From AI to Zapier: Essential Event Tech Terms for Eventprofs

Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Merijn van Buuren (00:10):
Welcome, welcome, indeed Welcome, to
Control + Alt + Event, the showwhere we navigate the future of
events with practical insightsand real solutions.
We're not just talking event,we're showcasing practical
examples and delivering realsolutions for the event industry
.
I'm here together with formerphotojournalist turned data
storyteller, the man who hascreated custom platforms, data

(00:32):
visualizations and anuncountable number of
integrations.
He's the founder of Visual Hive, a data driven AI marketing
engine for marketers and events,and if you need help on video
and data strategy,personalization and anything AI,
he's the one to talk to.
A pleasure to welcome you,Bogdan Maran.

Bogdan Maran (00:52):
Hey, thank you very much.
It's a pleasure to be here andjust to reposite it with a
lovely introduction for thosewho don't know you you are
Merijn.
You are a tech enthusiast byheart, founder of Event Mender,
clearly a man on a mission tohelp the events industry embrace
technology to its fullpotential.

(01:14):
You have worked with over 100event tech providers, a thousand
, over a thousand eventprofessionals and all types of
event, and he's the person youneed to get in touch if you need
help with finding andimplementing any of your event
technology.
So welcome, Merijn van Buuren.
If I managed to pronounce thatcorrectly at some point.

Almost almost , Merijn.
The pine part.
Let me remind you of that.

The pine.
I always forget about the pine.

Close call, though.
Thanks, Bogdan, and thank youall for tuning in live and being
here.
If you happen to be listeningto the recording of this episode
, make sure to join us live nextweek, as we will be live each
Tuesday at this time, which is3pm GMT or 4pm Central European
time, to get all your burningquestions answered.

That is absolutely true.
We will also, if you listen tous on any of your preferred
platforms, come to live and jointhe conversation, technically
speaking.
And today we will be talkingabout AI to Zapier, event
technology, the soup ofalphabets that we dive into.

(02:28):
And the question is you came upwith this idea and I really
liked it, and it's especially ofthe format, and you said
something yesterday about theknowledge gap.
Why do we need to get to expandthis digital dictionary?
Why do we need to stay ahead ofthe curve as event

(02:50):
professionals?

Well, that's a very good question, but before
we dive in a little overview ofwhat we will be talking to you
about today because this is thefirst topic, why do you even
need to match that gap and makesure that you are aware of the
event tech trends?
But also, what are the mostessential trends and tools?
What do these terminologiesmean, how do you apply them for

(03:15):
your events and what benefits dothey bring to you as an event
professional?
And, most importantly, how canyou actually implement them or
take the lead in the eventindustry by implementing them?
Today, as you said, we're goingto start with why this is even
important In terms of event techsavviness, it is obviously

(03:37):
crucial for you, as an eventprofessional, to stay ahead of
the industry and make sure yourevents are always cutting edge,
and the more we dive into thisdigital age that we're in
expanding your digitaldictionary, as we like to call,
it, is more and more essentialto keep up with those latest
trends, the innovations, and tomake sure that your event is

(03:59):
that cutting edge event thateveryone is as excited for as
people were for the Vision Pro,for instance, I think we went
through all three points aboutwhat you're going to do today
and just keep until the end.

Keep bury with us until the end, because we have
some three very lovely giftsthat we can give you.

So, moving forward, maybe we can go to the
next one in improving your event.
It's mainly about expandingyour digital dictionary and that
allows you, as eventprofessionals, to explore those
new technologies and tools andto open up the possibilities to
enhance event experiences,increase engagement and

(04:37):
streamline those operations.
And in order to do that, youneed to know the right
terminology to actuallycommunicate in the right way.
And that's where the comes inin terms of stakeholder
communication.
I think you also know a bit ortwo about the stakeholder
communication.
Wh y do you think it'simportant?

The challenge here is that you've got a very
traditional industry that iswell, is well equipped to get to
the point when it comes tosetting up a live event, when it
comes to setting up specificchairs, the specific setups,
legislation and everything else,but when it comes to technology
, we are lacking behind a lot,and that means that you are not

(05:19):
able correctly to communicatewith your suppliers.
You're not able to correctlycommunicate with everything that
happens above you.
So it's crucial that you get tothe point very quickly.
You understand what you wantand you understand what to ask
for.

Yeah, no, it is indeed essential in that
sense for your communication andobviously, the most, the best
way to stand out and, as thisbeautiful meme says, like, you
can be the competition if thereisn't any.
And by making sure that you areone of those event

(05:56):
professionals that actuallyunderstands the technology to
its fullest potential and beingable to understand the
capabilities for your event,you'll be able to integrate them
and use them in a way that noone else does, which makes your
event that one event thateveryone is looking forward to.
And obviously, today we wouldlike to explain a bit more in

(06:16):
terms of these most essentialtech terms that you can use, so
you can make sure to stand outand beat all the competition
because there isn't any withoutfurther ado, here are the main
topics.

