As a marketer, I’ve often joked about implanting RFID chips into people or at the very least, tattooing a barcode on their forehead so we can track their activities and behaviors. Now we have something even better ~ all kidding aside. Most everyone has a cellular phone, smart phone or mobile device of some kind. Many are outfitted with a GPS. People are willingly sharing information with the world about who they are, what they are interested in, where they are going and what they are doing. Wake up marketers! This is what we have hoped and dreamed about for decades!

There are six location-based applications / services I’ve had my eye on recently: Brightkite, Foursquare, Gowalla, Loopt, Whrrl and Yelp. In this post I’ll briefly describe each and offer a few ideas on how to take advantage of these tools to complement experiences, drive engagement, foster community and build brand relationships with audiences.

1. Brightkite

What is it? Brightkite helps people discover where their friends are and introduces users to new people, places and events in their neighborhood. It also allows users to simplify their social life by posting updates to several social networks.

What’s so cool about it? Brightkite works like many other social networks with friends, fans, “like” function, filters and search. Users can also customize locations. The introduction of other people, places and events provides and opportunity to create recommendations based on user behaviors and preferences – a potential gold mine for marketers.

Where to get it? Brightkite.com

2. Foursquare

What is it? Foursquare is an application that works on any mobile device. It allows users to “check in” at different locations, share their experiences, earn points & unlock badges, and become the “Mayor” to unlock freebies at different locations.

What’s so cool about it? The incentive-based ranking system and organic tie to restaurants, bars, retailers and other points of interest creates a compelling promotional model that can drive real business.

Where to get it? Foursquare.com

3. Gowalla

What is it? The Gowalla application lets users share their location with others on the Gowalla network, as well as Facebook and Twitter. Users can earn stamps for their virtual “passport”. New locations can be easily discovered by users and added to the Gowalla network of destinations. Gowalla is only available for the iphone and android-enabled devices.

What’s so cool about it? The integration with other social networks is huge. This can begin to help marketers create psychographic and technographic profiles of their audiences across platforms. The passport incentive idea can also help drive business and monetize audience activities.

Where to get it? Gowalla.com

4. Loopt

What is it? Loopt shows users where their friends are located via interactive maps on their mobile phones. It also helps tie people to locations and events. Users can also share geo-tagged photos and comments with people in their network both within Loopt and other social networks. Although Loopt works with many mobile devices, some are not included.

What’s so cool about it? Loopt is really great for finding the physical locations of other people in your network to organize ad-hoc meetings, or for brands to reach out to users in their area for localized promotions.

Where to get it? Loopt.com

5. Whrrl

What is it? Whrrl allows users to check in to different locations, share photos and comments of those places with others, unlock secret societies of users based on your behaviors and create and analyze your “footstream” or digital record of where you’ve been.

What’s so cool about it? Great tool for sharing your experiences with others in your network. For marketers a great tool for creating loyalty and advocacy programs for select “societies” and for spreading promotions beyond the scope of traditional marketing efforts.

Where to get it? Whrrl.com

6. Yelp

What is it? You may know Yelp for their restaurant, retail and other services reviews.

What’s so cool about it? Yelp already has a built in audience and a robust database of places to go and things to do. Connecting people isn’t too far off. Good reviews will drive business both online and on the street.

Where to get it? Yelp.com

Here are some ideas to help marketers to capitalize on these opportunities.

Participate: Subscribe to these services and make sure your business information is up to date on service profiles.

Promote: Create special promotions for subscribers to these services. Freebies, coupons, specials, referrals and loyalty / advocacy programs.

Pull: Create special environments and host formal events and ad-hoc meetups for audiences who belong to these location-based networks. Become THE destination locally.

Partner: Create opportunities for cross-brand promotions within your company and throughout your business partners. This is a great tool for localized micro-affinity marketing. Think dinner and a movie, drinks and museums, office supplies and printing services, makeover, haircut and shopping spree. You get the idea.

Piggyback: For event and experiential marketers, partner with relevant local establishments to extend the event experience. Scavenger hunts, visits to retailers who sell products you showcase at the event, client site case study visits, hospitality events, local office visits can enhance your experience and provide proof-point connections to the real world.

We live in interesting and exciting times. As you consider the social media strategy or your business, ensure location-based services are a part of the plan. Never before have marketers had such an amazing opportunity to connect with their audiences at the moment of truth.

Have other ideas? Please share!

Where You At? Location-Based Services For Marketers is a post from: Experiential Marketing 2.0

Marketers are increasingly challenged by breaking through the clutter to create brand experiences which solicit appropriate emotional and rational responses from our audiences in order to accomplish our business objectives. Tried and true techniques for engaging our audiences, including interaction and storytelling to drive relationships are still relevant. Engagement and authenticity continue to be key components of a well-engineered brand communications strategy.

Human communication is evolving. What attracts us and motivates us is constantly changing. The way we interact with each other, our communities and the companies we do business with is increasingly complex. Technology is everywhere and can become an insurmountable distraction or a useful tool to help us in driving indelible experiences which last well beyond a single moment in time and spark long-term relationships.

Here are six game-changing technologies that will help experiences and events make more of an impact on audiences and brands alike.

1. MIT’s Sixth Sense Augmented Reality:

Augmented reality combines visual, three dimensional environments with virtual information creating a hybrid view of the real world and relevant data. Several companies are running to create augmented reality applications for smartphones that will add information to maps, landmarks, people and the like. The most compelling vision of augmented reality however is not from a mobile device, but a wearable computer from MIT. Imagine interpreting attendee, product, brand, speaker, subject matter information instantaneously through an personal projection onto any surface. Other versions could involve audio cues delivered through headphones, or heads-up displays built into eyeglasses.  Very cool stuff. Pretty soon, we won’t need to remember anything. First the calculator took away our ability to do simple math, then along came the GPS so we can’t find our way out of the driveway, and now this…

2. Samsung PROM Audience Measurement System:

This system uses a camera and facial recognition software to determine the gender, ethnicity and emotional reaction of audiences to advertisements shown on an interactive screen. Using this data, the system can serve up different advertisements based on the audience standing in front of the monitor. Samsung is just scratching the surface here. Imagine using this technology for product demonstrations at a tradeshow, showcasing the most relevant products, features or benefits based on audience demographics or physical reactions. Imagine an entire experience being customized to a single member of your audience based on the same technology. What about speaking sessions? Or interactive virtual events where participants have their webcams on, giving the virtual event producer the opportunity to customize content based on the same information to each screen. Amazing stuff.

