Whether virtual, hybrid or in-person, technology platforms are integral to every part of our events and meetings.
But success in integrating event technology isn’t just limited to asking the right questions during the sourcing and vetting process. The next hurdle to overcome is ensuring that the set-up is conducive to creating an excellent experience for your attendees, speakers, and the rest of your key stakeholders.
A positive experience often comes down to the customer onboarding process and the team that helps you get acquainted with all the platform capabilities and features. As a result, what you get out of your event
While they might have different names, roles like customer success manager, account manager, or client onboarding manager are the secret weapon every event professional should leverage to ensure a successful event. They provide the guidance, skills, consultation, and knowledge to help you get the most of your event technology investment.
Whether you’re investing in a new audience engagement platform, registration system, or other event technology, here are eight pointers for the onboarding process and working effectively with event tech success teams.
1. Prepare for the kick-off call
You’re likely thinking about your event 24/7 and know it like the back of your hand. And though you may have had conversations with others in the company about your goals and objectives, your customer success team would like to hear that information first-hand from you.
In advance of the kick-off meeting, create a summary that recaps what you’re hoping to accomplish. Your customer success team may also ask you to complete a brief questionnaire. Taking the time to complete either of those in advance of the kick-off call not only streamlines your time together but provides a guiding document to refer to throughout the planning process.
2. Share your vision/game plan
The ultimate goal is to create a partnership between your organization and the technology provider. So, in addition to sharing your goals and objectives, tell them your vision. For example, has attendee engagement fallen flat in past events, and you want to do better this year? Are you looking to use this event format as the benchmark for future events? Or something else?
The more details and expectations the customer success team knows, the better they can help you achieve that vision.
3. Get advice on best practices
Working with so many different organizations and events allows customer success teams to provide unique insight into the latest trends and best practices.
Ask for recommendations on what’s working now and look for ways to incorporate that advice into your event planning.
4. Keep communication flowing
Depending on the event scope, your customer success team may set a series of follow-up planning calls, which could be multiple times a week or just occasional check-ins. During these, look for your customer success team to share ideas for features, set-ups, or integrations that might support making your goals a reality.
If there is a shift in your original event goals or visions, be sure to keep communication flowing by sharing those updates with the team.
5. Remember to ask questions
Remember, your customer success team knows the product platform inside-out. So the challenges or concerns you might face, they’ve likely already encountered.
Have a question about a particular feature? Want to try something new? Ask away, and remember, no question is too small.
Because your customer success team has worked with numerous clients, both in your industry and others, they know what works or have creative ideas or examples to share. And instead of you trying to figure out something else, they likely already have a better solution.
6. Collaborate on potential concerns
Even the best-laid plans sometimes go awry. Share any concerns with your customer success team so they can guide what to do in case something possibly goes wrong. In addition, they will likely share their standard contingency plans to ensure all bases are covered.
7. Involve them in speaker/sponsor training
Even though many speakers and sponsors have likely used different event technologies, the goal is to keep them focused on their primary activity. Let your customer success team provide the tips, tricks, and training to get them quickly acquainted with the technical features and capabilities.
Plus, the customer success team will share new features that may enhance their speaking or sponsorship presence. As an example, the latest version of ConnexMe includes the ability for sponsors and exhibitors to add an introductory or promotional video to increase visibility.
By having the customer success team help train key stakeholders, the better they’ll be prepared, and the better the chance will be for a flawless event for all involved.
8. Share feedback
Once the event is over, customer success teams often ask for feedback. Share what was helpful during the onboarding process, what worked, and what could be improved in future experiences.
This step is especially crucial if you’re working with a technology provider for an extended time period. Both teams are getting used to working together, and open, honest feedback builds a valuable and trusted partnership.
When organizing in-person events, planners and organizers rely on partners, suppliers, and vendors for a successful program.
Virtual and hybrid events are no different. There are many moving technical pieces when planning, managing, and designing events with multiple technology components. It’s time to involve your customer success team to create a successful event for all stakeholders.
For more information about how Evenium supports you throughout the entire event planning process, contact us.