Executive Summary
The Meeting of the European Public Choice Society was successfully held at the University of Minho, Portugal with the support of Whova’s event management platform. Researchers from all over Europe joined to discuss Public Choice and other significant scientific research topics.
The hybrid platform provided a backup plan to quickly switch to virtual and easily broadcast speaker sessions online if any Covid-19 issues arose.
When I realized [Whova] would work very well if we had to switch to a fully online conference, I said ok, this is a good deal! It works much better than just creating a bunch of Zoom links for every session.
About the Meeting of the European Public Choice Society
The European Public Choice Society promotes scientific research for the economic and interdisciplinary analysis of non-market decision-making. The society was created in 1972 by a small group of scholars at the University of Basel and now connects researchers across fifteen European countries to share scientific research each year.
Local organizers from the School of Economics and Management at the University of Minho coordinated the event in order to facilitate the exchange of ideas between professionals in the industry. With Whova’s online agenda, the organizers successfully managed an agenda of over 80 sessions, many of which streamed concurrently.
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Challenges
- Managing a complicated agenda
The organizers were managing over 80 sessions in just four days and needed an agenda that would be easy for attendees to navigate, and that clearly displayed session details.
- Checking in attendees at the physical event
To save time, the organizers wanted an efficient method to check-in and keep track of attendees throughout the event. They wanted an online method so they would not have to continuously print attendance lists.
- Gathering event feedback
It was important the organizers could gather feedback during and after the event to improve event logistics. They also wanted an easy way to obtain feedback from specific sessions.
- Encouraging networking opportunities online and in-person
Because many of the attendees were first-time event app users, the organizers wanted to ensure they felt comfortable interacting online and in-person through the app’s many networking capabilities.
Solutions
- Efficiently coordinate sessions on the virtual agenda
The app’s online agenda made it easy to display session and speaker information, and add multiple sub-sessions or breakout rooms. Attendees could filter or search for specific speakers and sessions in the agenda, then add them to their personal agendas.
The organizers also utilized Whova’s pre-made agenda webpages to conveniently add event information to their event website. Attendees could search for sessions they were interested in before the event, and plan their schedules ahead of time. Any changes made in the agenda were automatically synced to the agenda webpages without any further action required from the organizers.
The organizers easily displayed session information, and added many sub-sessions
- Check-in attendees through the app
Whova’s convenient attendee lists made it easy to check-in attendees for the annual conference. Event staff could quickly check-in attendees on the comprehensive lists through their tablets or laptop, and Whova automatically kept track of how many attendees had been checked in. The organizers could also easily print attendee name badges before or during the check-in process. If attendees or speakers pulled out of the event last minute, the organizers simply remove them from the attendees’ list.
With the app its so much easier, when someone sends me an email informing me they cannot come anymore then I would go to the attendee list and exclude the person or presentation. The program is immediately updated, it helps a lot.
- Easily communicate with attendees through announcements, surveys, and polls
The organizers took advantage of Whova’s announcements, surveys, and polls to gather feedback and reach attendees in real-time throughout the event. With the in-app announcements, the organizers sent push notifications about dinner excursions, event logistics, and more. If attendees missed an announcement for any reason, they could find them all under a discussion topic on the app’s Community Board.
Whova’s in-app surveys made it easy to gather information about event satisfaction and discover new ways to improve their annual meeting. The organizers could use polls in a similar way, and apply them to specific sessions or as push notifications in the app.
Attendees could find all organizer announcements under a discussion topic in the Community Board
- Connect attendees through discussion topics on the community board
The Community Board, an online networking forum, was a popular feature among attendees. They posted many discussion topics about post-conference excursions, favorite local restaurants, and more.
Attendees could quickly introduce themselves on the app through pre-made questions in the Icebreakers feature, where they shared favorite animals or hobbies. They could search for fellow professionals in the attendees tab, and send a 1:1 message or view the comprehensive SmartProfiles attendees fill out themselves with education, personal, and work history.
Attendees also shared many photos on the app, which could be directly posted to social media apps, automatically generating buzz for the event.
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