Takeaways from MOVE Global Mobility Summit 2018

Event planning is a skill that is to be built over time and experience. We believe that every event, no matter how big or small is an opportunity to learn. We try and find takeaways from every event we power to share with all you event professionals out there.

These lessons can be implemented by planners to optimize their event experiences. We ourselves have put some of these pointers into consideration and have based our product improvements on it.

Our most recent learning experience was the MOVE Global Mobility Summit 2018 held in New Delhi, India by Niti (National Institution for Transforming India) Aayog, the policy think tank of the Government of India.

India’s First Mobility Summit

The event was India’s first of its kind mobility summit in India, organized to promote safe, smart and sustainable transportation solutions for future generations. It was a large scale government event with a vast number of esteemed professionals from across all fields of mobility and transport.

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Being a grand initiative, the event was a huge affair with a lot of pre-events and workshops across the company happening days before the main event to focus on niche areas related to the overall event agenda. The event also a range of pre-events and attendees from all over the world. Barring the pre-event attendees, the main footfall on the day of the event was more than 2100.

There were some amazing panel sessions happening at the event by some of the best in the industry. Participants included delegates from tech giants including Ford, Tata, Suzuki, Mahindra, Virgin Hyperloop, etc.

Simultaneously, the organizers had an exhibition at the event venue itself showcasing some amazing innovations by companies in the field of transportation and mobility. It was quite a tech-driven event.

Hubilo’s journey to GMS

Hubilo received the opportunity to create the mobile app for the event due to its previous work with Niti Aayog for another large-scale government event, The Global Entrepreneurship Summit 2017.

Being a part of similar events helps us as vendors to gain perspective on every aspect of event technology that we must focus on for this particular kind of event. We knew the amount of work that was to be put in and the areas that we were required to focus on.

Hubilo was given the responsibility to create the main event app called MOVE Global Summit 2018. Apart from this, there were certain additions which were to be made to the MOVE Global Mobility Summit’s main website as certain pages including the pre-events were to be added. Hubilo received the opportunity to assist the organizers with these modifications as well.

An entirely new dashboard was created for the organizers along with the event and thus began the tasks.

The MOVE Global Mobility Summit 2018 event app:

The organizers of the Global Mobility Summit 2018 wanted to provide a platform to all the intellectuals and industry experts attending the event to start a conversation based on their event agenda.

The perfect way to do it was through a handy tool that attendees can access on the go; a mobile event app. The app was designed and developed with features that helped attendees discuss important issues and network with fellow attendees while maintaining their privacy.

1. Schedule:

The main event had a lot of amazing sessions with some really good speakers headlining these sessions. Apart from this, smaller events and exhibitions were happening at the venue simultaneously.

The entire schedule of the event along with the sessions and participants was listed on the MOVE Summit event app.

With such a huge event venue where multiple events were happening at a time, having a schedule handy made it really simple for attendees to navigate through the entire event.

2. Networking Platform:

Networking was key to accomplishing the overall goal of the event i.e. to help attendees from multiple facets of the transportation industry meet and discuss a safe and sustainable future of transportation through innovation.

Select attendees were given access to the mobile event app and the event networking platform in particular so that they can meet, chat and discuss upon the event agenda on the day of the event.

Attendees could filter the profiles of other attendees based on industry, designation or organization and set up a meeting with them in order to further the discussion.

3. Event Feed:

The event feed was an integral element in keeping the attendees updated on the entire event and interact with their fellow attendees. The attendees could post a variety of content on the feed including posts, photos, videos, polls and web links.

Polls were created in relevant topics from energy conservation, smart transportation to road safety by the organizers as well as the attendees that lead to healthy discussions on the summit themes. Attendees posted a lot of great infographics and images as well.

These posts received engagement from fellow attendees on the app, turning the feed into a sort of social media app exclusively for the event that provided a platform for them to interact productively.

4. Summit themes:

The summit was meant to discuss the future of transportation through innovation in mobility.

For this, a variety of panel discussions and sessions were organized on a vast range of topics which were then divided into six different themes as mentioned before. A brief insight into what the summit was going to focus on was provided within the event app itself.

Along with this, the organizers had also created a separate section listing down the main summit themes, providing a brief description of each theme and the importance of the same in the overall agenda of the event.

