stay in sessions or scan their badges and leave. Previously, conference organizers really had no way of knowing in detail what attendees did once they got their badges scanned. “Scan counts only allow us to gauge when they checked in,” Varraso said,

“but we have no knowledge of whether they left for large periods of time or which sessions may have captured an attendee’s attention for the full dura- tion of the session.” The benefit of using RFID, compared to scan counts, he added, “is that we have precise knowledge of the attendee behavioral patterns by the minute.” The data is helping Pri-Med to select and schedule topics. At Pri-Med West 2013, Varraso said, some popular tracks drew as many as 25 percent more attendees than the badge-scan

data showed. RFID data “becomes very useful in identifying which specific ses- sions drew the most attendees, as well as which sessions actually captured the attendees’ attention for the longest period of time.” The converse is also true. “If a ses- sion had minimal participation and barely kept the attendees there for the full session,” Varraso said, “then we know that not only was the topic deemed unattractive, but the actual delivery of the content also failed to keep the attendees’ attention.” An important part of the initiative

was to make sure that, at registration, attendees were informed and clearly understood how the RFID tags would be used, and were given the opportunity to choose whether they would wear a badge with a tag or not.

The biggest challenges were unfa- miliarity with the technology and uncertainty about how the data would be used. “Our promise to the attendees,” Varraso said, “was that we would use the data only in aggregate form and not at the individual level.” Even with those assurances, about 10 percent of attendees did decline the tags — a figure that wasn’t high enough to affect the integrity of the data that was collected, Varraso said. “Our big push was to make sure that we were transparent.”

As useful as the RFID data is, Pri-

Med is using it only at large, annual events like Pri-Med West, he said, add- ing: “It doesn’t come cheap.”

. Barbara Palmer is senior editor of Convene.

PCMA.ORG

AUGUST 2013 PCMA CONVENE

41