3. Kaon Interactive V-OSK:

As an experiential or event marketer, if you haven’t heard of Kaon Interactive or their V-OSK solutions you may be missing out on some pretty amazing technology. Kaon creates high definition, three-dimensional product models and system demonstrations to help sales and marketing teams illustrate product features and benefits. The V-OSK solution is basically an interactive touch screen that allows users to interact with a virtual product, process or solution. Demonstrations can be self-guided or hosted by a staffer. Key features and benefits can be programmed into each layer of the high-definition, three-dimensional image which can be taken apart or otherwise manipulated to obtain just the right view.  This is ideal for use in corporate lobbies, museums, executive briefing centers and tradeshows. I once heard someone define drayage as the best way to move freight the shortest possible distance, at the slowest possible pace for the highest possible cost. A Kaon solution virtually eliminates the need to ship or store products both large and small to events. A game-changer for companies who sell anything from consumer appliances to servers to manufacturing equipment, food processing machinery, medical equipment, or anything else that drives up the cost of floorspace, shipping and drayage. I can see this solution saving some companies millions. Their V-OSK presenter is a great tool for in-depth, interactive presentations for both simple and complex products alike. This can be used for speaking opportunities. Their solution is transferable to the web and e-literature, so once the models are built the ROI on multi-channel distribution is huge. Finally, everything a user does while using a V-OSK is tracked and measurable, helping you to design and develop the most effective demonstrations.

4. Siftables:

What?! Toy blocks for events?! Yep. These are interactive blocks or cookie-sized computers with motion sensing, neighbor detection, graphical display and wireless communication that can be programmed with calculators, dictionaries, music, etc. Kid’s play, right? Well, partially. I can see Siftables being programmed with more complex data. For example, molecular, atomic, genetic, physics, chemistry, pharmaceutical, biological, ecological, geological, astronomical, electronic, or business-process data. Now we have something very interesting for business and events as a result. Imagine using these interactive blocks as a demonstration or learning tool to tell a story to attendees about what happens when different elements of a (gene, pharmacutical drug, business process, etc.) are moved around or reordered. Add a projector and you can address a mass audience in a very compelling and entertaining fashion. Attendees could each carry around their own siftables and engage in collaborative ideation or problem solving. The possibilities are endless. I am watching these guys closely.

5. AllianceTech RFID Solutions:

Sure, we’ve all heard of using RFID to track whether or not attendees are sitting in our breakout sessions, but the power of RFID is so much more than that. AllianceTech’s ‘Intelligent’ series of products allows brands to understand attendance, manage leads, create surveys, understand booth and demonstration visits and durations, drive attendee networking and even tie into signage that can be customized for each attendee. What’s more, is I’ve heard AllianceTech is doing some very interesting things tying onsite behavior to pre and post event activities, including social media monitoring for some clients to give a true 360 view of audience behavior. Now that’s powerful. Real-time data which can be used to customize experiences on the fly, and longer-term analytics to create predictive models to drive real, consistent brand performance. I’m looking forward to when RFID is fully integrated into complete event experiences, well beyond intelligent signage. Imagine customized one-to-one signage, demonstrations, sound, video, lighting, temperature, scent, carpet pile, you name it.

6. Hypersonic Sound:

Ambient noise is a huge problem at events. Booth theater, speakers, product demonstrations, magicians, gameshows, even the attendees themselves add to the noise pollution and detract from the experience for everyone in the audience. Imagine sound being delivered exactly to the ears of the specific attendee you were targeting. The person to their left or right would not hear the demonstration, only them. Pretty amazing stuff. I’m waiting for active noise cancellation technology to be more effective and efficient in three-dimensional spaces (beyond the more traditional noise-cancelling headphone). It will be very cool when we can step off the tradeshow aisle carpet into a booth and experience total silence.

These are just six of some of the most interesting technologies with event applications I’ve come across. Of course, there’s virtual reality, photo or video activation, mobile applications and many others as well.

Please share your favorites!

Six Technologies For Events That Will Rock Your World is a post from: Experiential Marketing 2.0

During virtually every conversation we are attempting to have with our audiences, we are competing with their internal monologue, simultaneous social media conversations, emails, text messages, and other environmental factors.

We are no longer singularly focused. People generally do not live in the moment. Monologues and dialogues have become polylogues and we now live in a world where chaos, distraction and multi-tasking is the norm.

Audiences are harder to reach. People are more difficult to persuade. Competitive advantage is harder to achieve. It is exceedingly difficult to cut through the clutter and get your message out.

As experiential marketers, we are faced with an interesting challenge. Where we were once entirely focused on creating experiences which activated the emotional and rational levers of our audiences from a face-to-face perspective, we now have to account for the distractions of laptops, netbooks, and mobile devices. Additionally, social media has created a powerful back-channel which competes heavily with the experiences we work so diligently to engineer. Instead of contributing the the noise, if we take a targeted approach to engaging our audiences across their communications channels, we will be able to take what many see as an impediment to our success and turn it into an opportunity. Here are some thoughts on how.

Create Indelible Experiences. If you want to keep attendees engaged, the most important thing you can do is create experiences which naturally capture and hold their attention. Effective experiences tell a story, include attendee interaction, are authentic, on brand and immersive. These experiences engage the senses and activate both emotional and rational triggers of your audience. For more information check out Are You Experienced?.

