We’re at Event Tech Live again this year, showcasing our event app and services at the exhibition and participating in the education sessions. Event Tech is different to the rest.
It has an air of ‘cool’ about it, that other events-about-events don’t have. That makes it a good event trend barometer of what’s hot in the world of events.
Here are a couple of things I noticed:
Where Did The Walls Go?
Walls must be seriously passé as last year there wasn’t a single session held in anything resembling a room. The main stage was surrounded by exhibition stands and smaller campfire sessions were held in corners of the exhibition hall.
They certainly looked the part with logs for stools and autumnal leaves strewn around them. The lectern and screen didn’t quite fit the theme but hey, function over form as they say.
There are some pros and cons to this set up. On one hand the noise adds to the buzz of the whole event. On the other, hearing the speakers was challenging most of the time.
I really like the campfire idea, but I think the organisers should scrap the screen and lectern and have the speaker sit right amongst the crowd. That would feel more like a campfire chat and, as a bonus, the audience would actually be able to hear what they had to say!
By the same token being close enough to hear the sessions on the main stage from our exhibition space was great when there were no attendees to speak to.
But it was a bit distracting when actually trying to talk someone though an event app demo.
Event App: Latest Trend Or Deeply Rooted
Speaking of the event app world, is having an event app for your event still seen as hip? Or are they a standard element of every event? If the number of event app providers exhibiting last year is anything to go by it’s probably the latter.
We’re really looking forward to doing it all again this year and no doubt there will be many new trends to report back on. Check our hot event trend update from earlier this year and see if you think any of the hippest ideas are catching fire!