Ahead of the Curve: Mobile Apps for Meetings
T
oday, meeting planners have an overwhelming, ever-changing array of technological options and add-ons to choose from when it comes to enhancing the event experience. When it comes to mobile apps, the Overland Park CVB in Kansas now offers meeting planners a “try before you buy” option that enhances the Overland Park destination experience while helping planners gauge whether this kind of technology is a fit for their groups. “There are so many destination mobile applications out there
today,” says Liron BenDor, vice president of marketing. “They’re all wonderful, and they’re really fantastic tools for visitors coming to any destination. What we were noticing is that we get a lot of meeting planners, and a lot of meeting planners are seeing this for the first time - let’s give them a taste of what you can do with mo- bile app technology.”
As a bureau that prides itself on staying ahead of the tech curve, BenDor says her team pays close attention to trend reports such as MPI’s FutureWatch study, which shows that about 80% of meet- ing planners use smartphones. Through various partnerships, the
Overland Park CVB is able to offer those planners a complimentary, customizable way to sample mobile app technology for their groups. Event-specific pages are built in-house by the Over- land Park CVB staff and can include a welcome video, an agenda, and links to speaker bios, PowerPoint presentations, post- event surveys, and more, all in a password-protected area only ac- cessible by event attendees.
“A lot of planners wanted to know, ‘Can we keep this up after our event?’” BenDor says. “And we said, ‘Absolutely.’ There’s no expiration date. It’s your page, and it’ll live here as long as it needs to.”
The Overland Park CVB’s new meeting app is enjoying frequent requests and great feedback from planners, BenDor adds, with a new event page being built about once a week since July. “The main selling point is that it’s free,” BenDor says. “There are so many apps out there that do maybe a little more than ours does, but before organizations make such an investment in a mobile app that could cost $5,000 to $10,000, they want a taste of what it can do. In the end, we can say, ‘This is how many people accessed this page; your group really liked it’ or ‘You know, people didn’t really download this; maybe this isn’t the right audience.’ There are so many different scenarios in the way we want to help our meeting planners. It’s really an education tool for them.”
WWW.MIDWESTMEETINGS.COM - ALL NEW LOOK, ALL NEW PURPOSE, ALL FOR YOU 97
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