While we don’t make Event Apps, we always like to see what the more than 120 event app providers are doing — or not doing. This year, we were excited to see Attendee Engagement and Interactivity (top trend), Gamification (#4 trend) and Interactive Q&A (#10 trend) all rank so high on the chart. Further, we were surprised to see that many of the Event Apps reviewed by the Event Manager Blog are missing capabilities that we offer.
It got us thinking.
We should compare ourselves to event apps so you can see how these two technologies work together to improve attendee engagement.
How Does SocialPoint Compare to Event Apps?
At SocialPoint, our strength is helping deliver dependable, on-brand, custom-looking interactive trade show games and event gamification quickly.
Event Apps, on the other hand, are your online event guide and a single point of contact for event communication.
How do you integrate SocialPoint’s audience engagement games into an Event App?
Let’s use CVENT’s Crowd Compass as an example. In Crowd Compass, you can set up an icon with a link to our web-based app. When attendees click on the icon image, it opens our game as an internal web browser link inside the event app. When the player is ready to return to the event app, they click the back button to exit the game and return to the main menu.
It’s a simple way to add gamification to enhance the attendee experience at corporate meetings and conferences.
What are some of the ways that SocialPoint improves the attendee experience?
1. Manage Live Polls, Interactive Q&A, Word Clouds & Brainstorming
Our app allows you to set up a “show flow” of different types of questions that can be pushed to the attendees (by room) when it is appropriate.
2. Trivia Games and Quizzes with Leaderboards
If you want to turn up the engagement, then use our three strikes trivia game. A popular strategy is to activate trivia during breaks and put the leaderboard on the big screen during walk-in and walk-out. Attendees will go wild. You will quickly get more than 10,000 trivia questions answered in a one-day event.
3. Spin to Win Prize Wheel
Use this as a name picker or a prize picker – either approach will generate excitement in your event. Why SocialPoint? Branded, inventory management, and looks fantastic on the big screen.
4. Attendee Participation Game (APG)
It may look like word soup, but the APG is a content-based event gamification product. The APG ties together the best of what SocialPoint has to offer, so you can script out content-based games aligned to your event’s objectives. Which other vendor allows you to build games that include trivia, kiosks, prize wheels, and leaderboards?
What is the feature-by-feature comparison of apps in the Event App Bible and SocialPoint?
This table compares the audience engagement features in the Event App Bible with the features that you can find in SocialPoint. (Get the Event App Bible to see how your event app vendor compares.)
Feature
% of App Providers (per Event App Bible)
Available in SocialPoint?
Live Polls
83%
Yes
Live Polls With Onstage Display
78%
Yes
Live feed for Comments / Questions
78%
Yes
Anonymous Voting
78%
Yes
Social Media Wall
69%
Yes
Tracking Responses Back to the individual
69%
Yes
Speakers can manage their own Polling and Q&A
30%
Yes
Gamification
66%
Yes
upVote Questions
61%
Yes
InApp Registration
60%
No
On-site Registration and Checkin
60%
No
Individual Leaderboard
54%
Yes
Team/Group Leaderboard
40%
Yes
Gamification with Points for Rewards
52%
Yes
Virtual Prize Wheel
0%
Yes
Name Wheel Winner Picker
0%
Yes
Kiosk Based Trivia Game
0%
Yes
Instant Win Game
0%
Yes
Custom Prize Manager
0%
Yes
Digital Fishbowl Kiosks
0%
Yes
Scavenger Hunt
46%
Yes
Custom Games
43%
Yes
Session Checkin
66%
No
Session Checkout
49%
No
Event Checkout
46%
No
Video Livestreaming
34%
No
Audio Livestreaming
32%
No
Slides Livestreaming
32%
No
Automatic Moderation
28%
No
Brainstorming
26%
Yes
GPS Check-in Check-out
21%
No
Collaborative Annotations on Slides
20%
No
Live stream Recorded via app
19%
No
Live translation
12%
No
Automatic Speech to text
11%
No
Vocal commands
9%
No
What kind of data can I expect with SocialPoint?
Data, Reports, and Insights. After creating an excellent attendee experience that’s the real goal, right?
For those of you salivating with excitement about the data, generally, SocialPoint captures the following types of data in our games:
Player contact information
Game performance statistics
Player performance statistics
Content data (Survey responses, idea generation, live polls, etc.)
Traffic and participation (Who played what, where, when?)
Most people use the dashboard as a single page report to share with leadership and other stakeholders. They take the leads and any lead qualification (or next steps data) and upload them to their CRM. Then, we see mixed uses on the rest of the data.
After a recent sales meeting, our customer success team sent the client a spreadsheet with 35 tabs of data and a PowerPoint with more than 20 pages of reports and graphs.
When the reports become gigantic, like the one above, it’s usually a function of having a large number of content challenges.
Does SocialPoint have a back-end management system like my Event App?
Like your Event App’s content management system, SocialPoint’s back-end is cloud-based. You can confidently make changes from your office that will cascade to monitors, kiosks, and mobile devices in real-time.
When you signup with SocialPoint, you will get a user id and password. Depending on your plan, you may be allowed to manage access for your team.
Most event marketers are relieved when they see our back-end management system. It’s straightforward.
Even though we have a lot of products, we created an integrated user interface with a standard onboarding process for all products. We hide the complexity of each product, so users only see what they need to succeed. Things like dashboard reports, adding/editing content, downloading data, links for setting up the screens/apps. That’s all most people need during an event.
How will SocialPoint get me ready for my event?
You have 1,001 other things to do to make your event a success. Creating a game is just one more thing.
Once you signup with Socialpoint, you will be assigned a customer success manager. This contact is your new BFF.
She will help you plan and design your game, establish key project milestones, set up the software, and train your team before you go onsite. Oh, and you can contact your customer success manager when you are onsite if you need help!
I am not sure how this compares to your Event App provider but know that we are here to help you succeed. We won’t let you fail.
Final Comments
SocialPoint + Your Event App = Improved Attendee Engagement
While our strength is helping deliver dependable, on-brand, custom-looking interactive trade show games and event gamification quickly. Each purchase comes with an experienced customer success team to help you get things set up efficiently and effortlessly.
Samuel J. Smith is a thought leader, researcher, speaker and award winning innovator on event technology. In 2011, BizBash Magazine added Sam to its annual innovators list. Since then, Sam has won awards from Exhibitor Magazine, IBTM World, RSVP MN, International Live Events Association and MPI for innovation in event technology.