There is We'll talk towards the end about all
the terms that we came up withand the tools that we're going
to give you to navigate this,but we've picked up six that we
think that are crucial at thispoint and it would be very nice
if you put in the chat, becausewe have it here and we can look
at it, even if I look a littlebit over my shoulder but will

(06:53):
any questions, any terminologythat you want, any questions
that you want to ask and you cango through them.
But today we'll be talkingabout AI generally, integrations
and automations, big data,privacy, security, hybrid, async
, live and everything else inbetween, and a bit of a rant
around the technologies event,specifically event technology

(07:14):
especially from my side, atleast, absolutely.

And, as you mentioned, we did quite some
additional research to thisspecific session we're talking
about today, and we came up withover 5,000 different tech terms
and tools, but that wasobviously a bit too much to dive
into, unless you want to take acouple of days to listen to us.
So we looked at the commonpoints where they overlap, and

(07:39):
these six main topics that we'llbe diving into today really
cover all those aspects, atleast the most important ones
for you as an event professionalto know, good to know for those
that are listening in afterthis live and also for those
listening in live.
We will be making slidesavailable with actually some
additional explanation added toit.

(08:00):
So the slides we'll be usingtoday are more fun so you can
actually focus on theconversation, focus on the chat.
No need to constantly takenotes everywhere, although make
notes of those things that aremost important for you, but know
that the slides will also beavailable and actually with a
lot of additional knowledgethere for you.

(08:21):
Just a quick heads up, but yeah, without further ado, let's
dive into the first one AI andmachine learning.

I think we're going to have a home town.
Yes, that is my home town.
Ai is a lot of things, butsince the new additions and
everything exploding inmainstream with GPT is
specifically open AI and chat,gpt and everything else.
I think that my favorite partis that finally, my imaginary

(08:50):
friends talk back, which isabsolutely fun from that
perspective.
They don't really talk back asI would expect them to, but I'm
training them, so you're goingto get there.
So going into a I as a term isnot correct, because I is
exactly like events.
You know, you have b2b event,have b2c event, you have
concerts, you have some it's,you have Trade shows, you have

(09:13):
working networking tables, youhave workshops.
You have all these types ofevents that happen and is the
same t hing with AI .
It's basically a very generalterm that we've we've picked up
very quickly because it's easy,is very good for marketing, it
helps you transmit something.
But usually, because we'regoing into this part of the
conversation, usually it alsohinders your expectations

(09:37):
because you say I'm going to usea I, so what are you going to
use?
Face recognition?
Are you going to use voice totext?
Are you going to use livetranscriptions with translations
?
What exactly are you going touse.
So I, just as a very quickoverview, and as marine said you
have, you're going to go.
You can download the slideswith a little bit more details.
I sit at the top of the top of aframework that starts at the

(10:00):
bottom with deep learning, whichhappens for a while, quite a
few years.
You go down afterwards intoneural networks that you might
have seen when it comes torecommendation, and just for
companies like grip.
You go into machine learningand if you're into data and go
into that a little bit later,you will know that that makes
recommendations and you've usedthat even if you haven't
realized about it makerecommendations based on

(10:24):
Previous data and among manyother things like reasoning and
Ensemble methods and anomalydetection and all these crazy
words that you can findafterwards.
And then you go into artificialintelligence and artificial
intelligence, technicallyspeaking, deals with the part of
things like natural languageprocessing and you've got

(10:45):
intelligent robotics, you've gotvisual perception, you've got
planning and scheduling, you'vegot speech recognition.
So, technically speaking, ifyou played with any of the
recent tools like chat, gpt,like me, journey everything
around there it takes all thefree levels of deep learning,
neural networks and machinelearning and take them to
another level.
So that's where we are With theAI side, but, more importantly,

(11:07):
how can we use AI for events?
Because, as we said, we have alot of things.
One of one of my simplestdefinitions and examples is AI
is not going to take over ourjobs.
What I really hope, though, isgoing to take over the jobs of
the top level in the industrythat really don't do a lot of
things, and let's thehardworking guys add value to

(11:28):
the hard, hard working ladiesand gentlemen who actually put
together events.
Ai is about adding value to youand your audiences, so it's all
about from problem solving toplanning and scheduling for
yourself, to all the way tochatbots that help your
attendees manage their eventsbetter.
It's all about personalization.

(11:50):
It's all about adding all thesevalues to your events, and I
think I can go on for a fewhours here, but I'll try to shut
up and let you put something inas well.

