Case Study: Corporate Events

Corporate event management software creates an exciting attendee experience. Whether you’re organizing an internal event aimed at training, motivating, and rewarding your employees, or an external conference designed to woo your customers and partners, you can engage your attendees throughout the event. And, because company events come in all shapes and sizes, you need to consider all different requirements when choosing your corporate event apps.

We are honored to be trusted by so many distinguished corporations worldwide and have supported more than 350 corporate events in the past year. Please explore 5 different categories of corporate events our app has supported and how it has allowed organizers to bring their teams together in unique and creative ways.

1. Sales Kickoff Meetings

In the first quarter of 2019 alone, over 35 corporate companies chose Whova business meeting apps to support their sales kickoff meetings, inviting their sales representatives from branches around the world.

Goals: The organizers wanted to motivate, educate, and strengthen their sales teams with informative sessions, team building opportunities, and fun experiences.

Encouraging Sales Reps by Showcasing Their Success Stories

Whova naturally motivated employees to start in-app discussions with one another in Whova’s unique and popular feature, the Community Board. Attendees could share a wide variety of information and experiences under the Discussion Topics they created.

• Attendees could share their own success stories with colleagues through Discussion Topics. One attendee at the Herff Jones sales kickoff meeting created a Discussion Topic of “Inspiring Customer Stories.” This boosted employee recognition, morale, and motivation before the conference had even started.
• A contest in the Discussion Topics encouraged employees to brainstorm ideas. The organizers at the KBR conference created a Discussion Topic of “Suggest our new technology names.” By sparking friendly competition, attendees became more engaged at the sales kickoff meeting. 

Supporting Product Training by Sharing Knowledge

Whova helped organizers collect and share the resources employees would need to gain a stronger understanding of their company’s products and services. Live Polling facilitated interactive training sessions, while Document-Sharing helped circulate important information. Attendees could also post their own articles, tips, and ideas through the Community Board.

• Organizers could share product and training documents within the corporate event app. ISCO’s organizers shared 24 documents at their sales meeting to give employees up-to-date sales information in one convenient location.
• Document-Sharing developed industry knowledge among attendees and speakers. At Metl-Span’s sales kickoff meeting, speakers shared articles on their session topics to help attendees understand and remember their sessions. At KBR’s sales technology conference, attendees shared over 217 articles, ensuring a wealth of resources on each market.

Bringing Attendees Together Through Social and Networking Activities

Whova business meeting app allowed organizers to create sales events that brought whole teams together and gave attendees the chance to arrange their own activities for different purposes. Using the Community Board, attendees could create Social Groups to unite people from the same backgrounds or with the same interests.

• Attendees could organize their own social initiatives through in-app Social Groups. By creating Social Groups for each sales region (Canada, Southeast, Atlantic Coast etc.), attendees at Herff Jones’ sales kickoff meeting could arrange smaller social activities, such as drinks and meals. This boosted event engagement and enjoyment.
• Participants from around the world could share transportation from the airport. Organizers at International SOS created Airport Ride Sharing Groups, so attendees could make carpooling plans and meet other attendees before the summit began.
  

Whova also supported larger networking opportunities with Name Badge Generation, which allowed organizers to create custom name badges in different designs. This made it easier for attendees to quickly recognize fellow attendees who have commonality at busy gatherings.

• It was easy to identify attendees and find key people with Name Badge Generation. Organizers created name badges for attendees at Breg’s sales kickoff meeting in 7 designs to represent the different regions and types of participants. Networking was a breeze, which increased event participation.

Request more information to find out how Whova can support your sales kickoff meeting with our corporate event management software.

(go back to the top) 

2. Leadership Conferences

Many high-profile corporate companies have already chosen Whova to support their leadership events in the first quarter of 2019 to prepare for the new business year. 

Goals: The organizers hoped to create an experience where leaders could get to know each other better so they could continue working together effectively.

Motivating Leaders by Celebrating Growth and Strategy Ideas

Whova motivated attendees to share their insights throughout the event. Live Polling increased event productivity and engagement by empowering all leaders to get involved in the strategy discussions.

• Live Polls allowed leaders to align on their goals. PwC used 13 Live Polls to get an instant feel for everyone’s viewpoints at their leadership conference. Questions included: “What is your main focus for the new year?”, “What are your market priorities?” and “What are the most important client needs?”
• Attendees could compare their ideas through Surveys and Discussion Groups. Godiva used Surveys to ask leaders questions such as “How can you deliver results and bring our new values to life?”. Discussion Topics provided an outlet for team brainstorming and included “How can we leverage the brand?” and “How can we become better leaders?”

Encouraging Engagement Through Gamification

Whova allowed organizers to add elements of gamification to their events, which added fun and friendly competition among the leaders. Attendees could share photos with one another through our corporate event management app, and by enabling the Photo Contest, organizers could highlight the photos with the most likes as the winners. The Leaderboard Contest allowed attendees to compete to become the most active members of Community by posting the most messages.

• Attendees were encouraged to share photos of the event with a Photo Contest. BP offered the winner of its Photo Contest an exclusive, company-branded notebook, earbuds and mini speakers, which encouraged everyone to take more photos of the fun.
• Leaders were motivated to exchange ideas through the Community Board. The Community Board provided a popular platform for discussion and by enabling the Leaderboard Contest, organizers at Godiva’s leadership summit helped increase participation. Attendees wrote a total of 648 messages in the Whova business meeting app to try to win the contest for being the most engaged.

(go back to the top) 

3. Customer and Partner Conference

In the first quarter of 2019 alone, over 40 companies chose Whova to support their customer and partner events. 

Goals: The organizers wanted to showcase the company and its latest product innovations to boost business opportunities.

