Whether you’re a fan or not, it’s hard to miss the hype around the biggest football championship of the year. And this year’s coverage has been particularly interesting with a spotlight on first-time host, Minneapolis. Unlike previous metropolises like Houston and San Francisco, Minneapolis/St. Paul had some hurdles, including fewer traditional event space options and frosty conditions. But the Twin Cities capitalized on its “Bold North” strengths to become the ultimate Super Bowl hub with a wide lineup of memorable experiences in and outside the big game.

Event organizers know that balancing tech trends with the realities of business and budgets is a challenge.

Roll something out too early, or to an audience that doesn’t fit, and it can easily fail. Hold back on new tech and your event can feel dated.

So how do you make sense of “bots” and voice-activated technology like Amazon Alexa? Well, the first place to start is understanding the difference between a new trend and a new technology.

My first post covered the steps event marketers should take towards GDPR compliance leading up to the event – now it’s time to talk about what happens onsite and beyond.

The Big Day

Acronyms, folks, am I right?

(IDK, but I’m SMDH about GDPR. AFAIK, u r 2.)

Between these (and other) daft initialisms, scaremongering click-bait, and alarmist legalese the GDPR hype is becoming an ever-louder buzzing noise in the back of marketers’ minds.

The reason GDPR has been set up – to protect us and everyone else – isn’t the first thing that we’ve learned to think of when it comes to the subject. We’re too distracted by the prospect of being fined €10 million.

People’s palates continue to become increasingly sophisticated and discerning. There are more of us snapping photos of food, enjoying pop-up restaurants and cooking gourmet meals at home (with or without the benefit of the ingredients delivered direct to their door) than ever before. The term ‘foodie,’ which was once reserved for food snobs and the elite, is now a self-proclaimed adjective many of us wear proudly. If you’re new to the world of event food, read on for some helpful strategic tips for planning your next tasting.

With technological advances, it's becoming easier and easier for people to ignore traditional marketing messages. They can fast-forward commercials thanks to the personal video recorder (PVR) or avoid them altogether with apps like Netflix. They can mute digital advertisements from brands within apps and on various social media platforms, and they can filter their email inboxes to reduce content that includes sales copy. So how can companies reach potential customers without the message literally getting lost in the mail?

Since Corporate Event News launched this past September, we’ve done our best to bring you interesting, relevant news that will help you do your jobs better. Now we’re checking in to see if what we’ve been doing has been working – and give you the chance to provide feedback and input to help shape our content going forward.

The right speaker can help change an average conference or event into a memorable one. Approaching your speaker selection process with a purpose can lead to increased attendance, a more inspired audience and a higher profile for the event. You might think of a well-chosen guest speaker as the exclamation point to the content provided by your executives or presenters. Plus, the right speaker with proper motivation can help attract more attendees.

Tech helps the brand experience world go around, from audio-visual solutions to the latest innovations in digital marketing. Tech is precise, mathematical and useful. It can be eye-catching and fun, too. But ultimately, tech is just part of the show organizer machine that powers event marketing and sponsorship.

Stop the engines for one second.

What if I told you event tech, at its best, can make shows more personal and create deeper connections between you or your sponsors and audiences? It seems counterintuitive but it’s true.

Corporate events come in many types and sizes, but all have a few elements in common: online registration, some type of check-in process, and a credential (badge, wristband, or digital) assigned to each attendee.

At the simplest prospect or consumer events, in a single location for a few hours, the credential may be just a paper badge with the attendee's name printed on it. Or it may not be a physical credential at all: a QR code in a smartphone app may work fine.