Drive And Engage In The Conversation. Marketers too often take a broadcast approach to their messaging. We create environments, graphics, pictures, signs, videos, etc. to propagate our message. “Here are the features and benefits of our product,” Here is why you want to do business with our company” and the like. Instead of approaching audiences with answers, try using questions to tell your story: “What is your biggest challenge?” “What do you think about…?”, etc.  Spending some time in your audience’s shoes and understanding their needs will help build relationships based on trust. At an event it means more than setting up a booth. It requires speaking sessions, networking activities, etc. Online it means more than setting up a Facebook page or Tweeting about your products. It requires listening and engaging with audiences. Becoming an integral part of the conversation will ensure long-term brand success.

Create Social Destinations. Use Blogs, FaceBook pages, Twitter feeds, YouTube channels, Flickr, branded social networks, etc. If you build them, they might come. Think outside of the event in terms of audience, content and relationships. Building the channels and the content is just the first step. It’s critical you stay engaged and keep content fresh. These platforms are excellent for participating in the conversation. Make sure you do. Listening, reacting, commenting, etc. is the purpose of social media. Spend 20% of your time creating content and 80% of your time engaging the community. Social media destinations and audience engagement should be executed before, during and after the event.

Facilitate The Backchannel. Concerned about the lack of control you might have over brand perception in the social space? Participate! Research where your audiences are most likely to engage in social media and help facilitate and influence the conversation. Create official #hashtags. Use the social destinations suggested above. Create content that encourages audience participation. Ask provocative questions that rally your communities around an idea. Consider yourself the grand facilitator of all things directly or indirectly related to your brand both face-to-face and online. Use your physical presence to drive conversation into the backchannel – without distracting audiences from the live event. This is an important point. You’ve spend a great deal of time, money and effort to build a face-to-face audience. Engage and captivate your audience. Any social media activities should be additive and complement your efforts by addressing audiences beyond the attendee, not pull your attendees out of the face-to-face discussion, but be omnipresent.

Create A Mobile Playground. The most persuasive distraction brands compete with during a face-to-face event is the mobile device. Attendees are constantly checking email, texting, using mobile applications, social media and otherwise. Again, being omnipresent is an opportunity to engage attendees wherever their attention may be focused. Capture attendee mobile contact information at registration. Send emails and texts to attendees during the event to keep them engaged. Consider creating branded mobile applications that tie into the subject matter or theme of the event that engage attendees. Mobile games an sweepstakes are another approach. Use third-party mobile social media applications like Foursquare, Gowalla or Yelp to build interesting and engaging campaigns or mashups to keep audiences interested and immersed in your brand’s message.

Immerse Audiences In Virtual Experiences. In my earlier post Six Things to Consider on the Way to the New World, I talked about what a virtual event is, and what it is not. Virtual events are powerful tactics indeed. Consider adopting hybrid models to complement your physical events. Hybrid events bolster attendance, increase access to content, extend the life of a physical event, leverage and reuse assets, increase reach, drive buzz, enhance attendee value and improve ROI. Again, the idea is to be omnipresent within the community and to own the conversation wherever possible.

Always Look To The Future. Use RFID to track attendees areas of interest and behaviors or to personalize experiences. Consider using holography or augmented reality to create experiences that truly immerse and engage attendees in your experiences. Be forward leaning in your approach to investigating and adopting new technologies in your program. a good resource for ideas here is TED. Check it out!

These are just a few innovative ideas to motivate and activate your audiences. The key is to create physical and virtual environments and activities which attract, capture, engage and build lasting relationships with your audiences. Be on brand, be omnipresent and most importantly, be valuable.

Have other thoughts? Please share!

Embrace The Chaos! Experiential Marketing In The Real World is a post from: Experiential Marketing 2.0

Think of it this way. People build perceptions through five lenses: emotion, reason, knowledge, personality and experience. It is exceedingly difficult to effectively address these through logos, signage and the like. To truly build a positive brand impression requires the building of trust and relationships.

Here are 13 ideas to help you build your brand through broader and deeper audience engagement at your events.

Everything Matters: Every touch point with your audience has the opportunity to make or break their perception of your brand as well as your relationship with them. Take nothing for granted.

Booth Layout: The look and feel of your booth is a good starting point. Remember, what’s not in your booth is just as important as what is. Keep it open, inviting and comfortable.

Signage: Use messaging as a strategic weapon. Adopt a messaging hierarchy for your presence. Consider what your messaging strategy is, and what high level and detailed messaging you will include to draw people into your booth and entice conversation with your staffers. Hint: you don’t have to tell the whole story from across the convention center. Also, the amount of messaging, fontography, and integration with pictures and video is critical. All elements need to work together simply and seamlessly, to tell your story. You have 3-5 seconds. Go!

Experiences: In my earlier post, Are You Experienced? I discuss some tips on how to turn your event into an experience. Given that one of the key foundations of building perception is experience, you should really focus on this one. Make your events authentic, engaging, interactive and immerse your audience and you’ll go a long way to bolstering brand perception.

Storytelling: Use case studies and stories to build positive brand impressions from an audience perspective. Using guest speakers on panels or use video both at the event and online to draw your audiences in and show how your brand addresses their needs and makes them a hero in their own story. Check out Storytelling to learn more.

Trained Demonstrators: It is true that no one in your company knows your products better than the folks who created them. It is also true that delivering demonstrations based on audience needs (not product features and benefits) presenting ideas effectively in a public forum and engaging audiences in meaningful conversations, is a skill in it’s own right. If your staff is trainable (meaning they could pass as a professional speaker or demonstrator) by all means train them. If not, use them as company and product experts after the pros energize, excite and engage the crowd.

Educational Sessions: Whether you are participating in a third-party tradeshow, conference or planning a proprietary event, it’s important to add value to your audiences. In many cases this means offering some sort of education. The tracks you participate in, the type of knowledge you impart, the number of sessions, the quality of the speakers and the breadth and depth of content you provide all say something about your brand. Also, keep in mind that any educational session should be designed so it is entertaining, easily digestible and shareable beyond the session itself. Think about how audiences will use this content in social media.

