Event Tech From Marketers’ Futuristic Lens

Technology has become an inherent part of all marketing models. Event-tech is the buzzword in the event industry and marketers have their own benefits to reap from its successful deployment. Event technology is evolving at an amazingly fast pace and given the current scenario, this is a necessity.

Amidst the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic, most people and organisations have turned towards the digital world to gain better prospect and customer traction. They have incorporated event tech in their marketing strategy, to drive positive trends in their investments and respective marketing returns.

Deepali Nair, Director Marketing, IBM- India and South Asia says “The impact expected from an event is brand building in the thought leadership side and also from ROI perspective to be able to drive business. We have seen that the tech platforms have substantially increased the reach for us but when it comes to doing business and ROI, the opportunity that was presented by physical meetings with clients is slightly stymied.”

Speaking about the use of event marketing, Prabhakar Tiwari, CMO, Angel Broking explains that dealing with millennials and Gen Z means that creating excitement and sense of engagement for them is very essential which we try to achieve through events in our marketing mix. “The kind of global organisations that we are seeing today demands event tech platform even once covid will fade away. Especially since most organisations are adapting to the remote working culture now, event tech will open newer opportunities in times to come,” he added.

According to Vishwajeet Parashar, CMO, Bajaj Capital “Post covid event marketing has become a very critical part of the marketing mix for any marketer. Due to decreased dependence on on-ground activations & less ROI from traditional marketing, event tech has drastically increased over the past year. The expectations of marketers from event tech platforms are very simple that is give us all solutions under one roof rather than we approaching different vendors.”

Naair believes that the opportunity for the tech platforms is not to replicate what has already been done in the physical world but to rethink the customer journey and what will bring the ROI to the marketers.

While according to Tiwari the next challenge for the event tech platforms is to be able to give additional sensation with the 2D screen or the physical piece of device available.

Sharing perspective from an event tech platform, Bhavya Sahni, Director, Revenue Operations, Hubilo informs, “For an experiential event platform like Hubilo no two events look exactly the same and marketers are given the opportunity to drape the events their way as it is their brand and we have no limit to the visual library that brands can import inside the platform.”

“Hubilo has tried to give a depth to the platform by catering to the needs of all the stakeholders of an event be it the audience, sponsors, exhibitors or the organisers,” shares Sahni.  

The discussion was held at BW Applause Experiential Marketing Summit & Awards 2021