CRM and Marketing Automation platforms.

To see how Lead liaison’s growing library of digital activations (games), universal lead capture, and reward-based solutions can help your company generate more leads at your trade shows, contact us today!

Lead Liaison

Setting Goals & Motivating Your Team

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Setting Goals & Motivating Your Team

Lead capture is one of if not the most important aspects of events and tradeshows, and it could be argued that it is in fact the main point for driving revenue. Why else are you there, if not to create brand awareness, share your products, educate people about your offerings, and gather leads that lead to new relationships and revenue? The most successful trade show exhibitors create successful and memorable experiences that attract, engage, and ultimately convert leads from prospects into customers and hardcore brand loyalists.

How can you affect audiences positively and leave an unforgettable impression? Start  by setting realistic goals and communicate them to your team. Make sure everyone is on the same page. Managers often overlook team motivation, or they might not realize that their team lacks some motivation since they’re so focused on other things such as setting up the booth to their standards, checking up on the hardware, the kiosks, their lead capture software, making sure that everything works, stressing about time, and the list goes on. Establishing and maintaining goals for the team can easily be overlooked. In this article we will highlight the importance of 2 things:

1- Setting Goals

Setting goals and objectives is vital to track and measure the success of your company, event, booth, team, etc. you name it… And a lot of managers either set up goals that are perceived by team members as unachievable, or that don’t fit best with the situation.

When setting goals, be SMART: Specific, Measurable, Attainable, Relevant and Timely. To elaborate: Be specific so that there is no confusion. As mentioned before, you have to be able to measure specific goals to identify strengths and weaknesses. You also have to be reasonable in goal setting, placing goals within reach so your team can achieve them without them being too easy. Keep the competition spirit up, and make goals relevant to your company’s goals. Be crystal clear about deadlines to which the goals should be met.

2- Motivating Your Team

When it comes to motivation, there are 2 points we want to address. Going back to the second paragraph, I mentioned something important “positively affecting your audiences.” How do you expect to leave a good impression on audiences if your team is unmotivated, or not on their best behavior? How will you convert audiences to prospects, and prospects into leads and loyal customers? Team motivation is very important to the process, especially when it comes to dealing face to face meetings with potential customers, because in their eyes the team member that they’re talking to is the representation of your company. Ultimately, team motivation directly reflects on the brand that you’ve spent so much time and money over the years building.

Before your events, spend some time setting goals and developing a plan to motivate your team. Take the time necessary to motivate your team, talk to them, and ensure that they’re on full alert, equipped with all the knowledge they need to communicate your brand values and solutions to audiences at trade shows. Offer incentives and challenges to keep them motivated to win… which takes us to our second point:

Create corporate loyalty reward programs for team members to spark up a sense of achievement and competition between the team. Lead liaison has a rewards center with a broad selection of e-gift cards, in which Team members receive their own personalized profiles with progress reports indicating milestones they have achieved. This allows them to track their own progress and keep an eye on the big prize to fuel up their performance.

In that way you’ll make them feel like they have a bigger part in the success of your company, which they do! This also fosters a fun, competitive environment, a way for your team members to prove themselves, compete, and gain rewards which they achieve by their dedication and hard work. In the end, Loyalty & Reward programs are a win-win situation for you and your team. They will be motivated to work harder achieving the goals, engage new prospects, build relationships and leave a good impression on your audiences! Basically, everybody wins.

In conclusion

If you want to build a successful brand loyalty, gather good leads, and build a strong relationship with your audiences, start first with your team! Set SMART goals and communicate them to your team. Make sure they’re on board with all the necessary information needed. Motivate them by awarding them when they achieve goals, and give them the choice of rewards to boost performances.

To learn more about Lead liaison’s corporate loyalty reward programs, contact us today!

Lead liaison is a multifunctional event platform that provides: Universal Lead Capture, User Customizable Gamification, Marketing Automation, CRM, Lead Management, Sales Enablement, Leader Boards, Point Rewards & e-Gift Cards, Waypoints for Sessions & Scavenger Hunts, Player Profiles, and more with over 3,000 integrations for all common CRM and Marketing Automation platforms.

To see how Lead liaison’s growing library of digital activations (games), universal lead capture, and reward-based solutions can help your company generate more leads at your trade shows, contact us today!

Lead Liaison

Determining ROI on events: Why are you operating blind?