Speaking Opportunities: Like educational sessions, speaking session should be treated as critical for appealing to the emotion, reason and knowledge lenses of your audiences. Work with show producers to secure the most prominent speaking session(s) possible whether through purchasing sponsorships, or building such a reputation in the marketplace for excellence, the mere presence of your rockstar executive will draw crowds to the event.

Private Meetings: The most important audiences are those who  align themselves with your organization. This is true for prospects, customers, and loyal advocates. Holding special off-floor activities just for them will make them feel special and validate their affinity with your brand. Make sure these activities are of the highest quality,  valuable, entertaining and allow for networking with peers.

Audience Generation: Aside from “just do it,” remember the type and frequency of touches you have with your potential attendees before the event creates an important brand perception. Here you have an opportunity to show you care about these audiences, which activates emotional triggers.

Promotion: Although niche themes for your event can be fun and all, try to resist the temptation of going way off brand. Whatever promotions, gameshows, sweepstakes, giveaways, contests, booth themes, etc. you choose, they should be first and foremost designed to add real value to your audiences. Secondly, they should be aligned with your core brand values and messaging. The promotion should never outweigh the prominence of your brand. here’s a simple trick. Try saying the promotion name with your competitors brand and message as part of the slogan. If it works, it’s not for you.

Follow-Through: The speed and authenticity of your follow-up activities with your audiences after the event also have a tremendous impact on brand perception. make sure you have a plan for how to manage hot, warm and cold leads after the event. Ensure any information captured on site about the audience is shared with the sales or field staff responsible for post-event contact strategies. Audiences should be contacted as close to immediately after the event as possible, or they will shop your competition, and you have lost an opportunity to build deep, meaningful relationships, not to mention negatively impacted your return on investment.

Social Media Integration: Think beyond the event in terms of audience, content and relationships. Social media activities and audience engagement should be planned for and executed before, during and after the event. An event is a point in time, a relationship lasts far longer. Make sure you participate where your audiences are already congregating. Do your research. It may not be where you think.

An event is the best place for audiences to look a company in the eye and become immersed in a ‘brand experience’.  Second to this is the pervasiveness of the digital channel in providing interactive ‘brand experiences’ for many audiences. Outside of events, digital marketing provides an experience which engages audiences in a two way conversation with a brand. This often leads to a transaction that is immediately measurable. However, this transaction is far less indelible than a face-to-face conversation which helps build a long term relationship based on shared experiences, a mutual exchange of value, and the building of trust. You may meet your mate on Match.com, but (hopefully) you won’t marry them until you have built a face-to-face relationship.

Have other ideas for building your brand through events and experiences? Please share!

Building Brand Through Event Marketing is a post from: Experiential Marketing 2.0

According to Quantcast, as of November 2009, MySpace has just under 60 million regular users per month, making it the second largest social network in the US. 57% of users are female and 43% are male. As far as age is concerned, 46% of MySpace visitors are 18-34, followed by 13-17 at 26% and 35-49 at 17%. MySpace also boasts a large Hispanic and African American population.

Like all marketing, the trick for brands is to fish where the fish are. In other words, make sure the digital properties included in any social media strategy attract your target audience. Its also a good idea to align your brand appropriately with the content of the property to ensure relevance for the community.

MySpace attracts a younger audience than Facebook, and the content is more entertainment focused, including, celebrity, fashion, video, sports and most importantly, MySpace is building their business largely through music. With recent acquisitions of imeem, and iLike, as well as the build out of MySpace Music, News Corporation appears to be focused on billing MySpace as the premier social destination for all things music.

So how can event marketers leverage MySpace for events? Here are 8 ideas to get you started.

1. Its not about the event, its about the community. This may sound familiar from my earlier posts, but it bears repeating. As marketers, its important we change our thinking from using MySpace or any other social media platform for an event, to understanding how we can incorporate our event into the community. Changing our state of mind will help ensure we are focused on the right things and enable long-term success. What’s most important is approaching social communities comprised of the right audiences for our products or services. In some cases, there will not be an organic fit between branded content and community interests. Content should be carefully crafted to align, or alternate channels should be explored if content alignment is not possible.

2. Create a profile for your event. Although designed for people, a profile can be built for an event. This is really easy to do on MySpace. Make sure your presence is branded appropriately and community centric. Myspace is completely customizable. You can change the layout and background or create a custom look and feel using CSS tools. From here you can add different modules that display exactly the kind of information you want to display on your profile. Take advantage of appropriate modules for your presence like:

• Blurbs – Shows the “About” Section of your profile
• Details – Miscellaneous details about your event
• Interests – Here you can include the subject matter of the event
• Companies – Here you can list participating companies
• Friend Space – Friends or fans listed (think attendees or other interested parties)
• Events – Create and manage all your events or curriculum / agendas
• Calendar – Displays important dates about your event

3. Add multimedia content to your profile. Keep it updated to educate, inform and excite your audiences.

• Music Player – If your event is entertainment focused, this is the place to keep and showcase it (under MySpace Music)
• Video Player – Record or upload your own videos (under MySpace Video)

4. Keep the information fresh, interesting and engaging. Other modules can be used to better communicate and engage with your community. Use them daily.

• Status and Mood – Keep your audience apprised on event activities
• Activity Stream – Publishes everything you do on MySpace
• Comments – Allows you or others to post comments to your profile

5. Create additional value for attendees. Still other modules can be used to help attendees navigate the locale around your event

• Local Reviews – Helpful for destination events where attendees may be looking for hotels, restaurants, attractions, etc.
• MySpace Local – Can be used for attendees during regional events to find restaurants, hotels, and attractions

6. Identify, attract and befriend the right audience. You don’t need to boil the ocean here. Start by searching MySpace for people who you know who are already part of the community and “friending” them. You can also invite people you email or IM via your contact list to join MySpace. The next step is to use MySpace search functions to conduct searches of Profiles, Groups and Forums to identify folks who might be interested in your content and your event and “friend” them. Finally, you can promote your MySpace presence off site to attract others to become your friend.

