Creative ways to use our event management software

From day one we wanted to develop Oveit into more than just a ticketing app, to develop it into a complete event management software. We always knew that technology can help you offer unforgettable experiences to your guests. Time passed, we developed new features, and clients started using our software for complex situations. Today I will tell you how our partners use Oveit’s features in ways that may surprise you. Maybe you are looking for an event management software that you can use in an “unconventional” way (yes, we now that you are looking for more than a ticketing software), so go ahead and find some inspiration below.

Great way to collect shout-outs 

I am found of all creative ideas, but I will start with the idea one of our partners had not too long ago.  They were using Oveit to sell tickets for a high-school musical show. Also wanted to give parents a way to support their children by allowing them to buy some “shout outs” in the event programme. They had a dedicated email address for parents to contact them but found it difficult to offer a straightforward payment solution. It was also pretty difficult to make sure that all the shout outs are collected in one place and none is lost “on the way” (things can be difficult when you are part of a small team).

He had the ingenious idea to use Oveit for it; created a new event that allowed parents to instantly register the message by using our registration forms. Set up a limited number of tickets (each ticket was a shout out) and money went straight into their account through our direct payment feature. After the registration period was over they simply downloaded the list and printed the shout-outs in the Event Programme. An easy way to solve a complicated situation.

Print screen from Oveit - event management system

Rewarding loyal customers through our event management software

Loyalty is something each brand looks for from its customers. Loyal customers are hard to find, so when you do let them know that they are truly appreciated. One of our partners (a Sports Organization) uses our NFC technology for both payments and access control at the VIP lounge. They wanted to do more for the fans that rarely miss from a home game, so they have created a special rewarding program. Depending on the number of consecutive games the fans attend they receive a gift from the organizer. Because the fans use their cards to pay or access designated areas our partner can easily keep track of those that qualify for the loyalty program.

Loyalty programs are very appreciated by customers and 76% consider that personalized offers based on their purchase history are crucial.

Art that speaks to its admirers

Our NFC capabilities can be used to engage attendees within your events. We developed it thinking it would be a great way for attendees and sponsors/exhibitors to connect.

However, I know someone that took this feature one step further. Visiting a museum is always fun, but it’s much funnier when art talks to you. Yes, our NFC features are used in museums, and visitors can find more about a particular piece, an artist or an art movement. Online searching for information is very common among museum-goers. Art that follows up is not something that you see on a daily basis and it’s a great way to create a buzz while helping visitors find more about what they love.

follow up email sent using Oveit's attendee engagement feature

photo/text source: wikipedia.org Example of personalized follow-up email sent using Oveit’s engagement feature

Using the “badge” option as a gift coupon for your services

Discount coupons are a great way to attract new business. According to a study conducted by Firstdata, 11% of coupons are used by new users, meaning they are a great way for new customers to test your products or services. A quality interaction will convince them to become regular users, and adding gift coupons can increase your client base. To estimate what this could mean take a look at how small improvements can increase your business. 

Oveit can be used to create gift coupons that will be sent directly to the beneficiary through a 100% personalized coupon while all the financial data goes to the person that places the order.

Our cashless payment system for day to day activities

Our main focus is on cashless payments, there’s no secret here. We are happy to see that more and more event planners use our software for this feature, increasing their revenue. Our “light” setup was adopted not only by event planners but also by an elementary school that was delighted that can use it in its cafeteria. Parents credit the pupils’ accounts (they use colorful NFC wristbands that scholars love to wear) and using our software they are sure that the kids use the lunch money…for lunch.

colorful NFC wristband

The same system is used by a large corporation as a way to partially support lunch for its employees. Each month the company adds an amount to each employee account as they use their personalized NFC cards to pay at the cafeteria. If they run out of credit employees can add extra credit.

We are happy to see that more and more employers opt to use our cashless payments solution in order to create a closed-loop ecosystem to manage lunch benefits.