5. Participants :

The event was a first of its kind event with a lot of VIP delegates speaking at the event. You could say, the A team of transportation was assembled to headline and participate in various discussions and panel sections, from CEOs and Chairmen of mega transportation companies.

These speakers were listed as ‘participants’ on the event app. Attendees could browse through the sessions that the delegates were a part of.

It was a great way to engage attendees in the session and creating a feeling of anticipation in case an attendee was looking forward to hearing a celebrity speaker or hear the opinions of a particular participant.

6. Individual QR Code & Login mechanism:

The app was personal to every attendee. With an OTP based login, attendees were required to log in to the app to use certain services. Each attendee had their individual attendee profile on the event app.

Apart from this, the event app also had a section called QR code whereby each attendee could access their own QR code with their details embedded in the code. They could the use this QR code to check-in at the event venue.

With an event that had such a huge footfall, i.e. more than 2100 attendees, this feature made the check-in process relatively faster and simpler as attendees can directly check-in with the QR code from their app itself.

7. Live Polling:

A polling feature was integrated within the event app for the summit. The feature was extremely handy in terms of engaging the event attendees. On the second day of the event, the organizers involved the attendees with the mobile event app by conducting a quiz through this live polling feature throughout the day.

The live polling feature can also be used to gauge attendee opinion on certain important issues and get a discussion started on the same in real-time.

Apart from this, the event app also contained a live Q&A feature that could be used by attendees to pose queries and have them answered by session speakers live.

Website additions:

As mentioned before, along with the main event app, we were also given the opportunity to assist the organizers with certain integrations in their existing event website. Following were the custom sections that were created from the organizer dashboard that were integrated on the MOVE Summit Website:

- Event Registrations

- Individual sections for blog and pre-events

- Event Networking section

- FB pixels + Twitter social media integrations and tracking

Our takeaways to help planners organize events with a cause

1. Tech can help you plan sustainable events

Green events are on the rise. The aim of this event itself was to get a discussion going on sustainable transportation through innovation.

One of the ways in which planners can try and facilitate green events is through the use of event technology. Having a handy event tech tool such as an event app helps save on paper brochures and is good for the environment.

Apart from this, the entire event was a technology hub promoting a sustainable future. From social walls to exhibits promoting technology in transportation, there were exhibition areas that showcased innovations in transportation systems.

2. Networking plays a major role in large-scale events

In a large scale event with more than a thousand attendees, it is almost impossible to converse and network with every single attendee. In this case, attendees might miss out on a great level of potentially beneficial connections as they were not able to interact with a majority of fellow attendees.

A digital event networking platform, in such a scenario, is a great way to help attendees filter out connections that interest them and interact with these connections. The networking feature of the GMS mobile event app helped attendees discover the profiles of more than 2100 fellow attendees.

They had the option to either set up a meeting with the people they’re interested in networking with or message them directly on the app. This feature contributed a lot towards the overall attendee ROI of the event.

3. A dedicated Event Platform helps further the event agenda

It is important to provide a platform to attendees to discuss important issues especially in case of events with a cause. The MOVE Global Mobility Summit was held with a cause to discuss the future of mobility, sustainable mobility through innovation to be exact.

The event feed feature was meant as a tool for a large number of attendees to interact and post their opinions on an open platform where other attendees can engage and contribute to the discussion.

There were a lot of polls and discussions that were posted on the event feed by the organizers as well as the attendees on a range of transportation-related topics that lead to a healthy discussion among the attendees. It increased engagement as well a help organizers achieve their end goal i.e. to get the discussion going on smart mobility solutions and innovations.

4. Pre-events can be a great event promotion strategy

With planners who opt for pre-events within their event promotion strategy, it is a must to categorize and leverage all these events accordingly. Taking the example of the MOVE Summit, all the pre-events had a separate space on the main event’s website.

The events were also leveraged for promotion on social media. Talks about the main event began way before it began as many publications extensively covered and focused on all these pre-events.

Each event can add on to the promotion and participation for the main event and can increase the footfall for the main event when leveraged properly. With events that have a lot of pre-events, proper categorization is a must

Another large-scale government event, another amazing experience with something to derive from.

Have your own event experience to share? Something that you think might help other planners learn from?

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