7. Engage your community. If you build it, they might come. In order to be truly successful, you must engage and interact with others. Reach out to other MySpace profiles with related content (industry, fan, speaker, exhibitor, etc.). Post photos, videos, music, stories, links and updates that will keep your audiences interested and engaged. Also take full advantage of MySpace:

• Blogs – Allows you to create your own blog or view others blogs – update your blog regularly. For more guidance on using blogs effectively at events, please check out my earlier post, The Importance of Blogs in Experiential Marketing.
• Groups – Join relevant groups or create your own group based on the event – make sure you participate actively.
• Forums – Start new discussions or participate in other revelvent discussions actively to foster your community and drive interest in the subject matter of your event.

Here are some thoughts on the kind of content you should post regularly.

• News about event content (again, think community interest first) and  event operations
• Links to outside blogs (speakers, exhibitors, industry sites, subject matter experts, etc.)
• Links to other MySpace pages (speakers, exhibitors, industry / subject matter groups, etc.)
• Photos and videos (speakers, experiences, exhibits, demonstrations, previous events, subject matter relevant, audience and fan provided)

Remember, the beauty of social media, is you don’t need to create everything, you can leverage and share what others have done, provided it is on brand, relevant to your audience and appropriate for your presence.

Think long-term. This is not just about awareness and audience generation for your event, but an engagement strategy that will make your event a vital component of the community and an important accentuation point in the relationship with your audiences, whether they be attendees, speakers, exhibitors, press, analysts or otherwise.

8. Leverage appropriate applications. There are hundreds of applications in MySpace. Browse application categories or search apps based on keywords. You can also create your own applications to be included in the MySpace universe. Here are some I’ve found useful:

• Custom Countdown: Allows you to create customized countdowns for your events
• iTwitter: Syncs your tweets to your MySpace profile
• RSS Reader: Include RSS feeds from your blog, news sites, subject matter experts, etc. on your MySpace profile
• Create Free Polls: Survey your MySpace audience and report the results
• YouTube Post: Post your YouTube videos directly into your MySpace profile
• Business 3.0: Integrate your business information, products, services, etc. into many social media platforms

Building a MySpace engagement strategy (or any other community engagement strategy)  is easier said than done. Participating in communities takes time and diligence, but with the right focus, your event can become a prominent fixture both within the MySpace community and beyond. Remember to observe, create, share and engage and long-term success will be yours.

These are just some of the things you can do with MySpace. There are many other uses and applications for events. If you have other ideas or ways in which you’ve used MySpace for events please share!

8 Ways To Use MySpace For Events is a post from: Experiential Marketing 2.0

The most significant takeaway: The definition of a lead varies by company, business model, industry, approach and audience.

All said, here are some thoughts to help you ensure your definition, data collection and pipeline management process are aligned for maximum effectiveness.

1. Determine the minimum information required. Typically we need a name and some contact information:

• Name
• Address
• City
• State
• Postal Code
• Country
• Telephone
• Mobile Phone
• Email
• Social Media

Minimum is important. You want to make sure it is as easy as possible for your target audiences to provide information. Also think in terms of communications platforms. How does your audience prefer to be communicated to? Email? Direct Mail? Telephone? SMS? What about connecting via Social Media? (Now there’s an idea! However, I’m not sure if we will get to the point of: “Please check here if we can ‘friend’ you on Facebook.” By the way, does a Twitter ‘follow’ constitute as an Opt-In?) Think about how your organization typically communicates as well, within the current marketing campaign, by your sales teams, customer service and beyond. There are also advantages and disadvantages to each communications channel. Think about the differences between interactivity, engagement, interruptive vs. collaborative, one-way vs. two way, static vs. dynamic, etc. The platform you choose determines the contact information you need, and says something about your brand and customers as well.

2. “Opt-In” is not just the law, it is a strategic weapon. Think carefully about how you want your audiences to participate. There are several types of Opt-Ins:

• Specific Marketing Campaign
• General Company
• Specific Product or Service
• Partner Offers

Interestingly, how you present Opt-In questions is just as important as what types of Opt-In questions you choose. Studies have shown this is a balance between quantity and quality of leads. Negatively-framed questions (Opt-Outs) receive higher participation rates than positively-framed questions (Opt-Ins). Pre-selected choices also receive higher Opt-In rates, however the quality of these leads tends to be lower than those where participants are required to select the option. Copy treatments and page positioning have also been shown to effect participation quantity and quality.

3. BANT Qualification has two inherent strengths. BANT Qualification, or understanding a prospects Budget, Authority, Need and Timeframe (hence the BANT acronym) assists you in understanding whether or not a prospect is a viable customer. For example, a prospect’s budget is too low for your product or service, or they don’t have the authority to make the purchase decision. It can also help your sales teams in prioritizing leads. Should a prospect be looking to purchase a product or service in the near-term (Timeframe) of have more than enough Budget to purchase your offering(s), they could be considered a ‘hot’ lead.

So how do you get BANT information? Here, you have some choices. You can either address BANT with your marketing approach, leave it to your sales teams or adopt a hybrid model. Here are some examples:

• Budget: (formulaic) “What is your annual household income?”, (direct) “What is your company’s annual budget for X?”
• Authority: “Are you Head of Household?”, “Are you the final decision maker or do you recommend or influence purchase decisions for your company?”
• Need: “Do you own a home?”, “Does your company outsource your IT?’
• Timeframe: “When are you looking to purchase a new car?”, “When does your company’s fiscal calendar end?”

As you can see, these types of questions can be asked through a marketing campaign, as part of an initial sales or outreach (telemarketing) campaign, or across both.