NFC-based ecosystems for tourist complex

The idea of ecosystems has always been on our minds, this is why we have developed Oveit into more than a ticketing software. And starting from the event ecosystem we looked further, making it easy to use in more complex environments.  With their help, we managed to develop our software so that it can manage a touristic complex, the NFC room key becoming a powerful tool that is used to:

Attendees can use it to:

-open rooms

-pay at bars, restaurants, gift shops (in the ecosystem)

-access different areas on site (access to different facilities is connected to the room guests have booked, so permissions come as “benefits” added to the account)

-guests that stay at this resort have access to a nearby Contemporary Art Museum and in order to see if they really visit it the entry is added as a “perk” and checked in individually (using the same “room key” which, of course, it’s an NFC card).

A new way to manage treasure hunt games

Our NFC capabilities were not once used for implementing treasure hunt games, but a particular occasion stuck to my mind. One of our partners used Oveit for a company retreat and the NFC wristbands to capture data on what activities its employees prefer. For the treasure hunt game, they used our software to create checkpoints and check if each team has covered the whole track. Each time a team reached a milestone the team leader tapped the wristband to the NFC device. Our event management software sent an email containing clues on how to reach the next checkpoint and also marked that they have covered that point of the track. Easy implementation for maximum fun.

Hope this article helped you discover new techniques to satisfy your customers. If you have a question for which you haven’t got an answer please let us know. We can’t promise Oveit will be the perfect solution for you but we promise we will look into it.

November 5, 2018 Event management, Events, Museums, Oveit Features 1 comment

Infographic – Why use cashless payments for your water park?

July 25, 2017 Access management, Infographics, Oveit Features No comments yet

How to reduce queues during festivals

HELLO

Festivals are becoming bigger and bigger every day; some good examples are Coachella, Tomorrowland, Mawazine etc., which are hosting hundreds of thousands of guests every festival. The festivals are getting upgraded while their popularity is increasing. Organizers are bringing only A-list artists, increasing the number of stages, and accommodating more attractions and partners; the overall experience is getting better and better every year.

Festivals are becoming bigger every year but they are also increasing their prices accordingly

Not only the festivals are getting bigger, additionally, they are becoming more expensive too. Guests spend between 50 to 500 euros to attend such kind of event and their expectations have increased exponentially. Most of the crowd which is attending festivals is composed of Millennials who consider that experiences are more important than things.

In this time, when people appreciate experiences more rather than valuables, it is important to do everything possible to fulfill this need and create a flawless and remarkable experience.

The most recurring issue that usually arises within festivals is queuing; nobody likes to waste their time waiting in line, however, it always happens.

The lines can’t be 100% avoided, though, there are a few practices that will reduce them considerably.

One of the most popular practices which is becoming rapidly adopted by most festivals is the NFC wristbands. Through the NFC wristbands, event planners are trying to offer a higher event experience making it more convenient, secure, and transparent.

Visitors can top-up money on their wristbands at any point of the event, and pay without queuing in lines – everything just with a simple tap while event organizers benefit of transparency and complete control with real-time reports over all sales.

The wristband is synced with a specific ticket category which allows the visitors to access all their designated areas more easily and if entitled receive perks such as T-shirts, free drinks, etc.

Additionally, with the help of the NFC chip, the wristband can be used to create a new level of interactions, such as: Treasure Hunts and challenges, rate favorite products or shows, save playlists, check geolocation etc.

Since 2015 the NFC integrated wristbands started to become popular within the events’ world. If back then guests were complaining about wristbands’ failures which left them unable to buy food or drinks, today they do work smoothly and are reducing considerably the queue.

No more queue for food and drinks, but how about the registration process. When attendees arrive at the event, they need to change their ticket into the NFC wristband. Unfortunately most of the attendees are complaining having to stay a few hours in line to get their wristbands; it is of course a big turn-off, when the pre-event excitement is killed by a huge waiting time.

Trying to be on-top of the situation, event planners are already finding solutions to combat this huge registration lines.

Event planners are always trying to find solutions to reduce queue

Big events(e.g., Coachella) are shipping the NFC wristband directly to guests, right after the ticket is purchased. Guests receive precise instructions which they need to follow in order to configure their wristbands from home. Also when arriving at the event’s premises, it is mandatory to have it already attached around their right wrist. In this way, guests can enter directly, without having to stay in line to do their registration. This practice turned out to be successful and diminished the lines considerably.

