How to use Envoy to keep lines moving at your next event
Event marketing is on the rise. According to a 2015 article by MarketingProfs and Content Marketing Institute, 77% of B2B marketers use in-person events as part of their content marketing strategy. And, 67% of B2B marketers think that event marketing is their most effective strategy.
If you’ve ever hosted an event for your company, you know how crucial it is for the check-in process to go smoothly. Whether it’s a small happy hour or a massive conference, one of the worst things that can happen is a traffic jam at check-in. Long lines at the front definitely do not set the right tone for your attendees —a single negative experience at your event could make or break your company’s reputation (especially if there’s social media involved!)
Now, more than ever, it’s important to make sure a structured, efficient process is in place to provide the best experience for your attendees from the beginning. But not to worry — you can use Envoy to help ensure a consistent, delightful experience for all your attendees off the bat.
Many of our customers are using Envoy specifically for event marketing. Let’s explore how they’re using our product to streamline their check-in processes and prevent those dreaded traffic jams.
Keep lines moving during check-in
It can definitely slow down the sign-in process if you have to search through a long list of RSVPs every time someone checks in. Our pre-registration feature can help you minimize sign-in time and keep lines moving quickly,
Prior to the event, just upload a CSV of all your attendees into Envoy as pre-registered visitors. When your guest enters their name into the iPad on the day of the event, their email address and other information will automatically appear, reducing the sign-in time. The pre-registration feature also allows you to print badges in advance and lay them out neatly for your visitors to pick up at reception.
“It adds a nice touch that makes our company look professional and welcoming,” says Juliette St. Andrews, the receptionist at Hattery, a co-working space in San Francisco.
By utilizing Envoy’s pre-registration feature, signing in at an event becomes as easy as 1–2–3. Because attendees are invited in advance, they’ll only need to input their name, take a photo (if you’d like), and sign a release form or NDA (again, if you’d like) when they arrive. Rather than manually looking up every attendee against a printed Excel sheet, lines will be much shorter with this speedy sign-in process.
Tip: For larger events, you can use multiple iPads at any location on any Envoy plan. To do so, just download the Envoy app and use your location’s email address to sign in on the iPads; they’ll all sync to that location’s web dashboard. Use as many as you’d like to suit the size of your group!
If you’d like to make sign-in even speedier, you can also connect bluetooth keyboards to the iPads. Many visitors find it easier and faster to type on a keyboard compared to an iPad screen.
Make post-event follow-up a breeze
Envoy easily fits into your existing marketing stack and makes post-event follow-up easy. If you need a list of everyone who attended the event, it’s easy to export that visitor data using Envoy. You can also see which invitees missed out on your event so you can send a dedicated follow-up email.
You can also manage this type of communication with some of our helpful integrations, including MailChimp, Eventbrite and Salesforce. With our Eventbrite integration, you can easily import registered attendees from Eventbrite into Envoy as invited visitors. Then, export that list of attendees into MailChimp to send a follow up email and Salesforce to add them as leads.
One of our customers, Whitby School, loves using Envoy for marketing follow-up. Their open house events are a huge opportunity to showcase the “Whitby difference” by allowing for the school to deliver personalized attention to prospective parents.
“In the past, the Admissions team would scramble afterward to get the information into our system, and the odds of missing something were much higher,” Kaitlin Pitcher, Whitby School’s Events Coordinator explained. “This information is extremely useful to us because we use it to send follow-up emails to those who attended.”
She says automating the sign in process has been great for Admissions because it gives parents the right information at the right time, and “allows for seamless follow up with a parents after the event.”
Ensure that your event feels just as polished as your brand
Envoy’s sign in process is customizable and streamlined, ensuring that you can extend your brand experience and continue to deliver on your brand promise at an event. With the ability to add a unique logo, accent color, welcome screen slideshow and even order beautiful custom badges just for your event, attendees will feel like your brand experience is seamless.
Envoy is also extremely easy to setup, which is especially helpful if you’re throwing a last minute event. One of our customers, POPSUGAR, was able to get up and running in a day. “When I’m looking at vendors, I don’t want to go with anything I can’t set up right away,” says Bjorn Pave, Senior Director of Information Technology. “I was impressed with Envoy from the very beginning.”
Interested in using Envoy for your next event?
- One of the biggest benefits about moving to a cloud solution like Envoy is how simple it is to get started. Check out a quick video with more details here. You can also explore all of our features with a two-week free trial.
- Read our case studies to learn more about how companies like Whitby School and Galvanize use Envoy for events.