4. Conditioning leads is good or you and good for them. Conditioning leads is the art and science of collecting additional demographic, psychographic and technographic information from your audience, while educating them about your brand and products. Conditioning allows brands to learn more about their audiences, and their audiences to learn more about them. It’s a courtship of sorts that will (hopefully) lead to a long-term relationship. Think about what additional information you’d like to collect about your audiences over time. This can inform your current pipeline, futures sales and marketing efforts, and provide some incredible opportunities for your customer service organization to drive retention, expansion, loyalty and advocacy.

Think of conditioning questions as the “nice-to-know” information about your audiences. This information, while not required for the sales process might help hone your future marketing efforts or give your sales teams an edge in establishing and building relationships with prospects. Some examples: “Do they participate in social media?” “What publications do they read?” “How many people are in their family?”

Similarly, understanding what additional pieces of information your audiences would like to, and need to know about your products or brand can help optimize your marketing, sales and service efforts. Here we include what audiences “need-to-know” about our brands and products in order to make a purchase decision, as well as the “nice-to-know” information that may drive audiences from the consideration to preference stages of the pipeline. “Does your organization align to your audiences moral and ethical compass?”, “Is your brand fun and playful, or more serious and straightforward?”, “How engaging and personal is your company?” Every communication with your audiences should tell a part of the story. People do business with brands they know, like and trust. Frequency and cadence of communications is important here. Understanding the balance between too much, too often and just right takes time and practice.

You can also use the conditioning process as a strategic tool to control the speed at which prospects move through the sales cycle. For example: for complex products or solutions, more conditioning may lower return rates and increase overall customer satisfaction. Or, if you have a smaller sales staff and a marketing campaign is wildly successful, conditioning can be used to keep prospects in a holding pattern until your sales teams can address them.

All said, capturing and qualifying leads can be a far more complex process than “name, address and phone number”. If you adopt a strategic approach to your lead process that is aligned to your sales, marketing and service efforts, you can manage your pipeline with great effectiveness and efficiency, build stronger and deeper relationships with your customers and drive long-term business success. Think beyond the lead.

Do you have any thoughts on defining a lead or managing the process? Please share!

Demand Generation: The Anatomy Of A Lead is a post from: Experiential Marketing 2.0

Mashable recently published “Google Wave: Better than Twitter for Conference Chatter” by Charlie Osmond at Freshworks. At first pass this article made a lot of sense. Charlie talks about how #hashtags aren’t an ideal way for people to share relevant content, and that the wiki-like interface of Google Wave makes it quite easy for users to share information of all kinds, effortlessly. This creates a more optimized platform for conference back chatter.

After watching the above video and spending some time checking out Google Wave (many thanks to Mike McCurry for the invitation) I quickly realized Google Wave is much more of a game-changer for event marketers than I originally thought. For those of you who have not yet received the coveted invitation, or if you have but just haven’t had the time to explore Google Wave, here’s a brief synopsis.

Google Wave is an online tool for real-time communication and collaboration. A ‘wave’ can be both a conversation and a document where people can discuss and work together using richly formatted text, photos, videos, presentations, drawings, maps, interactive games, and more in real time. Google Wave is an open platform and developers are being encouraged to create extensions, plug-ins and applications to make this offering even more powerful. Jay Lahiro also has a nice description on his blog.

We’ve been talking about social media as a conversation or dialogue for some time now. Google Wave allows us to have true ‘polylogues’, where multiple users can participate in the discussion at the same time.

There’s been a lot of discussion as of late about how to use Facebook, Linkedin, and especially Twitter for events. These discussions tend to segregate communications streams into ‘front channel’ and ‘back channel’. The intent here being that official, planned content around an event, whether face-to-face or virtual, is considered ‘front channel’, with most referring to social media as a ‘back channel’ communication stream. This is not to say that legacy social media tools cannot be used for ‘front channel’ communications, but few event producers have done so effectively. Participation tends to be limited to “We have a Facebook page.” or “Here’s the official Twitter #hashtag.” There tends to be an attitude that if you build it, they will come, instead of truly integrating social media content into an event and actively engaging communities online before, during and after an event.

Google Wave has the potential to change this paradigm. Here, official content (speaking sessions, blogs, photos, videos, exhibitor content -- promotions, product launches, etc.) could be included in a wave along with social media tools (Facebook, Twitter, Blogs, Conversations, etc.) This allows for the integration of ‘front channel ‘and ‘back channel’ communications streams, allows users to create their own event experiences and creates a true community around the event.

Virtual event platforms like InXpo, Unisfair, ON24, etc. should take notice. An open platform like Google Wave can disrupt their business model and give brands, event producers and event agencies a free and simple way to connect audiences with brands virtually. For face-to-face events, Google Wave provides a compelling enhancement which can add real value to their experiences for their audiences (think the ultimate hybrid event). The true measure of success however will be for event producers to learn more about how to engage audiences both on and offline, and use the event as a communications hub where brands, subject matter experts and audiences each have an equal share of voice in the community.

It’s challenging to describe Google Wave in words. The above video does a nice job of walking through the basic offering, and there are several other blog posts, etc. which can give you some more insight, but to truly understand it you must experience it. I strongly encourage my fellow marketing, social media and event brethren who haven’t spent time in Google Wave to secure an invitation as soon as possible, and begin to use the tool to better understand how you might use it to engage your audiences. Google Wave is in preview mode, and has not been made publicly available. The faster we can get over the learning curve and more we can influence its development, the greater the value it will have for us as it becomes more widely available.

Already on Google Wave? Please share your thoughts, and be all means, please connect with me at ianmcgonnigal@googlewave.com.

Google Wave: The Future of Event Engagement? is a post from: Experiential Marketing 2.0

I offer that although there are similarities and the two often complement each other, they are fundamentally different.

Simply stated, in this context an event  is a gathering of people at a predetermined place and time for the purpose of exploring and sharing information that is of common interest. There are several different types of events, ranging from large tradeshows and conferences, to panel discussions, networking meetings and intimate proprietary engagements. Each event type has a purpose in the sales and marketing cycle – a topic which I’ll discuss in a future post. But is an event in itself an experience?