The NFC wristbands represent an important milestone in the process of reducing queues within festivals

What are the biggest benefits when using the NFC wristbands?

  • Visitors tend to spend 15-30%more
  • Speeds up purchases & reduces queues
  • Minimize cash handling
  • Captures all sales and audience insights
  • Control and transparency
  • More interaction within the event

It is interesting how in a short period of time so many uses have been found for the NFC chips. With the use of a simple chip, attendees can do almost everything with it. Their Social Media profile can be synchronized and all their data stored and access after the event. An NFC wristband is the only thing you need in order to attend a festival. No need to worry for your wallet, money or mobile phone, you only need to be worried of not having enough fun.

July 17, 2017 Event management, Event professionals, Events, Oveit Features No comments yet

Cashless payments dramatically improve water parks experience

As the northern hemisphere melts down under the mighty sun I had the greatest idea ever (not!): why don’t I write an article about cashless payments for water parks and how the industry adapts itself. Because what can be cooler (pun not intended) than documenting exotic water parks while you ride a crowded subway to work? But this article walked me around the world, helping me discover incredible destinations, epic constructions, and some interesting ways of using cashless payments within water parks #tech.

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I found up some interesting facts about water parks:

The Waterpark Capital of the world is…Wisconsin Dells, Wisconsin. But although Wisconsin is home to the biggest water park in the U.S.A. (Noah’s Ark Waterpark) and has more water parks per capita than any other place in the world, the state of Florida leads when talking about the number of attendees; the biggest four locations gathered over 7.2 million people in 2016.

The first indoor water park was built in Edmonton, Canada, in 1985 and was the biggest indoor waterpark until 2004.

The biggest indoor waterpark in the world is Tropical Islands, situated 60 km outside Berlin. The building was initially designed as an aircraft hangar and it’s one of the biggest self-supported halls in the world (the dome is 107 meters high)… It’s spectacular! Tropical Island Resort also opened an outdoor section which helped them bring in over 1.1 million attendees in 2016 (a spectacular 13% increase if compared to 2015).

Speaking of leaps forward, another European Waterpark holds the record for the biggest percentage increase: Siam Park, located in the Canary Islands, opened its gates for over 1 mil guests in 2016, a 15% increase if compared to 2015.

When speaking of the total number of guests the gold medal goes to Chimelong Water Park, from China, which had over 2.5 mil attendees last year; that’s about 600.000 more than South America’s most visited water park, Thermas dos Laranjais.

As I was saying…it’s hard to concentrate when things are melting down around you. Fortunately, there are plenty of places that can help us overcome the heat, and water parks and pools are there to help. But you know what is not helping? The need to carry cash and/or cards when we are in our bathing suits…

I’m an advocate of using NFC technology for water parks, a technology that can make the experience a better one for attendees. How? By linking the wristband to a customer account and crediting it (so there will be no need to carry cash around or periodically visiting the locker to grab some more). Also, the wristband can replace the key to the locker, helping attendees concentrate on the only thing that should be important while they are on site: having fun!

“Paper and coin currency in water parks will go the way of the dinosaur,” said Buddy Wilkes, from Shipwreck Island Waterpark, Florida. And I totally agree.

Let’s review the major benefits of cashless payments for water parks:

To business:

    • Reduced cash handling by employees (so cases of fraud or human error are out of the question)
    • Improves transaction speed (a report from American Express states that “contactless transactions are 63% faster than cash and 53% faster than using a traditional credit card”)
    • Order value increases by over 30% (customers have instant access to their money, eliminating the extra step of walking to the wallet will increase the number of purchases)
    • Information about guests
  • Ability to prioritize clients (that pay extra for different benefits)

To guests:

    • Possibility to receive preferred customer benefits (this is the kind of experience that is hard to forget)
    • Reduces the risk of losing the ticket (or the cash/personal card)
    • Eliminates the need for holding separated tickets for different areas on site (the wristband can store all the access information)
    • They can keep track of family members
  • No more need to wait in line

The idea of using a wristband for contactless payments isn’t new and the technology has been used for some years in the industry but this year we witnessed something great. Orlando Volcano Bay, opened in May 2017, took the technology one step further: their waterproof wristband, Tapu Tapu, announces you when it’s your time to use a ride; this smart wearable it’s not just for cashless payments, it also waits in a virtual line for you, so you can do something else until it’s your time to use the ride.