No, I think you're absolutely right and, as
you say, like AI is here not totake our jobs.
I think we all familiar with thesaying that the AI is not here
to take your job, but the peoplethat are using AI are there to
take your job, and that'ssomething that also emphasizes
why it's important to understandthis terminology and to make

(12:20):
use of it to make yourself moreefficient, to make your
processes more efficient, to getmore and better results, rather
than to have to leave your jobbecause someone else who did do
it is taking over, because theycan do twice as much as you can
if if you're lacking behind.
So that is indeed a veryimportant point and, as you
mentioned, there's a lot ofapplications for AI in events

(12:41):
and it's up to you to understand, to Take a good look at your
processes and where AI canreally add help for you to be
more optimized, to do more, tosave yourself a lot of time.
I think that that's the mainpoint.
I would add to one very quickthing, just as an example
because you're very, verystructured focus.

We're trying to be very focused on examples and
give you practical terms.
So, from my perspective, interms of using I extensively in
an in one applied case, we do alot of strategy and we do a lot
of consultancy and helping eventprofessionals get to a point
where they need to get to,regardless if that means AI,
data integrations or just usingtechnology or just formulating a

(13:25):
commercial plan.
And with one of our clients,when we worked with a Dalton, be
with that and be advisory whichbig shout out to to aid here
Because we love him and what wedid we are supposed to come up
with we did a workshop.
We took a deep dive into whatwe're doing and usually it takes
us about two, seven to ten daysto come up with a strategy that
is very nicely done with awhite paper and everything else.

(13:46):
So we took that from ten daysto about five days.
So we've half that time withactually way more better
documented the better documentedarguments, bigger white paper
and everything else and bettervisualization.
It doesn't mean that they didit for us.
It took me about three daysinitially just to train it, but

(14:08):
other afterwards the output waswas quite streamlined and very
interesting.

Love that example and also a perfect segue
to the next meme Spending tenminutes doing the test manually
or spend ten hours writing codeto automate it.
Although if you do that task Alot of time, it is definitely
worth taking a bit more time.
In your case, three hours tothen for each and every client,
for each and every event thatyou're working with, save

(14:40):
sometimes a few days in yourexample, and the same is true
for integration and automation.
I think we all are in some wayor form familiar with one or the
other, or maybe both of them,but I think it's also good to
understand the differencesbetween those two.
As you know, integration isoften seen as that first step

(15:03):
towards creating a cohesivesystem or a landscape within,
within which then automation canbe used, more effectively
implemented.
So they complement each other,and that's why we also group
them in this case.
I am a big fan of both of themIn terms of integration, we all
know that event professionalsevery day they are looking for

(15:24):
that all in one tool that no onehas yet created or not
perfected in that regards, andthere's always something missing
or lacking.
And how beautiful would it be ifyou can just find a way to
still add that missing piece orthose missing pieces to the
puzzle.
And that's really whereintegration comes in Gives you

(15:45):
the possibility to kind of mixand match, pick and choose the
different features, differentplatforms that you like to use
in your workflow, in your day today life, and create a one tool
that Really covers it all.
And then automation is kind ofthe cherry on top, where, within
those systems, instead of youhaving to go from one system to

(16:05):
the other or look in one systemand then Put it in another one,
automation can really automateall the different small tasks
that are quite repetitive.
For instance, if someoneregisters for your event, then
would be great.
If it also happens to be placedin your series System, it
automatically gets updated andthen they get an automatic email

(16:28):
.
So, in that sense, all thosesmall steps that previously you
had to do step by step, one byone, now all of that is
happening in the background,which allows you as an event
professional to focus onOrganizing the event.
And here I think you again havea great example of working with
one of your more recent clients, finding a way where they had a

(16:52):
few different tools.
I also was lucky enough tocontribute a little bit to that
project where they wanted tohave different tools from CRM to
their events registrationsystem, to an event platform, to
task management system, andintegrate all of that.
Maybe you can give it a bitmore.

Absolutely true.
The beauty of it and where Ithink it integration and
automation fits in is especiallythis example, because I think
it's a very good example Is thatis not just about the event
technologies.
They're not talking about justregistration, for example, and
your digital platform orsomething to that degree it's
about.
It's about Smoothness ofoperations.

(17:31):
When we came in, the biggestproblem was how can we make
operations smoother?
So how can we transmit, how canwe make the flow from sales, so
from the we're talking about atraitor here so from the sales
point to actually deliveringsomething fantastic for that
Exhibitor and sponsor and forthe attendees themselves.
And I think we're talking aboutone, two, three, four, five,

(17:53):
six different platforms, out ofwhich one we've custom built
because it was cheaper to toautomate and to make it better
From for the exhibitors and forthe organizers as well.
But all of those platforms talkto each other.
So it's not fully automated, isnot the magic one, because you
can't do that, you have to do alittle bit of manual wrangling,
especially because events have aspecific, every event has a

(18:15):
specific requirement and thatmeans that when you go to, when
you go to something that is offthe shelf and it's not custom
built and extremely expensive,because custom builds can tend
to be extremely expensive whenyou try to do everything it's.
It helps you save literallyhundreds of hours a year across
all events portfolio.
It helps on board your sponsorsbetter.

