Exhibition organisers know that the show itself is the culmination of a year of planning and negotiations, and a formidable organisational feat. Fortunately, in this digital age there is a wealth of software tools available to help you.
Now, the companies behind the software running in the background of your show are pushing to make the tradeshow itself the central event in a year-long dialogue between organiser, exhibitor and visitor. Along the way, they hope to heighten the importance of technology in the organiser’s eyes.
Both Ungerboecke Software and Active Network Events provide software solutions for almost every aspect of event management – sales, registration, floorplans, session management and more.
“There are still a lot of people out there running their business on Microsoft Word and paper, and you don’t see that in other industries,” says Krister Ungerboeck, president of Ungerboeck Software Intenational. “I think a lot of our exhibitors are a bit frustrated. They think if they offered that same quality to their customers they would be out of business.”
Ungerboeck’s exhibition software provides solutions literally end-to-end: all it leaves up to you is coming up with the idea for the show in the first place. Floor plans, displays, registration, satisfaction surveys, speaker planning and anything else you can think of are all optional modules available from the company.
“Working with multiple vendors is frustrating for users,” Ungerboeck continues. “Customers are tired of the inevitable finger-pointing where one vendor blames the other. The end result is that the customer doesn’t get their problem solved. Having a single vendor with an end-to-end solution gives customers a single point of accountability.”
As for his company, Ungerboek has high hopes. With offices in Germany, France, Australia, Hong Kong and China, the US-based business has a healthy global footprint.
“Our objective is to double in size over the next three years. If we can double in size we can double our research and development team,” says Ungerboeck. “We got our first customers in South America in the past few months, so that’s one place in the world where we weren’t already.”
Active Network Events (ANE) is another determined competitor in the exhibition software world. The company has offices across the US as well as Canada, Australia, China and Singapore.
“Originally it was about efficiency, but what has started to emerge is the need to maximise value for the event in terms of the stakeholders,” ANE global strategic director Anthony Miller tells EW.
“We are moving away from an event being a standalone moment in time. Previously, you might see people go to a tradeshow to have contact with a brand and that was it, but not now. Today a tradeshow is a moment in time for a conversation then we have to move on.”
JR Sherman, general manager of ANE, says BRIC expansion plans are in the works. “We are certainly looking at China and trying to figure out where to land there. I would say China is farthest along. For us it’s almost easy because it’s client-driven. If the client wasn’t driving us there we would look but it wouldn’t be as quick.”
According to Sherman, ANE is also looking at business in India and Brazil, but doesn’t have any specific plans for Russia at this point.
With such comprehensive software available for every stage of planning, running and following up an event, what is keeping exhibition organisers from taking it up? Is it the cost? The belief that Microsoft Word is just as effective? A reluctance to accept change? In any case, with exhibitors the world over under more pressure to demonstrate return on investment in exhibitions, organisers should be evaluating the most efficient methods possible to keep their events running smoothly and successfully.
Any comments? Email exhibitionworld@mashmedia.net
