We recently ran our Rethinking Event Sponsorship Workshop for 50 event planners from the London area. It was led by Matthew Weihs from Bench Events. And if the number of questions from the audience is any measure, event sponsorship is a very hot topic.
In fact the Q&A section of the event app after Matthew’s session was so popular we adjusted the agenda on the fly and let the conversation flow.
Brainstorming
As you would expect we had many associations in attendance.
Some in an enviable position where they have more sponsors than sponsorship opportunities, some who struggle to facilitate the attendee networking their sponsors desire and others who are daunted by the prospect of selling to sponsors.
A great discussion ensued with attendees offering advice to each other based on their own challenges and experience.
Event App Sponsorship
Our second session was led by CrowdComm’s Matthew Allen, on the topic of Event App sponsorship.
We had introduced the app for the workshop via a promotion video that played as attendees took their seats.
Matthew then showcased some of the ways the app can add value to sponsors during his session.
Gaming
First up was gaming and a giant rock-paper-scissors challenge, the winner of which was awarded 500 points on the game as a starter.
The answers to other game challenges were buried in the session content and the lucky winners won an event app game for one of their own events.
Branding
Matthew also showcased many other places in the app where a sponsor’s brand can feature from in app alerts/push notifications to live polling and Q&A results to live display.
Networking
Lunch was kindly sponsored by Hilton WorldWide and was served in the room to encourage attendees to stay and network.
I had the pleasure of chatting to quite a few event planners and by all accounts they thoroughly enjoyed the workshop.
We did too and as bonus we have identified two other very pertinent topics we plan to run workshops on early next year. Email me if you would like to be invited: [email protected]