A brand experience can be as complex as a visit to Disneyworld, or as simple as a discussion with a customer service representative over the phone. We all have experiences every day. Some are positive, some are negative, but few are designed effectively.

An effective experience engages all senses. It activates the emotional and rational triggers within us and motivates us. A typical event marketing program will employ some experiential tactics, but few completely. Here are seven ideas that will help you integrate powerful brand experiences into your event marketing program.

1.  Start with the audience. In order to design an effective experience or series of experiences, its important to understand your audience first. What are their emotional and rational triggers and inhibitors? What do they need to feel and understand in order to act on your objectives? Make sure your experience puts your audience in a position of power and confidence. After all, its all about them, not about you or your products. Although you are creating an experience for the masses, its important you drive a sense of intimacy with each and ever member of the audience. Make it as personal as possible. This foundation can be used not only in experience design, but in product development, sales process, customer service training and beyond.

2.  Know your objective. Event marketers often get trapped in their own repetitive cycle of events. Year-over-year they build and plan the same events, perhaps swapping out products and messaging from time-to-time. Its important to step back and examine the business, marketing and sales objective of your program, and then the contribution of each event tactic to that program. Establishing appropriate objectives for your event is the easy part. Sticking to these objectives and designing unique experiences which truly deliver against these goals is often the challenge. Focus on as few objectives as possible. This will ensure you invest time, budget and resources appropriately to drive success.

3.  Design the experience to be immersive with all six senses in mind. Yes, I said six. The sixth being rational intuition. If it all comes together, your attendees will feel and think they “belong”.  Its important your experience is as immersive as possible, surrounding attendees from all sides and use external influencers to effect internal responses. Event marketers often focus on the visual, sometimes the audible and seldom any of the other senses. Here are some thoughts on engaging the senses.

• Sight: Make it compelling: exciting video,vivid photography, appropriate colors and graphics all play a part.

• Sound: The volume is often just as important as the audible content itself. Remember to use ambience and silence to your advantage. These can be powerful engagers or distractors.

• Touch: Give your attendees something to touch, and to engage with. Think about texture. Holding something in their hand has been proven to drive value perception and ownership. Also don’t forget about temperature or air quality. At a tradeshow even plush carpet with a thick pad creates a welcome retreat for foot-weary business infantry. In speaking sessions, make seating comfortable, but not too comfortable.

• Smell: Site inspections are important. If a hotel conference room has a mold or mildew problem, this can detract from the experience. The same goes for strong cleaning products. Plan for the aroma of attendees. Ambient smell can be just as distracting as ambient sound.

• Taste: Especially important for hospitality settings. Make sure the food and drink is of the highest quality possible.

4.  Don’t forget about interaction. Interaction with things, as well as people. Arguably, the most important part of any experience is the people present and audience interaction with those people. Human interaction can make or break an attendee’s experience. Be professional, be engaging, be friendly, and most of all, be human. This is what will build real long term brand relationships.

5.  Tell a Story. In my earlier post Storytelling in Social Media and Events, I described some ideas on how to incorporate effective storytelling as a tool to engage and interact with audiences on both an emotional and rational level. You can tell a story at a single event or across several tactics. Success will be determined by your audience, your message and the way in which the story is told.

6.  Stay on brand. Do not sacrifice your brand intent to create an experience. Ensure the type, quality and tonality of your experience reflects well against your brand personality. Anything else will hinder audience engagement and long-term retention of message and brand association with the experience.

7.  Be authentic. Authenticity is critical in driving trust with your audiences. Ensure your experiences are genuine, authentic and true. Consider adopting a case study approach within your experiences driven by customers, partners, etc. to further empower authenticity.

Is your event an experience? These are just some guiding principles to get started. As marketers, we should walk around in the shoes of our audiences as often as possible to build effective and relevant experiences both face-to-face and virtually. As always, if you have other ideas, please share!

Are You Experienced? Seven Ideas for Engaging Your Audience is a post from: Experiential Marketing 2.0

One way to advance the conversation around using Twitter for event and experiential marketing is to leverage third-party applications. There are literally hundreds of Twitter applications available. A case could be made for using any and all of them for your event marketing program. I’ve spent some time reviewing some of the more interesting applications which can complement your events beyond creating buzz. In some cases there are alternate tools which perform the same function as those listed below. Feel free to explore. These are some of my favorites.

Twellow: The Twitter yellow pages. This directory searches the profiles (bios) of Twitter users when you enter a keyword. This application can be used to identify potential attendees, speakers, exhibitors, suppliers, etc. Its very simple to use, and ranks search results by number of followers.

Icerocket Twitter Search: There are several Twitter search tools out there. This is one of my favorites. Its a real time search engine and searches for keywords used within tweets. For events, Icerocket can be used to find trending topics, monitor hashtags, or find people of interest based on what they tweet. Bonus: Icerocket also searches blogs.

Tweet Later: This is one of my favorites for event marketers. If you plan ahead of time, you can schedule some of your tweets to coincide with the event schedule. Great for reminding followers of speaking sessions, or promoting your booth and other activities throughout an event. The perfect tool for press releases of new product launches, etc. I’ve used this tool for tweeting key points of my presentation while I was giving it. With rehearsal and timing it can work out pretty well. Keep in mind, while you can schedule some of your tweets ahead of time, its important to stay connected and be a part of the ongoing conversation live.

Tweetdeck: Monitoring the conversation around your event is critical. Tweetdeck makes this simple by allowing you to monitor several keywords, hastags, and people at once. Consider using Tweetdeck to monitor the conversation around your event in realtime. You can also set up Tweetdeck on large format monitors for attendees to see what content is buzzing in the twitterverse while they’re at an event. Bonus: Tweetdeck also integrates with Facebook and MySpace.

Tweetbeep: A very useful tool that monitors keywords and links and sends activity alerts by email every hour. Imagine having trending topics about your event, sessions, speakers, etc. delivered to you as they happen. Deploy Tweetbeep in addition to Tweetdeck to monitor hot topics.