(18:38):
It helps you manage sales.
It helps you do everything fromthe.
It's fantastic to see that comealive, because you're just
about to wrap it up next weekand it's been absolutely joy to
work on from that perspective.

It's a beautiful project.
Fortunately, we're not namingany names today, but I'm sure
people are interested.
They can hook you up and get abit more in detail in terms of
examples of what tools they useand how they can actually
implement it for themselves.
And a big part within thatintegration and automation is

(19:14):
also the flow of data, and thatis then a great segue to our
next topic, which is big dataand analytics.

Yeah this is your hometown it is absolutely spot
on, because the challenges thatwe have at the moment and if we
go back to the first point whenit comes to AI, ai is nothing
without data, let's be veryclear about it.
So it might help you take halfa step forward, but without the
data that you have, withoutcustomizing it with your data so

(19:48):
I'm not saying about sharingyour data, but having your own
instances and training them withyour perspective and context it
doesn't mean anything.
So the project we're talkingabout allowed us to go and say,
okay, we've done all of this,you have all your data in one
place.
We have the point of truth,which is absolutely vital.
But can we move now?

(20:09):
Moving forward, Can we optimizeeven more?
Can we look past everythingthat happened now?
Can we predict revenue, forexample?
Can we look at betterpersonalizations for your
audience?
That comes over and over?
Can we build that community andcan we go into it?
And for me, data is again.
We can go hours and hours ofwhat big data means.

(20:30):
You have event professionals.
From my perspective is one ofthe biggest unchapped business
intelligence solutions for B2Bcustomers.
So the amount of data that anevent can output is absolutely
huge.
The challenge here is that youdon't be scared when you compare

(20:50):
yourself to Google, for example, because that's not the point.
So, if you have your data andyou have your point of truth,
the magic of AI, the magic ofintegrations, the magic of
everything will happen withoutdoubt, and I think where it gets
, where it will get you.
If you look at big data fromyour perspective as an event
organizer, you're looking at thefirst meme just be the only one

(21:14):
, because you want to be on topof everything.
You want to know everything.
And I'll quote here for afriend, from somebody that I
hold very dear, david Preston,who told me that at some point
that look, companies should knowbetter than event organizers of
what's happening with theiraudience.
So, if you're looking at a bigcompany, david comes from the

(21:36):
perspective of IBM working withtheir events across the world
for a few years and managingtheir events across the world.
And my counter argument as muchas I agree with this up to this
point, this is not true anymore, because when you're talking
about big data, you're talkingabout scraping or social media,
for example.
That was one alleyway of doingthat, but that's not going to
happen in the next three to fouryears.

(21:57):
We are going to be owners of ourown data and what happens at an
event that, in that bubble oftime, gives you very accurate,
very in-depth and better datathat what would happen on a
day-to-day basis online and howyou should look at it is use the

(22:20):
big data that is coming fromoutside.
So use tools like Databricks andGoogle and get your data and
help your partners get your data, but add to that that little
bit of with commas of data thatyou get from the events is vital
to structure everything elseand you should keep a look at it
.
And, of course, a bit of a rant,data visualization, which is

(22:43):
one of my favorite parts notnecessarily the data management
and the strategy andvisualization and storytelling.
That's kind of my thing is datavisualization doesn't mean how
many times you scan a peopleindividually in and out.
It's about what they do, howthey behave, how you look at it
and so on.
And one of the things that Ithink started our conversations

(23:04):
a long time ago was I wasfascinated how you use data with
Event Mender to actuallystructure the event platform so
event organizers can come.
So event organizers can comeand have a better understanding
of what they're talking about,and I think that's a small step
in terms of big data, but it'sabsolutely crucial and it

(23:26):
highlights exactly why a smallamount of very good data can
have a huge impact over big datapoints across the system
Absolutely.