There is one more great benefit of using wristbands for contactless payments (and also to store access credentials and to unlock your locker) and I let it last on purpose; not because it is not important, but because I want it to be the idea that you’ll stick to: going paperless will make a big change to the environment. This totally slipped my mind, but the guys from Waterbom Bali helped me realize how important this benefit is to us all. It’s been over 7 years since they first started using waterproof wristbands for cashless payments and are happy about the improvements made: because they are aiming to be #1 water park in the world that cares about the environment. Maybe this is why people love them some much and voted them as the number 1 water park in Asia in the Tripadvisor TraveleresChoice ranking. You rock, guys!

P.s.  For more statistical data you can check out Statista, Wikipedia or http://www.teaconnect.org/images/files/TEA_235_103719_170601.pdf, that’s what I did :).

June 30, 2017 Access management, Oveit Features 2 comments

How do you prepare for a cashless event?

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Last week was a full one for us here at Oveit; on Wednesday we visited the lovely city of Riga to participate at We are Museums event WAM 2017 – Tech loves Culture, where we met many museums professionals eager to use #tech to offer their customers a better experience; Thursday and Friday were reserved for ICEEfest, Interactive Central & Eastern Europe, one of the biggest  tech-related events in Central & Eastern Europe. At ICEEfest we were in charge with the registration process and also implemented the cashless payment system, offering attendees the possibility to pay using their wristbands. Everything went as smooth as it can so we thought that would be nice to share some insights that can help you to implement this cashless payment method for your next event.

Here are some hints for a better workflow:

Use the right tool, so you don’t have to use 2 of 3 different software products for one event (our friends used Oveit to sell tickets, check in attendees, print badges and set up the cashless payment system). We used our software “as a hole” and made it really easy to associate the NFC wristbands to an attendee and credit his/her account.

Test your hardware. For this event, we used 24 laptops, 10 NFC readers, and 6 thermal printers. It all worked well but you can be sure that we didn’t wait for the first guests to arrive before we (individually) tested every piece of hardware that we were going to use for the big event. We checked and double checked so when the guests started to arrive we knew that everything is in place and any malfunction that may occur can be easily fixed.

Make sure you have enough power supplies and a strong internet connection (it is strongly recommended to use a private network for your apps, different from the one used by your guests).

You will need to host 2 different training sessions for people operating the software: one with the cashiers (that will credit your attendees’ accounts) and one with the vendors. It’s incredibly easy to use the NFC cashless payment system (at least ours is) but you must make sure that everyone knows how to use it (don’t assume that they don’t need to test it first).

Have a crew on site that knows how to use the software and can be of help if needed. If you have access credentials for each selling point it would be best if the “guys on sight” have the ability to reset them (they are there as a backup, to fix any problem that may occur). If someone has trouble remembering how to log in (or what’s the correct password) – they will have someone to ask for help. You use NFC to improve the general experience so make sure that you have someone on site for this sort of problems.

Conclusions

Using cashless payments was a bliss; there were attendees from all over the world at ICEEfest, so you understand why using cash would’ve been a problem. First, not everyone had the time to stop by an ATM and withdraw cash; second, the queues would’ve been huge with hundreds of people trying to figure out which bills to use. This system allowed everyone to use their credit/debit card to top-up their accounts and a simple tap for pay at all the 8 stores available on site. The result?

A payment system that was very easy to use and no more queueing.

 

If you still have doubts about the NFC technology and how it can help you offer a better experience for your attendees I encourage you to read this article, where you will find (almost) all the right reasons :).

June 21, 2017 Business events, Events, Oveit Features No comments yet