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Determining ROI on events: Why are you operating blind?

One of the biggest challenges event managers seem to have is determining the return on investment for the events they participate in. The reason for that is because they are consistently lacking one piece of crucial information. In fact, it is a piece of information that is readily available to them if they would just ask this simple question of their CEO, CFO, CMO, or owner of the company. It’s a magical question that opens up all sorts of possibilities and releases your creative energy once you have the answer. It causes all aspects of your business, and the company’s short and long-term goals to become crystal clear. So, what is this question?

 

What is the value of a new customer or client to the company? 

I am continually amazed at how many event managers from both small to medium-sized businesses, all the way up to fortune 100 companies have no idea what the value of one new customer is to their company. Now, one of the most common reasons I have discovered for this lack of information on the part of event managers is that no one ever told them the importance of the question, you can’t ask a question you don’t know you should ask.

A lot of companies view events as just another line item on their overall marketing budget, and as long as marketing is producing results, then hi-five! But, that doesn’t mean event managers and their teams don’t benefit from knowing what a customer or client is actually worth to the company. Just as the Sales team needs to know what the value of one new customer is in order to determine salaries, commissions, and bonuses, the event team needs to know this information if they want to put together an effective strategy, and/or evaluate new technologies and tools that can help them achieve their goals.

In so many cases, event teams are left to rely on the show organizer to provide them with their leads, and then it’s up to them to try and qualify them or send them onto sales to qualify and pursue. This makes it even more difficult to determine whether what you are doing at these shows is effective. But, when you know exactly what a new customer is worth, you then begin to look at your budgets differently and can make a case to those within the company who have the final say on approving your budget that investing in a more effective lead capture system will be worth it because you can justify the return on investment. Imagine no longer needing to rely on the show organizer to provide you with a lead list that is also being distributed to your competitors as well. But, because you know the value of a new customer, your ability to move your events team forward with an effective strategy for growing the company will give you the upper hand. 

As live events come back, and with the increased implementation of hybrid events, knowing exactly what you’re aiming at will make all the difference in the world when it comes to planning which events will be the most profitable for you, and creating a strategy to CRUSH IT at those events. 

We sincerely hope that this will inspire you to dig a little deeper into what each new customer actually means to your company, rather large or small, and will help you become more empowered to make impactful decisions for your team and the company as a whole.

For information about Lead liaison for your next event or marketing campaign, or to get started with Lead liaison: CLICK HERE.

Lead liaison is a multifunctional event platform that provides: Universal Lead Capture, User Customizable Gamification, Marketing Automation, CRM, Lead Management, Sales Enablement, Leader Boards, Point Rewards & e-Gift Cards, Waypoints for Sessions & Scavenger Hunts, Player Profiles, and more with over 3,000 integrations for all common CRM and Marketing Automation platforms.

To see how Lead liaison’s growing library of digital activations (games), universal lead capture, and reward-based solutions can help your company generate more leads at your trade shows, contact us today!

Lead Liaison

5 ways to increase lead capture adoption at events

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5 ways to increase lead capture adoption at events

With in-person and hybrid events coming back in full force, it’s time to think in-person lead capture again. For many exhibitors, this usually involves scanning a name badge or business card through an app or scanner. These apps are great for quickly getting contact data from your event and into your marketing automation or CRM system of choice.

But in order to get contact data from a scan, booth staff have to actually use them.

Many organizations struggle to get staff to adopt new lead capture methods. After all, taking someone’s business card and scribbling a few notes worked before, why shouldn’t it work now?

Event marketers know exactly why that doesn’t work. People fall through the cracks and don’t receive follow up, and you have a delay in processing your data. 

How event marketers can help increase staff adoption:

1: Set Expectations

This may seem obvious, but you’d be surprised how many event coordinators pay good money for lead capture without setting expectations. Who should booth staff be scanning? Here are a few different responses we’ve gotten from our partners:

  • Scan everyone who comes to the booth, no matter what.
  • Only scan potential customers (exclude vendors, sales people, etc).
  • Only scan qualified potential customers.
  • Only scan potential customers with a sales opportunity.

Different people will have different opinions. Many marketers usually favor gathering as many leads as possible and qualifying later. Sales teams, on the other hand, are mostly interested in hot leads, seeing potentially unqualified leads as time wasters. Make sure everyone knows what you need from them.

