Events

Nowadays, event organizers have a lot of options available for digital communication. For any event or a conference, communication usually happens in three phases - (1) Before the event, (2) During the event and (3) After the event. The first phase is mostly about marketing, where the focus is on reaching out to as many potentially interested people as possible. In the second phase, communication is more focused with fewer interested and committed people who are attending or who may attend the event. Once the event is over, communication is mainly to keep the enthusiasm going until the relevance of the event diminishes or to possibly announce the details of the next event.

In the first phase, since marketing is a priority social media platforms such as Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, LinkedIn, Youtube, etc. are good places to communicate. An event should also have a website, or a landing page at least, where all the marketing communication could be funnelled to. In the later part of the first and in the second phase, it is also a good idea to have a mobile app for focused and personalized communication with attendees. In the last phase communication could happen over all platforms.

Although creation of website entails some additional cost to the event organizer, the benefits of having a website far outweigh the cost repurcussions. This is because - (1) Website is a space to showcase the event branding, (2) Website is a place where an event can be pitched attractively and (3) Website is a place to sell tickets online and nowadays people prefer buying stuff online.

It is also important to have a dedicated mobile app for events because - (1) a properly implemented event app can drive the attendee engagement up, (2) an event app can provide a personalized communication and experience, (3) through an event app, it becomes possible to collect data of the users and use it effectively to improve the marketing communication efforts and (4) selling tickets through a mobile app can become a truly seamless and easy experience.

Today, majority of the Internet traffic in India comes from mobile devices (more than 60 percent roughly). When we talk about event communication, this particular data-point can be viewed from two different perspectives

• Perspective 1 - Having just a website, even if it is mobile friendly, is not enough. Having a mobile application seems equally essential. If majority of the users are going to use mobile phones to consume content, it makes sense to build a dedicated app that provides a smooth and native user experience. Forcing them to use the crippled mobile friendly version will just drive them away!
• Perspective 2 - Although majority of the users are on mobile, 40% share of website users is still significant and cannot be ignored.

Looking at these two perspectives of e-commerce implementations, it becomes quite clear that both the 'website only' or 'mobile only' strategies are doomed to fail. Presence on both the platforms is not only recommended, it is mandatory for success. But this comes at a cost of a significant upfront investment in technology even before the event takes off. A disastrous proposition particularly for smaller event organizers wishing to setup digital communication platforms. But, from another perspective, not so much!

We, at MeGo, are helping event organizers to kick-start their event communication more effectively. We are mainly doing two things:

• Precise Technology Support - The ZonCon technology is a future-proof technology using which merchants can create their customized and branded event property in the form of a website and a mobile app.
• Drastic Reduction in Technology Costs - Our homebrewed backend, called ZonCon, singularly works with both websites and mobile apps. This drastically reduces technology development, maintenance and logistical management costs.