It's the difference to comparing pairs to
apples or apples to apples,which the latter is obviously
the one you want, especially foryour event, if you want to make
that informed decision andunderstand how you can improve
on your event, which parts youmaybe should let go of in the
future and which parts youshould double down on.
And again, their quality ofdata that you also mentioned in

(23:58):
the AI.
It is essential and lucky forus.
We just spoke about theautomation part.
When you bring that into thedata, then you can look at real
time data and you can make onthe spot decisions.
And I think that is also wherethere's so much potential still
for the event industry to beable to say at the day of the

(24:21):
event, like, listen, this isgoing well, but this is not, and
we can improve.
On the day rather than a weekafter the event, look at the
data and be like, oh, we shouldhave done this better, which is
still good information, but ifyou can change it on the day of
the event, that's what reallymakes an impact and that's what
your attendees will notice, andthen next year they won't be

(24:41):
like, oh, yeah, but this part ofthe event wasn't great.
They were like well, it startednot, but man, were they able to
turn it around?
And that's how you wow them,and that's how they come back
for more next year?

Absolutely.
And just to segue to the nextone, do the next bit At this
point.
The tools available to storeand manage your data so I'm
talking about the collection,data preparation and even data
visualization, because dataanalysis and storytelling it's
something slightly different Areeverywhere and are very good,

(25:13):
so you don't have to have yourown server somewhere in a room
to have it to have your datasecure.

And that is kind of the next topic in terms
of your data, not only is veryimportant, but I can be
extremely it's important to lookat security, but we are in a
better place now technologicallyto do that, and I'll let you
take this one, because this isup your alleyway yeah,
absolutely and I think both dataprivacy and security are things
that are top of mind, or shouldbe top of mind at least,

(25:41):
especially if you're working inthe in the EU, but, generally
speaking, all over the world,people are getting more and more
aware of their own privacy, thefact that everything that's
free you pay for with your data,what is happening with that
data, and even if you pay forsomething like for an event,
probably will still happen thatyour information ends up with
the ex-example.

(26:01):
There's, for instance, or theevent in that regards, for you
as an event professional, tounderstand privacy, as in the
focus on the rights ofindividuals regarding their
personal information and howthat data is collected, but also
the security of it.
As you mentioned, there are alot of tools that obviously
cover that, and it's not thatyou have to bake in and code the

(26:25):
security all by yourself, butunderstanding especially if
you're working with governmentalorganizations that have a very
high standard in terms of thedata security that the tools you
are working with Also coveredtheir standards and you don't
have to know the exact detailsof how it works, but just
knowing that they comply to aspecific ISO, an ISO term, or I

(26:52):
see, Bob, it's important thatyou own your data and have easy
access to it, absolutely, andthat's also something where you,
as an event professional, havean essential role into deciding
which platforms to work with.
For instance, we are nowhosting this event.
It's also an event on LinkedIn.
We are not the owner of thedata.
Linkedin is owner of the data.

(27:13):
If you are working withspecific tools, it's good to
know who has ownership of thatdata.
Is the event platform that I'musing gonna sell my data to some
big company, or is it actuallyall owned?
Are all my attendees safe?
And that is something thatbuilds trust, something that's
very important in our industry,obviously, and to make sure that
participants feel at ease,especially if you're working in

(27:35):
a specific niche category whereyou have high standards for data
and privacy and security, it'simportant for you to Understand
the basics.
You don't have to knoweverything again, it's way too
much of a rabbit hole to divedeep into but just understanding
some of the terms, like yourwebsite needs to be secure, you
need to have an SSL certificate.

(27:56):
You don't have to know how itworks, you just have to know
that you need to have it so youget that nice lock on your
browser.
So people feel Confident whenthey are searching for your
website and they come to it andthey don't get a pop up.
Hey, this site is not secure.
To give you an example, andtalking about tools, I think we
are flying through the time, sowe'll just yes to the next one.

(28:19):
We will be decided.
We decided not particularly todive into virtual, because we've
all heard a lot about virtual,but obviously hybrid and
asynchronous events Are verymuch what's top of mind for
event professionals these days,and these platforms obviously
have a lot to do with All thetopics we've mentioned before.
What are they integrate with AI, whether they help you to

(28:41):
automate or integrate with yourcurrent, with your current
system, for instance, but alsothe data they produce and how
they visualize it, how you cantake action on it.
The privacy and security, likeAll these topics kind of trickle
in this one together, becauseyou, as an event professional,
you wanna make sure to cater toyour audience and obviously not
everyone is waiting for avirtual event.

(29:02):
A lot of people, if they cannotbe there I keep repeating
myself, obviously, but let's say, you broke your leg or there's
a storm or whatever reason.
You cannot be there in person.
You still wanna be part of thatevent and, depending on your
audience, you can decide toeither go with in this case we
decided to be To do hybrid, asthe simultaneous event that

(29:25):
means that both your virtual andyour in person attendees are
present at the same time doesn'tmean they have the exact same
Program, or it doesn't have tomean that they have the exact
same program but they will beattending at the same time,
which allows you to find ways tobridge those audiences together
and to create mutualexperiences and, in that sense,

(29:46):
expand your reach for your event.
But asynchronous is just as goodas an option.
If you have an audience thatdoesn't need to be there, that
isn't really there to feel therush of the in person audience,
but you just wanna trickle downsome content, some ways to
interact with them during theyear during a longer period of
time, then asynchronous is theway for you to go.