2: Keep it Simple

We all know it’s important that follow up is targeted for the attendee. You can’t just send a giant email blast with generic content and expect people to engage. You can’t either send personalized content if you don’t know anything about the person.

Having said that, we’ve seen a tendency to ask a lot of survey questions. 

A while back, we had a partner who was switching from paper lead capture forms to digital lead capture. They copied the paper form which included 20 survey questions. All of them were marked required and many had follow-up questions. They left their event with only three new leads from the app.

What happened? The sales staff got frustrated. They felt like they were stuck doing data entry while lines built up at their booth. To quote one of the reps, “I look like I’m just playing on my phone or texting friends; it’s embarrassing.” 

They ended up switching back to the paper forms where they felt more comfortable. The result was that it took several weeks before all of the leads were entered into their CRM.

While it’s tempting to gather as much data as humanly possible, remember your staff are in a busy, highly interactive environment. Make the lead capture process as quick as possible by using the minimum number of survey questions you can.

3: Avoid Manual Entry

Event marketers trying to save on expenses might decide they don’t need to pay for badge scanning. After all, Developer kits usually cost several hundred dollars, and renting devices could break the bank once they add all of their users. Their staff can just type in the contact info, right?

That decision is more costly than you might realize. Just like in my example above, when staff only have manual entry as an option, you can expect them to avoid submitting data on the sales floor. They simply don’t have time to do it when face-to-face with prospects. Instead, they’re likely to collect business cards and upload them later in their hotel room.

However, if users can conveniently scan a badge or business card, lead capture takes mere seconds. Consider that next time you’re thinking of saving a buck on lead capture.

4: Stick to Multi-Select Fields

You’re probably noticing a theme here…

The key to adoption is making it as easy as possible.

The more typing there is, the more time lead capture takes, and the less your staff will want to use your capture form. 

When dealing with surveys, multi-select fields take very little time. Imagine how much longer it would take to type “Lead Management Automation” than to just tick a box.

5: Use a Universal Lead Capture System

Inconsistent experiences are one of the biggest complaints both marketers and booth staff.

Every event and every provider has their own scanners and apps. Some let you add custom survey questions, some don’t. Some only provide badge scanning, others can also do business cards. And, unfortunately, not all are very intuitive.

People are much less likely to invest their time in learning to use an app if they know they’ll probably never use it again. However, if you use a Universal Lead Capture (ULC) system like Lead liaison, users will have the same experience at every event. Most importantly, you have control over what the form looks like as well as the questions asked.

To get the most out of your next event, contact Lead liaison today for more ideas on how ULC can make life easier for your staff.

Lead liaison is a multifunctional event platform that provides: Universal Lead Capture, User Customizable Gamification, Marketing Automation, CRM, Lead Management, Sales Enablement, Leader Boards, Point Rewards & e-Gift Cards, Waypoints for Sessions & Scavenger Hunts, Player Profiles, and more with over 3,000 integrations for all common CRM and Marketing Automation platforms.

To see how Lead liaison’s growing library of digital activations (games), universal lead capture, and reward-based solutions can help your company generate more leads at your trade shows, contact us today!

 

Lead Liaison

CASE STUDY: Lead Capture for Speakers & Conferences

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CASE STUDY: Lead Capture for Speakers & Conferences

I once attended a hybrid conference. It was an opportunity for me to learn from the experts, find out what is new in our industry, and connect with colleagues I have not seen in a long time. I also wanted to see one speaker in particular (a client) that was using Lead liaison lead capture games to engage the audience. Here is what I observed.

There were 8 sessions, which I attended over two days. Each session was 1 hour long. Of these 8 sessions, 6 of the speakers were simply talking and showing a few powerpoint slides. One speaker did send out a poll to their virtual audience and shared the results with both the virtual and live audiences to discuss. But the one speaker who was using Lead liaison engaged both the live and virtual audience in a completely different way… plus, walked away with 59 leads! Here is what they did.

