Planning a successful event is hard.

The country is home to thousands of spectacular events that attract attendees from all over the world, so if you want to have any chance of standing out, you need to keep looking for ways to make your events better and more interesting than everyone else’s. Luckily, advances in technology have completely revolutionized how event planners put together events. 

But why are so many event planners considering beacon technology? Let’s explore five of the main reasons below. 

Provides a Unique Marketing Opportunity

Event planners must always be on the lookout for ways to get the most out of every single event that they organize. 

And beacon technology provides unique opportunities to engage audiences and drive sales or attendance goals in the process. 

For instance, using proximity marketing, event vendors or hosts can send notifications to attendees that are near a particular part of the event such as a store, a conference, or anything else.

By offering exclusive deals or unique call-to-actions to people that are nearby, companies can maximize the chances of guiding people where they want them to go, gaining more control over how an event unfolds.

For instance, people nearby could be notified of an exclusive, limited-time deal that a sponsor of the event is offering and quickly direct a stream of people to the sponsor, helping to control outcomes and maximize the value of the event. 

Valuable Insights Using Heat Maps

Another intriguing use of beacon technology is setting up heat maps for your events that allow pinpointing precisely where each and every attendee is during your event. 

Now, you may be thinking how can that be useful, but the truth is, experienced event management companies know that being able to control the flow of the attendees can help to streamline the entire event and ensure that there are no holdups or interruptions that can delay the schedule.

For instance, beacon technology can help to control traffic through checkpoints or gates, alerting the event organizer if a certain area gets overflowed, allowing to allocate human resources in real time.

Another way to use beacon technology is to monitor the behavioral patterns of the attendees.

You can identify the most popular areas of your event, and use these insights to improve your future events, expanding on the areas that were the most successful and removing those that ended up sucking up resources and time without producing the desired results.

Finally, if you want to gain more control of where your attendees go, you can send automated notifications to those attendees that drift away from where you want them to be. A short message enticing them to go to the main area for a special performance, a great deal, or merely to not miss out on the main event can all help boost participation levels during your event.

Streamline Networking

Most business events and conferences revolve around networking – the leading people in the industry gather in one place to discuss trends and share valuable experiences, so event planners in the UK must make an effort to make networking as easy and convenient as possible.

Luckily, beacon technology can help take your event’s networking possibilities to a whole new level.

If you use beacon marketing in combination with an event app, you can provide a virtual network where attendees can connect based on interests or specialties, and then send notifications to attendees once someone they decided to communicate with is nearby.

This can significantly improve the networking efficiency in your event, helping people seek out connections that they deem the most valuable, which can position your event as a pioneer of new technology.

You can even gamify the entire experience by setting up a points system and rewarding the attendees that establish the most connections.

Improve Navigation

Getting around a larger event with multiple booths, speakers, or performances can be a challenge. It’s not only frustrating for the attendee but also bad for you as an event planner, since the more time the attendees waste wandering around, the less time they spend attending events or networking. 

But today, event management companies have an easy way to solve this problem once and for all.

With the help of beacon technology, you can set up a system where attendees can get easy directions on their phone, through the event’s app. By wearing a beacon, they can be alerted where they are and where they need to go, eliminating the need to wander around looking for directions.

The technology can also provide information about nearby booths or speakers so that they can find out what can they attend that’s nearby. 

If your event is on the larger side, you can also add the option of marking off sections that an attendee has already visited so that he can plan his time more effectively.

Sponsorship Opportunities

Finally, as an event planner, you must be thinking about making your event as profitable as possible. And with beacon technology, you can gain new opportunities to raise sponsorships that weren’t possible before.

If you use beacon technology during your events, you can set up alerts that promote special offers from sponsors to your guests. It’s even possible to set up the alert to go off as they come near the booth or area where the sponsor is operating.

You can sell these promotional alert spots to sponsors and not only increase profits from your event but drive attendance to specific areas and boost overall revenue as well. 

Want to learn more about how event technology can and should work together?  A great place to start is found here: What You Need to Know Getting Started with Event Technology Integration. 

Sarah Hill is a content writer at Seven Events Ltd – a leading venue finder in Birmingham offering event management, team building, incentive travel, and conference management. She started her career in the events industry almost a decade ago as time progressed, she became an avid event blogger sharing her insight on corporate event planning.