(30:07):
And obviously there we have alot of event tech terms as well.
I know both.
Then you've done also a lot ofevents or experience a lot in
this direction.

What, for you, makes hybrid and asynchronous
events essential looking at timeI think I have to be quick to
that on that but it's it'srelatively simple is the way
everybody else outside events,everything.
You don't have to be in thatplace, you don't have to be at
work, you don't have to that.
Do that.
So, if you, if you only keepthe live event, which is a
unique and specific experience,you don't have too much, too

(30:41):
many chances of success.
If you're focusing on contentspecifically, for example,
because most people go to eventsfor content, educational and
education.
In this very simple, take a bigevent like money 2020 they have
15 stages.
Nobody can physically be atthat on all those stages.
So, when it comes to hybrid andI think it means that either I
can go for coffee and listen toa chat without having to be

(31:04):
there or I listen to it while Icommute, because I might be
there just for a day, but I canthen engage with it afterwards
and go on my website and go andfind that.
But keep in mind, you have tomake it interactive, you have to
make it work for them.
So my, my concept is alwaysmeet your audience where it is.
If they need two minutes whilethey go with the dogs outside to

(31:27):
see something.
Meet them there.
If they need an hour while theyrelax to listen to something.
Give them an hour, but makesure that it's targeted and it
adds value to them and it savesthem the most important thing
that they have, which is typewhy.
That's why hybrid and I think,are important.
Time is the most valuableresource they have.
Save it and you'll get there.
Gain their trust.

(31:48):
And the example I think wetalked about was a little
slightly different because itwas in the middle of pandemic
and it was one of my favoritestill events I've been on and we
had the.
We had a relatively small event, only 70 people, but they were
supposed to be live in a roomtechnically speaking, multiple
rooms and network and createconnections and pitch certain

(32:10):
ideas further to be funded.
So they need to make friends,basically, and pandemic hit and
they couldn't anymore.
So we had, I think, 70 pluspeople around there on all parts
of the globe on all differenttime zones, so the somebody
should interact at 5am, somebodyGMT, somebody was at 2pm GMT

(32:31):
because that's when their workwas done and we go back to
everything in terms of dataimplementation, integrations,
and we didn't have AI at thatpoint, but still we've managed
to make a platform out of aboutnine different solutions.
That managed to take the role,and it was about being
asynchronous, aboutcommunicating about me and you
being in completely differenttime zones but still working
together.

(32:51):
So we had this huge mirrorboard where people were actually
putting ideas and commenting onthem, and it was asynchronous
and they could access documents.
At the end of the day,everything was.
We looked at data and looked athow people actually integrated
with it, how people used it,when they use it, and it went on
for two weeks.
So we had to adapt every singleday to see how we can improve

(33:13):
this looking at data.

I think it's a great example and, to
Kathryn's point, like Iappreciate, easy to find
recordings as well.
I think on demand is a huge partboth of simultaneous, where you
simultaneously look at ittogether with the in person, and
the online participants afterthe event ended, as in
asynchronous events.
It's quite an important element, especially for those that are

(33:38):
really interested in the topic,but there were, as you mentioned
, 10, 20 sessions going on atthe same time.
You cannot duplicate yourself.
Maybe in the future there willbe technology to do that, but at
the moment we can't.
I see we are indeed flyingthrough time, which is great,
but we have one more, because Ithink the bottom line of this is

(33:59):
there are a lot of things toconsider when it comes to your
event, and one of the things wewere discussing about is the
need for event professionals toalso find ways to not put all
that weight on their ownshoulders and work together with
people like you and me who loveto work with technology, and
that's why we wanted to divequickly into event technology

(34:22):
specialists as well.

That's my rant.
Surely, keep it under 30seconds.
The reason behind the rant isvery simple.
I've actually seen a few jobsonline and we've had this
conversation a couple of daysbetween the two of us that
advertising event technologyspecialist exactly within these
terms I don't mind the terms andI know we have this new term
called CEO, which is chiefevents officer, which deals with

(34:44):
the execs and higher tiers andthe CEOs and how to bring the
economical part into theeconomical conversation within
an organization, which iscrucial.
But if you don't have a strongbase, that CEO won't be able to
deliver those results.
So an event technologyspecialist is not the individual
who creates the forms in C-Ventor in Bizabo or in IDLume or in

(35:08):
any form like that.
It's the individual who needsto understand your KPIs, your
business objectives, yourengagement objectives and go
back with their knowledge aboutthe industry and the technology
not just the event technologybut everything else and make
sure that those work andidentify those tools that will
make your event unique,operationally fluid and making a

(35:31):
lot of money in the same time.
Yeah, that's my answer.