  1. PREPARING THE AUDIENCE: When we entered the session room there was a slideshow running as we waited. It explained that this would be an interactive session as well as to have our phone ready and that prizes would be awarded to the most engaged participants. It also gave us a QR Code to scan to play a fun game while we were waiting and get comfortable using our phone. (I crushed this game by the way!)
  2. ENGAGE YOUR AUDIENCE IN LEARNING: The speaker’s presentation was broken down into 3 parts. Each part had 1 image on the screen when the speaker was teaching, followed by a QR Code for us to scan. The QR Codes led us to different learning games designed to test how well people were paying attention to the content and reinforce the key takeaways.
  3. CREATE A COMPETITIVE ATMOSPHERE: We were sitting at tables so, before we played, we were asked to identify which table we were sitting at. (This was great as it created a competitive atmosphere AND anyone who would normally not participate would have to jump in and not let their team down! The virtual audience was put on teams too! Our table played a total of 3 educational games.
  4. REWARD YOUR AUDIENCE: Towards the end of the session, the speaker announced that they would be giving away prizes to the top 3 individual players with the highest combined score from all 3 games AND the team with the highest combined scores! BUT, we had one more challenge which was a super fun game! You could literally feel the energy in the room heighten as it was “game on” and everyone was ready to play! Once we played, the speaker announced they would be showing us a Master Leaderboard that was gathering all of our individual and team scores. When it was revealed, the room cheered and celebrated the top players and team. In the end, my team did not win, but there were 3 individual winners who received $100 eGift cards (electronically fulfilled by their Lead liaison Gift Card Rewards system) and a team of 8 at table – 4 that were excited to win bluetooth earbuds! The speaker also invited everyone to visit their booth to meet their team and pick up a small gift. SMART!
  5. THE RESULTS: That last fun game we played was tied to a lead capture form where attendees could request a copy of the presentation, product information, or a meeting. When the event was all over, I met with our client and here is an overview of their results:

There were 10 tables of 8 in the room. It was almost sold out with 63 people attending in person. Online, there were another 30+ attendees attending. Of all attendees, 61 participated in person and 22 participated online. Of the 83 who participated, 59 became leads! (44 requested more information and 15 requested a follow up meeting after the show with their sales team.)

As for the attendees… We got to engage with their brand in a fun and memorable way! I could not have been more proud of how well our client utilized Lead liaison Gamification and Universal Lead Capture. They really took our advice to heart and stood out over the other sessions, created an engaging, fun and memorable brand experience, and they were the only speaker to actually capture leads! It was an amazing success story that I had to share.

Now, if only the event organizer had Lead liaison’s Event Engagement Studio setup, they could have gamified the entire event! Attendees could have scored points for engaging in every session, and earned points for meeting with exhibitors and sponsors too!

Contact Lead liaison today to learn more about how we can help your team prepare for event success by partnering with the leader in Universal Lead Capture and Engagement solutions.

Lead liaison is a multifunctional event platform that provides: Universal Lead Capture, User Customizable Gamification, Marketing Automation, CRM, Lead Management, Sales Enablement, Leader Boards, Point Rewards & e-Gift Cards, Waypoints for Sessions & Scavenger Hunts, Player Profiles, and more with over 3,000 integrations for all common CRM and Marketing Automation platforms.

To see how Lead liaison’s growing library of digital activations (games), universal lead capture, and reward-based solutions can help your company generate more leads at your trade shows, contact us today!

Lead Liaison

Demystifying APIs & Dev Kits for Event Lead Capture

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Demystifying APIs & Dev Kits for Event Lead Capture

When Event Organizers & Exhibitors work together, everyone wins!

You’ve set up your Universal Lead Capture form, your documents are ready to go, and your team is trained. Now the important question:

have you figured out how your team will actually be capturing contact data at your event? 

For most events, especially in the US, you can get contact data by scanning name badges. Universal Lead Capture apps like Lead liaison can pull in data from badges. To do this, however, you’ll typically need an API, or developer’s kit. 

This is where things go off the rails sometimes. You email the show management, and they have no idea what you’re talking about. How do you navigate these events and get your scanner up and running?

How to Retrieve API / Dev Kit Info

1: Check the order form

Many lead retrieval providers will have the API kit on their order form. This is a best case scenario. It might be listed as one of the following:

  • API Kit
  • Developer’s Kit
  • Third-Party Kit

If it’s on the form, then that’s all you need to buy. No need to rent scanners or license the provider’s app. If it’s not on the form, it’s time to contact the provider directly.

 

2: Identify the lead retrieval provider

Show management rarely has much to do with lead retrieval. You can ask them about badge scanning and APIs, but more often than not they’ll have no idea what you’re talking about. They will usually contract out to a lead retrieval provider. 