Twtvite: a free event management tool that helps you organize and promote local Tweetups (informal social gatherings of people with like interests). You can use Twtvite to organize tweetups around your event. If you are using Tweetdeck or Tweetbeep to monitor conversations around your event, Twtvite can be the perfect tool to organize adhoc discussions to complement planned event curriculum based on what topics are trending.

Poll Everywhere: Need an audience response system on the cheap? Poll everywhere allows audiences to submit messages or answer multiple choice questions via tweet, SMS or the web. The best part: their feedback is instantly embedded into your live Powerpoint presentation. This tool has some amazing applications for hybrid events. Here you can get feedback from both face-to-face and virtual audiences during a presentation that is also streamed live via the internet.

Twtpoll: Simple polling application that allows you to submit a question to the twitterverse. You can choose form 17 types of questions and set a time limit for answers. This is great for gathering information for presentations before an event, or getting feedback after an event. Bonus: You can share Twtpolls across any social network.

Twitpic: This tool allows you to share pictures via Twitter – complete with geotagging. Share live pictures of your event with the world! Encourage attendees to share their event pictures as well. You might even incorporate a photo scavenger hunt into your event using Twitpic.

Twitvid: Like Twitpic but for video. Super easy to use. Share videos of speakers, entertainment, demonstrations, etc. via Twitter. Encourage attendees to participate. Bonus: autosharing to Facebook, MySpace and Youtube is integrated.

Twitcam: Create a live twebcast! Broadcast your event via this simple, instant streaming video application. This is great for speaking sessions, demonstrations, etc. Integrates with a twitter window so observers can comment / ask questions during the presentation. Its a good idea to have a moderator and a decent webcam / mic hooked up to your computer.

Tweetchat: Very cool application that allows users to conduct  live chat over twitter via #hashtags. I participate in the #eventprofs tweetchat as often as I can. You can organize tweetchats during your event on trending topics, or schedule these as part of you planned curriculum. Tweetchats can also take place off hours or for virtual participants.

These twelve Twitter tools will help you advance your event program beyond the profile, #hashtag and promotional tweet. If used appropriately these applications can drive community engagement before, during and after each event to create real relationships with your audiences across your event program. Use one, use some, use them all, its your choice. Understand your audience and objectives first, then pick the best tools to meet your needs. I’ve only scratched the surface here. Again, there are hundreds of third-party Twitter applications out there, and they come and go daily. If you find something that’s worked for you please share!

12 Twitter Tools Every Event Marketer Should Know About is a post from: Experiential Marketing 2.0

Imagine an outbreak of Norovirus on a cruise ship during an event, a branded archway collapsing on a crowd at a tradeshow, a bomb threat, or a fire at your hotel during a conference. Anywhere there is a gathering of people there is potential for something to go wrong. Having the right plan in place and acting appropriately can help ensure public safety, as well as ensure your brand survives when events attack.

I recently had the opportunity to attend a panel discussion on “Managing PR in a Crisis” produced by the Boston chapter of the American Marketing Association. The panel included several crisis communications rock stars:

• Thomas Lee, who was the spokesperson during the MWRA Deer Island disaster where two workers suffocated in an undersea tunnel – currently at 451 Marketing
• Donna Morrissey, who managed communications for the Archdiocese of Boston during the Priest scandal – currently at the American Red Cross
• Capt. Vic Beck, who managed Public Affairs during the Iraq War – currently at U.S. Navy

The panel was led by John Kellogg, a PR expert at Commonwealth Creative Associates.

Having been through a few event crisis situations in my career, I found the content to be extremely relevant for event practitioners. Here are 6 tips the panel brought up during the discussion which every event planner should consider as they build out their programs.

1. Have a set communications protocol in place: The worst position you can be in when a crisis occurs is unprepared. Make sure you develop a communication plan which addresses: what gets communicated, who gets communicated to, and what channels will be used for this communication during and after a crisis. Make sure your plan is flexible and revisited before each event to ensure it is ready to go in the event of any crisis. Having a plan and being prepared for a crisis is more important than ever with the immediacy of the social web.

2. Understand every audience is different: Audiences are complex. Different situations require different approaches in crisis communications. Make sure your plan is tailored to each audience and each situation through on-the-scene intelligence. It’s a good idea to discuss the dynamics of event audiences before your event so your plan can be tailored accordingly.

3. Writing matters!: Before one word is uttered about the crisis, take the time to think through and write down your messages. Practice reading it aloud. This will help you unsure the communication is complete, consistent and accurate. Always strive for simplicity and clarity.

4. Accuracy is critical: Get the facts straight before building your message. Be truthful and honest at all times with all audiences. If informational inaccuracies do occur due to different perspectives and the like, correct them, acknowledge them and communicate them as quickly as possible.

5. Speed is important: Ensure public safety first, then ensure your communication plan is executed as quickly as possible during and after the crisis. Remember accuracy trumps speed. Make sure you have correct information before communicating your messages to anyone.

6. Credibility is paramount: Crisis communicators have long been perceived as dishonest spin doctors. Always do the right thing. Humanity and authenticity goes a long way when engaging your audiences. Ethics matter. Be transparent to the situation. Anything less than “the truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth” should never even be considered during a crisis situation at an event. This above all else will drive trust and brand affinity well beyond the crisis.

There was once a time when PR practioners believed if they controlled the media, they controlled the message. Social media has made crisis communications far more challenging, and crisis communicators need to move more quickly than ever to ensure accurate, trustworthy information is communicated to audiences of all types. Sources matter, therefore the social web cannot be 100% trusted despite the speed at which citizen journalists are reporting their perceptions of crisis situations. It’s critical event planners are prepared with the right plan, the correct approach and the appropriate response to any crisis situation. Be accurate, be fast, and above all, be honest and your audiences and brand will recover when events attack.

When Events Attack: Managing Communications in a Crisis is a post from: Experiential Marketing 2.0