Yeah, absolutely Sure.
No, I like it straight to thepoint and it's a lot more about
just the technology itself.
It's really making sureeverything comes together.
And that's a good segue to thenext slide, where we talk about
how to implement these kind oftools today.
And, as you mentioned, there'sa lot of small steps that work
to that bigger goal.

(35:54):
And if you want to try to takethat big step while you all know
the letter, I think you'll bestanding on the bottom of the
letter and we obviously want youto be able to climb to the top
of it.
And that's why we came up withkind of these 10 steps or nine
actually, but the 10th one youcan kind of implement at any
point where you get stuck, tomake sure you can already start

(36:15):
implementing these technologiesand understand the technologies
better.
And it all starts with you,your event goals and outcomes
you have in mind to thenunderstand your audience, do
some research and evaluatedifferent tools.
Again, at each of every one ofthese steps there's someone that
can help you, whether that'sone of us or any of the other

(36:35):
event technology professionals.
We have a large network, so ifyou're looking for a specific
question, don't hesitate toreach out, because it's
important to have those threefirst steps so you can actually
plan ahead, set it up the rightway, test it a few times, train
your team before you actuallystart preparing your attendees,
running the event, and theneventually collect feedback,

(36:57):
analyze and improve and kind ofstart back up on the top again.
And yeah, again, we are here tohelp you wherever you feel the
need.
If you have a question, put itin the chat, but also don't
hesitate to reach out onLinkedIn or send us an email,
whatever you like.
We're here to help you make themost out of your technology so
you can again, as we said in thebeginning, come ahead with your

(37:20):
events and stay on top, so kindof rushing through it.
But we have three nice giftsfor you today.
Yeah, let's dive in.
Let's unpack the first one.
For everyone who is strugglingwith it, it feels overwhelming.
You know you have sometechnologies there, but how can
you improve on them?

(37:40):
Are they the right one for you?
How can you implement them inyour event tech formats?
We understand there's a lot ofquestions that touch up on the
topics we talked about today,but that go a bit deeper, and
that's why we're offering foryou a free 45 minutes assessment
with us, either with Bogdan orme, where we dive into your

(38:01):
specific situation.
Not sure if you want to add aspecific.

Look, you and us are awesome, equals awesome.
It's.
Every event is special.
That's why we do this, so wecan go through the details,
understand where you are andgive you at least the direction
or some actionable thoughts.
It's not just about let's talkand give you, but the idea of
this is to go in and dosomething actionable.

All right, yes, you're right.
When you're passionate aboutsomething, you always run out of
time, Kathryn.
And thank you, Andrew.
Andrew, we really are happy togo through them and more than
happy to go through them in moredetail.
Another one we spoke about thefact that we just went through
those 5000 different terms toget to this presentation.
Well, we actually decided whynot do something with the data?

(38:49):
And we collected all of thatdata, all the different terms
and an explanation, and givingthem to you.
You can either scan the QR codeor go to bit.
ly/TechTermsAtoZ

I think we can show it a little bit, because a
couple of minutes won't destroyour site.
We didn't expect to be on time,like last time.
The bar was way too high tofinish up on the door that we
had.

But we had a few.
We'll have to keep it short,but it's good to show them.

Absolutely.
We actually had a little bit ofdata visualization.
It's not the point now, we'llshow it next time, but if I find
my page.
So basically, if you go to thelink in the QR code or share
that on LinkedIn, you'll findall the 6,406 terms with
explanations on this page.
You can use the search bar.
But way nicer is we used achatbot called Bob E, which I

(39:42):
strongly recommend.
We like doing this and talkingabout the technology term, so we
use a chatbot.
We use the no code platformcalled Noodle.
We use a lot of things thatyou'll find here, but you can
even have a conversation withthis chatbot.
So, for example, you can askfor a term or you can ask for a
specific case study.
I'll give you this example veryquickly In terms of what would

(40:04):
you like to know, where you'dlike to go, so you can start
engaging with the chatbot andlet us watch you, let us let us
what you think.
We will work on this to addmore features as we go forward.
And it actually works.
I was panicking there for asecond, but my London internet
actually caught up with me.
I'm very happy.
So, yeah, it's have a chat,have a play with it, have a tool

(40:25):
that it's specifically trainedwith, the, with over one million
two hundred points of data ifyou want to know exactly or
Slightly more than that, so it'shopefully quite nice.
It's something that you'requite proud, and, yeah, back to
back to the gifts.