Oftentimes the provider will be listed in your Exhibitor kit. It may even be listed directly on the show’s website. If there is an order form for lead retrieval, it will often reveal who the provider is.

If you’re having trouble identifying them, contact show management. Be very careful with your wording. If you throw around terms like “API Kit,” they’re probably going to get confused. If you have to contact show management, we recommend the following wording:

“Hello, we’re trying to set up lead retrieval for EVENT NAME. Could you please let us know who is providing lead retrieval services? We’d appreciate it if you could either connect us or give us your contact’s details.”

If management is still unsure, you can ask them if the badges will have barcodes on them and who is providing the name badges. Note that this is not always the lead retrieval provider.

Contact the provider directly

Once you know the provider, contact them directly. We’ve had the most success by asking questions like this:

“Hello, we understand you’re providing lead retrieval services for EVENT NAME. We use a Universal Lead Capture app and would like to set up badge scanning. Do you have an API kit or developer kit so our app can scan the badges at EVENT NAME?”

On rare occasions, the provider might misunderstand what you’re asking. They may send you an order form for their app at the event. Make sure they understand you want to use your Universal Lead Capture app.

 

What if there is no API Kit?

In some cases, there may be situations where the provider does not or can not offer an API kit. Depending on the situation, there are still a few things you can try.

1: Ask for post-show reconciliation

With post-show reconciliation, your Universal Lead Capture app will scan and save the badge ID. Once the event is over, you can send the list of badge IDs to the lead retrieval provider. They will return a list of contact details that apps like Lead liaison can use to complete your submissions. While it isn’t instant like with an API, the end user experience is the same. Your users simply scan the lead, add notes and qualifiers, and submit. 

2: Ask for a sample badge

Sometimes providers don’t offer an API because the contact details are embedded in the badge. If you can get a badge to your Universal Lead Capture provider, they may be able to read the data without the need for an API. Lead liaison, for example, has a team of experts that check badges for you. 

3: Talk to show management

If all else fails, let show management know how important it is for you to use your Universal Lead Capture app. Many show managers aren’t even aware that these sorts of apps exist, and as a paying exhibitor, you can make a difference. We’ve had managers make changes by sending messages like this:

“Hello, we use a Universal Lead Capture app that we normally use at the events we attend. Usually the lead retrieval provider has a developer kit which allows our app to scan the badges. We understand that PROVIDER does not have this option.

Our app is configured for our needs. It has all of our questions and documents set up for our organization, and our booth staff are used to it. We would rather not have to train on a new app and figure out how to fit it within our data flow. Please consider finding a provider that offers this in the future.”

4: Take a Picture of Badges & Business Cards

Lead liaison can easily transcribe the data and send it to your CRM or Marketing Automation platform.

In some rare cases the provider may have an API kit, but show management has specifically told them not to offer it. In those cases, we suggest sending a message like this:

“Hello, we use a Universal Lead Capture app that we normally use at the events we attend. Usually the lead retrieval provider has a developer kit which allows our app to scan the badges. PROVIDER has informed us that you will not allow them to offer the kit. This is disappointing.

Our app is configured for our needs. It has all of our questions and documents set up for our organization, and our booth staff are used to it. We would rather not have to train on a new app and figure out how to fit it within our data flow. Please consider allowing this option.”

Premium lead capture solutions like Lead liaison empower teams to collect custom event data, collect and distribute that data instantly, and begin the follow up and meeting scheduling process long before the competition. Lead liaison provides event teams with resources to make every event a success such as in-app lead rating, meeting scheduling, team communications and more, and event engagement solutions that will increase activity and engagement at your booth!

Click here to explore Lead liaison’s award winning, premium lead capture and event engagement platform and view testimonials from event professionals who use the app.

Lead liaison is a multifunctional event platform that provides: Universal Lead Capture, User Customizable Gamification, Marketing Automation, CRM, Lead Management, Sales Enablement, Leader Boards, Point Rewards & e-Gift Cards, Waypoints for Sessions & Scavenger Hunts, Player Profiles, and more with over 3,000 integrations for all common CRM and Marketing Automation platforms.

To see how Lead liaison’s growing library of digital activations (games), universal lead capture, and reward-based solutions can help your company generate more leads at your trade shows, contact us today!

 

Lead Liaison

Sessions Tracking Solved!