Ensuring Everything Ran Smoothly with Effective Event Management

Whova supported event management by keeping everything on track in one handy and professional-looking location. With Mobile Agenda, organizers could easily build complex schedules, limit attendance for smaller sessions with the Session Cap, and manage the check-in process.

• Organizers offered concurrent sessions to provide customers with better guidance. PSI Metals split up different user groups through concurrent sessions and managed the session capacity limit with Whova’s Session Cap feature.

Nurturing Relationships with Customers and Partners

With Whova corporate meeting software, customers and partners felt valued and included throughout the events. Break the Ice! on the Community Board automatically generated messages for attendees so they could say hi to other participants with just the click of a button. Announcements allowed organizers to send attendees push-notifications and emails throughout the events.

• New partners could introduce themselves to organizers through the Community Board. Global Indemnity‘s partners sent out a total of 107 Icebreaker messages to say who they were, where they were from, and which organization they were part of. Other attendees could see these messages and easily reply to set up a meeting.
• Customers were given the VIP treatment through in-app Announcements. Organizers used 17 Announcements at the Hyphen Solutions customer conference. They informed attendees about everything from the location of customer appreciation events to transportation options and party passwords.

Highlighting Product Innovations and Getting Valuable Feedback

With Whova, organizers could highlight company products and expertise while still aligning with the preferences of their customers and partners. Organizers could request Session Ratings after each session and send out Surveys on the general event experience through the app.

• Organizers gained helpful customer insights from Session Ratings and Surveys. Hyphen Solutions sent out feedback surveys at the end of their customer conference to gauge how attendees had found their event and to improve them for future years.

Request more information to find out how Whova can support your partner or customer event with our corporate event app.

(go back to the top) 

4. Training Events

Many corporate companies have organized their training events with Whova, providing their employees with education and team-building opportunities.

Goals: The organizers wanted to build an interesting agenda of sessions and activities to help their employees become more motivated and effective in their jobs.

Streamlining Event Management from Attendance Tracking to Team-Building

Thanks to its wide range of event management tools, Whova helped support organizers from before the training began until after it had finished. Organizers could check in attendees through our corporate event software, either by scanning the QR codes or searching by attendee name. By recording who had attended the training, sending out participation certifications was simple. Organizers could also offer helpful additional resources during the event through the Logistics section of the app.

• Event Logistics were quick and easy to find on the event app homepage. Synopsys provided key information through Logistics, including drinks tickets, meal information, and shuttle departure times, to keep the large number of attendees on the same page.

Empowering Attendees to Organize Their Own Learning Opportunities

With Whova, it was easy for attendees to get organized and get the most from their opportunities. Organizers could allow attendees to build their own personal agendas through My Agenda to better manage their event experience.

• Attendees could create their own schedules on the Agenda. My Agenda allowed attendees at Cohen & Company’s training conference to add sessions and social activities they had joined or created to their personal agendas. This meant they always knew what they were doing and when.

Encouraging Attendees to Participate and Interact During the Training

Whova allowed organizers to bring existing employees together so they could learn from one another. Organizers could use the Community Board to facilitate discussions about learning topics or to answer attendee questions before, during, and after the training. Attendees could easily find the people they wanted to interact with thanks to pre-populated SmartProfiles and Attendee Matchmaking, which transformed random networking stress into a targeted networking experience. The one-on-one Meeting Scheduler then allowed attendees to connect in person at the most convenient time.

• Attendees could interact more easily through the Community Board. Organizers at Synopsys created a Q&A Discussion Topic for one of the speakers to gather questions during the training. Attendees also created their own open Social Activity called “Pre-Event Chat and Questions” and sent 228 private, one-on-one messages.
• Organizers empowered attendees to network throughout the event with in-app prompts. Organizers at the Adidas Engineering Day added “Network at Dinner” and “Find a Lunch Mate!” buttons to their agenda, allowing attendees to reach out to one another with just one click. This encouraged a total of 1,390 networking interactions throughout the training.

(go back to the top) 

5. Retreats

Whova is proud to have supported many company retreats, which were rewards for the hard work of employees.

Goals: The organizers wanted to give their attendees an exciting and luxurious experience that would make them feel valued, closer with their colleagues, and motivated to keep up the good work.

Bonding with Attendees by Making Them Feel Appreciated

Whova made keeping in touch with attendees quick, easy, and fun, increasing event participation. Ask Organizers Anything on Whova’s Community Board allowed attendees to reach out to their event organizers at any time in an obvious place.

• Organizers had the opportunity to bond with attendees through the Community Board. Organizers of TCF Bank’s retreat answered a wide range of questions from “How do we expense our taxes in Costa Rica?” to “What should I wear for zip-lining?” This personalized support made attendees feel valued and closer with the team.

Bringing Attendees Closer Through Team-Building Activities

Whova ensured that everyone could participate in their preferred activities and meet like-minded attendees along the way. With our corporate meeting management software, both organizers and attendees could create Social Activities on the Community Board during the retreats.

• Attendees could share their interests with one another through Social Activities. On the Mitchell Lewis & Staver retreat, one attendee created a Volleyball Social Activity. The get-together was so popular with other players on the trip, that the attendee created another Social Activity: “Volleyball: Back by Popular Demand!”
• Group meal-planning was made easy on the Community Board. With Meals on Your Own, ElderCounsel‘s organizers could offer reservations for dinners that weren’t included on the team-building retreat. This helped attendees find restaurants and meet up outside of sessions.

(go back to the top) 

Corporate Event Management Software that Makes a Difference

Whova’s corporate event app and business meeting app have brought great success to all kinds of corporate events, such as sales kickoff meetings, customer and partner conferences, leadership conferences and summits, and team building activities. Contact us today to sign up for your next event.