Yeah, back to the third gift.
I kind of hinted to this onealready in during the
presentation.
Obviously, the slides we usetoday had quite some visuals but
not really in depth explanation.
So we created a slide deck thathas every term that we spoke
about and, within that term, thefive most essential terms
within that topic or categorythat you need to know, with a

(41:02):
small explanation why it isessential to have it as an event
professional, just to give youa bit more context so you can go
to that at your own time assynchronous or do it together
with an event for a smallsimultaneously.
That's great and obviously, ifyou have any questions about
that or anything else, then feelfree to reach out to us as well

(41:25):
.
I know we are out of time, butbut let's take one, two minutes.
Obviously this one is a is anessential one as well.
We do record this session.
It will actually be availableon the podcast channels.
It will.
From tomorrow onward it will beon YouTube as well, so Just

(41:47):
search for control out event andyou'll be able to find the
channel there.
But on all the podcastplatforms we are there as well
and we'll cut up some of thesetopics so you can see some bites
sized content here and there aswell.
Who knows, we might be onTiktok anytime soon.
We are recording this.
For those that requested it orthat cannot find it, I will send

(42:11):
it to you as a DM, or, if youhaven't asked for it, just send
us a message.
We're happy to share you therecordings so you can go through
it at your own time andobviously make sure to also
schedule that event tech checkup so we can walk through that
together.

If there are no questions, then, then I think we
can believe we can and thankyou very much for being here
taking.
It's quite a pleasure to seepeople engaging and we are quite
excited and that's where we aretalking a lot and we get a
little bit sweaty if we pressthe wrong button or if my screen
crashes and I cannot see wherethe slides are to press the next

(42:49):
one.
But we do have a question fromKathryn what tech do you use to
do this live?
We use restream.
It's one of my favorite.
I've managed to convince Merijnto to use this one.
I think he's more accustomed tostream yard.
There are quite similartechnically speaking.
I like I like this one justbecause I'm more used to it

(43:12):
technically, I think.

I used to use riverside dot FM.
Well, thank you, Kathryn, veryhappy to hear that, Kathryn.

Thank you very much.

That means the world to us.
I used to use riverside dot FMbefore this, but unfortunately
they don't support overlayswhich allow us to have the
control event logo here, forinstance, or our names, which
for us was a deal breaker andthat's why we went with restream
.
In case you're wondering, it'sa beautiful tool.
Definitely check it out.

(43:43):
Well, actually, if we can goback to the slide one more day,
because I would love to watchone, I forgot about this.
I would love to give people aquick heads up for next week,
because besides the fact thatyou can do an event tech check
up with us, we're actually goingto do live event tech
assessments.

(44:04):
So you can come to us next weekTuesday.
If you have a specific questionabout your event tech stack or
you want us to have a look atyour event tech stack, we can do
that together in thatparticular call.
Obviously, it will help if yousend us a message beforehand so
we can prepare a few things.
But, no sweat.
We can also do it on the gowhilst we are live.
So feel free to send us amessage.

(44:28):
Make sure you are there,obviously next week to either
submit your own event tech stackand your own event tech
challenges or to listen to otherpeople and how they are solving
it, so you can expand yourknowledge.
Yeah, it's the same time asthis week, 3pm GMT or 4pm CET.

We did miss a question from Bob.
But Bob, we can, we need to.
From Bob to the but we need to,we need to buy your coffee and
go through that because I thinkin another episode specifically
dealing with data collection, onusing third parties, and how
much do you need to explain tous and this probably two
episodes, if I'm not sure.

We'll make sure to put that as a specific
episode actually on the timeline.
But also you, Bob, can just youknow with this specific
question, you can get an eventtech check up and we'll be happy
to walk you through that aswell.

Definitely, and thank you for putting our
podcast on the on the list, bythe way, just yeah, if you want
to see content from events, gofollow Bob Toovey.
You'll see what he does.
He does amazing stuff.

Absolutely Event Planner News for all your
lists of all the YouTube videosthat are being posted, all the
event podcast that ever existed.
You name it.
They have it all there, so makesure to check them out.
Coffee sounds good, guys.
Well, I hope we see each othersoon in London.
Indeed, with that, let's notkeep people any longer.

(45:53):
Yeah, I think.
Yeah, just thanks everyone forbeing here and any any last word
from your side of.

I'm beyond excited we're doing that and thank you
for the support doing this.
And thank you for the supportand just give us some feedback.
Any questions?
Pop us a message by us, as inscan the QR code and come and
talk to us, even if it's notsomething that you have any
pressing questions about.
Just want to have a healthcheck and see where you are and
where you're heading.
See you next Tuesday at 3pm GMTand 4pm for Central European

(46:26):
Time.

Absolutely.
Happy Days.
Have a good day.
We're looking forward to thenext one.
Cheers everyone and thank youfor joining.

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