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Sessions Tracking Solved!

How to accurately scan attendees into sessions when hundreds to thousands of people could be flowing through the door when it opens. Many organizations have the need to track and record which attendees are attending sessions so they can award continuing education credits and other meetings just want to track who attended which session. Problem solved using one of Lead liaison’s latest feature updates:

Rapid Scan!

When Rapid Scan is enabled in the app a door monitor is able to quickly scan the badge of everyone who enters without any additional steps like hitting submit or answering questions in the normal lead retrieval screen. Simply focus the camera on the badge, beep and move on to the next badge. The app will continue scanning until the submit button is pressed at which point all of the scanned data will be uploaded into the system. Quick and accurate! 

Need to report if an attendee stayed for the entire session?

Event managers can also scan badges using rapid scan as they exit the room and the system will time stamp both the entrance and exit of the attendee. 

The system makes it easy to report which attendees were in which sessions because the Lead liaison software OneFocus creates an “attendee journey” in their profile so an event manager can easily see and export each session attended. We also integrate with many different software platforms if you want to have an automatic sync of the data. 

Short on staff?

The app can also be configured for kiosk mode which will allow an attendee to scan as they enter the room. If the attendees are trained that they need to scan in and out to be awarded the continuing education credit then rest assured they will make sure to scan properly. 

Contact Lead liaison today to learn more about how easy it is to track your session attendance using rapid scan in the Lead liaison app.

Lead liaison is a multifunctional event platform that provides: Universal Lead Capture, User Customizable Gamification, Marketing Automation, CRM, Lead Management, Sales Enablement, Leader Boards, Point Rewards & e-Gift Cards, Waypoints for Sessions & Scavenger Hunts, Player Profiles, and more with over 2,000 integrations for all common CRM and Marketing Automation platforms.

To see how Lead liaison’s growing library of digital activations (games), universal lead capture, and reward-based solutions can help your company generate more leads at your trade shows, contact us today!

Lead Liaison

Cultivating Quality Interactions on the Event Show Floor

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Cultivating Quality Interactions on the Event Show Floor

Not all events are the same, but a few attributes all events should have in common are positive community building experiences, conversations that increase knowledge and breadth of opportunity, and positive ROI.

The direct path to ROI is one beset with quality interactions. When preparing for your next event, plan to engage with your prospects. What is your plan for brokering new conversations?

What impression would you like to make as a company?

Here are a few takeaways to help you make the most of your events:

1: Give people a reason to visit your exhibit space.

Is your booth well built? Good! You’re halfway there. Is it interesting and staffed with a well equipped events team? Now we’re getting there…

Let’s talk engagement:

Event activations are becoming the new norm for enhancing interaction at in person and hybrid events. Activations, also known as Gamification, connect attendees with activities that combine fun with education and brand impression. Activations launch anywhere, including on personal devices, so they can go anywhere providing incentives to visit sponsored booths and important locations, attending sessions, reviewing presentations and more.

All this activity and involvement nets increased event revenue, additional intentional interaction, and as a result – more conversations leading to business transactions.Lead liaison’s suite of over 60 event activations helps event organizers and exhibitors drive engagement at their events and provides exhibitors with better lead capture processes. The intuitive Activation Builder makes it extremely easy for anyone to customize games with branding of any kind.

2: Be inviting

Now that you know how to draw additional traffic to your booth, don’t forget to converse with your attendees as soon as they arrive. Smiles and good body language are well received and can increase opportunities for conversations.

3: Flex your customer service muscle

Oftentimes you will have booth traffic that won’t lead to a direct sale. That doesn’t mean you should cut down on your customer service skills. An attendee could have questions that require you to refer them to someone else. Offer a quality experience and they will remember that. If they know how good you are at taking care of them, the positive experience will provide an opportunity for future word of mouth referrals.

4: Listen

Customers come to trade shows for the opportunity to have conversations and understand more about certain products and services offered by exhibitors. The in-person conversation is the most valuable sales tool there is. If a prospective customer is at your event and stops by your booth, they have something to say. FIRST, LISTEN to their questions, understand their needs, and give them your attention. Sales take time, this is just the reality. The more listening you do from the start, the better. Create that positive experience on your first meeting!

5: No PDE (Public Displays of Exhaustion) allowed!

Sit only if you can do so out of public view. When prospects walk by a booth, they expect to see energy and excitement. Nothing is more deflating in the eyes of an attendee than walking the floor to see people sitting behind a table at a booth showing no energy.

6: Have fun!

If it takes an extra cup of coffee or a candy bar, find energy to have fun. Look, staffing a booth at a trade show is tough. Travel, setup, long days, we know it isn’t always glamorous. Why go through all that just to be upset on event day? If you need it, give your booth staff a break or two during the day to recharge. It is so important everyone in the booth is in good spirits when any attendee drops by, even on day three of an event.

During 2020 so many of us missed the in-person experience when we had to move to online events.

Today, in-person experiences are back in full force with tons of attendees excited to make those in person connections again. Appreciate every opportunity, and always look to build upon every handshake or fist bump.

We hope these simple tips were helpful to you as you plan for upcoming events. If you need creative ideas and resources to make your next event more engaging, contact Lead liaison!

We’re here to help YOU make every event a huge success.

Lead liaison is a multifunctional event platform that provides: Universal Lead Capture, User Customizable Gamification, Marketing Automation, CRM, Lead Management, Sales Enablement, Leader Boards, Point Rewards & e-Gift Cards, Waypoints for Sessions & Scavenger Hunts, Player Profiles, and more with over 3,000 integrations for all common CRM and Marketing Automation platforms.

To see how Lead liaison’s growing library of digital activations (games), universal lead capture, and reward-based solutions can help your company generate more leads at your trade shows, contact us today!

Lead Liaison

Best Practices for Transcribing Business Cards and Contact Information

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Best Practices for Transcribing Business Cards and Contact Information

Companies struggle finding easy and fast ways to transcribe contact information from documents such as business cards, trade show badges, resumes, and handwritten notes. In this article we discuss these solutions and examine the trade-offs for why you would use one method over the other.

Lead liaison invented two proprietary methods of transcription which are far superior than traditional optical character recognition (also known as “OCR”) methods commonly used today. These methods are called:

Human AI and Pure AI

Both are very distinct methods that have their own advantages. Relative to standard OCR, the methods have a 63% higher accuracy rate. OCR is an older technology that does not learn from its mistakes (no machine learning) and uses hard-coded programmatic code that doesn’t adapt. It typically runs inside an app and on a device, making it inflexible. As a result, OCR is hard to update and has quickly become irrelevant when compared to other methods.

“I’ve used OCR apps from the App Stores and they always frustrate me. I tried dozens of them, over and over, really looking for the right solution. I determined they’re not very accurate, constantly require fixing and tweaking, lack integration with sales and marketing systems, and don’t fit the needs of marketing teams. They’re meant for individual sales people who have time on their hands to correct data – says nobody. Our engineering team pounded the innovation drums giving us industry-leading solutions that fit numerous use cases. We’re super excited to introduce our newest method, which we call Pure AI.”

Lead liaison CEO Ryan Schefke

Lead liaison’s study of 10,687 business cards and documents requiring transcription determined standard OCR was accurate 60.34% of the time. In comparison, Lead liaison’s methods were 98.6% accurate on average. That’s a 64% improvement in accuracy resulting in better quality contact information, more precise lead data, and improved lead management workflows.

HUMAN AI:

Lead liaison’s classic method, known as Human AI, uses an operations team of several hundred people. The workforce transcribes the contact information while artificial intelligence processes the data to find matching information and discards bad information. The result is a highly accurate process ideal for multiple use cases.

PURE AI:

The second, and newest method, is called Pure AI. Pure AI uses a sophisticated process that combines machine learning, image analysis, data intelligence, and artificial intelligence to perform its magic. The best method for your business depends on your use case.

In the tables below we’ve highlighted six (6) use cases for transcribing contact information from documents, all of which Lead liaison supports. If you need help transcribing business cards, badges, or handwritten notes at trade shows or marketing events Lead liaison can help. Similarly, if your company does door-to-door sales or has sales processes that use contact cards in any form, we can help. Whatever you use, ditch OCR as it’s a thing of the past. Use Human AI or Pure AI to leap into the next generation of transcription.

 

 

 

Lead liaison  is a multifunctional event platform that provides: Universal Lead Capture, User Customizable Gamification, Marketing Automation, CRM, Lead Management, Sales Enablement, Leader Boards, Point Rewards & e-Gift Cards, Waypoints for Sessions & Scavenger Hunts, Player Profiles, and more with over 3,000 integrations for all common CRM and Marketing Automation platforms.

 

To see how Lead liaison’s growing library of digital activations (games), universal lead capture, and reward-based solutions can help your company generate more leads at your trade shows, contact us today!

 

Lead Liaison

5 Creative Solutions for Event Organizers

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5 Creative Solutions for Event Organizers

Exhibitor Media Group reports that in 2023 companies expect to exhibit at an average of 47.2 in-person events per year (6% more than in 2019).

As trade shows and marketing events start to fill up the calendar, event organizers need creative solutions to bring in more attendees and drive value to sponsors and other stakeholders. In this article we outline five solutions for event organizers to bring life to their events. 

Scavenger Hunts

The classic scavenger hunt, or treasure hunt, was historically run using a piece of paper and stamps. Attendees would visit booths or prime destinations in an effort to complete their card. It’s sort of like playing a lottery ticket or bingo. Tick off all the squares and you win! In an age where digital dominates, organizers have an opportunity to move a scavenger hunt experience from physical to digital, while going green at the same time. Solutions exist that leverage QR codes as the destinations while attendees load a progress report that tells them what stops they’ve completed and where they need to go next. This is an excellent way for event organizers to drive traffic to key areas, exhibitors, or sponsors – getting them to do what you want them to do. Event organizers can also monetize each stop thereby creating additional revenue streams for their event. 

Two Truths and a Lie

This event experience encourages attendees to network with each other. I’ve been to many events in my career. Although the events industry is rather “clicky”, it never fails that I’m walking around the show floor introducing myself to people. Sometimes it feels awkward as people are almost suspicious of “nice guys”. Why should it be that way? Event organizers can give attendees a reason to connect with one another . Two truths and a Lie is one of the best ways to do that. Prior to the event attendees answer three questions about themselves, with two answers being truthful and one answer being a lie. Event organizers can program how the experience works, and whether one attendee needs to guess the truth or the lie of another attendee. If they get the correct answer the attendee earns points and a chance to be atop the leaderboard.

Speed Networking

We’ve all seen the popularity of dating websites grow over the past decade. The concept is great. Match people up, have them go on a date, and if there’s a good match then the rest is history. These concepts can also be applied to business through speed networking to help event organizers. Solutions exist where groups of people can join “rooms”, which might be dedicated to common interests. Attendees meet in the room at a specific time and are matched with another person where they have a time limit to network. Once the networking session is over, the attendees are matched to another person. This is a great opportunity to connect buyers and sellers together, like-minded buyers together, attendees with common interests, and more. 

Digital Activations

Exhibitors spend lots of time and money hauling in giant spin the wheels, whack a moles, or Plinko to their live event hoping the aid acts like a minno to hungry fish, attracting attendees in swarms. Event organizers have enough to worry about and can’t spend the time bringing in physical activations. Instead, solutions exist for digital activations that can be run on tablets. Event organizers can brand digital activations, sell sponsorships, and use them to deliver a message or preview content. When attendees engage with the digital activations they earn points. Points accumulate over the course of the event as attendees vie for a spot on the top of the event leaderboard. Attendees can be incentivized to participate if prizes are awarded for people that finish in the top X position on the leaderboard. 

Session Surveys

Event organizers often offer educational sessions at their event. Although, most organizers miss out on the opportunity to collect data, feedback, and further engage attendees with the use of surveys or polls. Surveys or polls can be displayed using a branded QR code at the beginning or end of a session – or even somewhere in between. Attendees can scan the QR code with their smartphone to take the quiz/poll. Data is aggregated for event organizers to use and provide feedback to the speaker while improving the experience for the following year. When attendees participate they can earn points and get a spot on the leaderboard – encouraging them to participate at deeper levels. 

We hope these five creative solutions for event organizers give you some ideas for your next event! Contact Lead liaison at www.Leadliaison.com if you’d like our help in providing any of these five solutions. We can help!

Lead liaison is a multifunctional event platform that provides: Universal Lead Capture, User Customizable Gamification, Marketing Automation, CRM, Lead Management, Sales Enablement, Leader Boards, Point Rewards & e-Gift Cards, Waypoints for Sessions & Scavenger Hunts, Player Profiles, and more with over 3,000 integrations for all common CRM and Marketing Automation platforms.