January 3, 2023
As a meeting and events professional, you’ll know any event comes with unexpected changes, and more so in the current climate. You’ll also know that to manage these changes, keeping the right people informed at the right time is key. For that, you need good communication and an effective channel. Even without the changes, you’ll need to keep attendees updated and engaged before and during an event.
Most meetings and events professionals will use email to communicate with attendees. While email is powerful, it isn’t always the best way to reach attendees. When there is a critical change, email may not signify urgency as most recipients do not get a notification for an email.
In addition, earlier sources state that the average person received over 100 emails per day. With so many emails hitting our inbox daily, what else can you use to ensure communication isn’t missed and reach attendees at the right time?
That’s where SMS messaging comes in. Short text messages straight to an attendee’s mobile phone. Here are the benefits of combining SMS into your meetings and events communications and how our platform makes sending SMS a breeze.
SMS allows you to reach recipients directly, as they will receive a message on their native text app rather than having to open another app on their phone. SMS is therefore more likely to be opened before an email.
Planners can send concise and timely messages to attendees, making it ideal for communicating critical information.
SMS also gives you a broader reach than email as you can reach attendees regardless of if they own a smartphone or have an internet connection.
Sending reminders or alerts is a great way to keep event attendees engaged and informed. For instance, to remind participants of a time and venue for an activity. Meeting planners will want to keep reminders short and relevant, and SMS is perfect for this.
SMS alerts are more noticeable over emails, so the greater the likelihood of the attendee noticing the alert. An email could get lost in a flood of other notifications, and it might be too late before a participant notices it.
SMS is a unique way of communicating with your attendees or customers. Integrating SMS into your communication plan will impress your clients and give your organisation a competitive advantage. Here’s what one of our customers, a travel company using Qondor SMS has to say:
“It saves us lots of time, and our guests feel well taken care of.”
Meetings and events companies not using Qondor or without access to sending SMS miss out on its benefits and many organisations stick to email. Those that may consider SMS would have to use an alternative provider or integration. Even then, it can work out costly per event. But we have a solution for this.
Qondor has built-in functionality to send SMS to attendees within the platform. It makes communicating with attendees or participants a breeze. Norwegian Adventure Company shared a case where there was a change in departure pier for a group of over 100 participants.
This was easily solved using Qondor SMS. The planner typed one message to send to all participants. SMSs were sent in one go and handled in Qondor without the need to switch between platforms.
The attendee received a short SMS with the information they needed, and it was more effective to be notified via SMS than email.
A communication plan is crucial for event success and attendee satisfaction. There’s a greater advantage in setting up everything ahead of time so you don’t have to do it on the day.
With Qondor SMS, you can easily schedule all communications, (emails too) so that they are sent automatically. Meeting planners define the recipients, type the SMS, select the time and date and Qondor handles the rest. The planner does not need to wait to create and send messages. This task can be done weeks, even months in advance.
For example, you may want to send a personal greeting when the event schedule has begun, reminders, practical information, addresses, map links and so on. Often, information needs to be sent outside of office hours so using the scheduling feature gives meeting planners control and saves time without compromising on service.
SMS is a personal and engaging medium as our phones rarely leave our hands these days, so what better way to engage attendees? It is direct and SMSs pop up prominently on our mobile screens.
Personalization is great for engagement. Qondor enables planners to insert merge tags, which automatically pulls in event, customer or participant information such as event dates, participant name, email address and more. Planners can also pull in booking information from Qondor Forms and request payment or provide a login link to a booking. Participants receive information relevant to them, making it quick and easy for them to take action.
Meeting and events planners can also create a custom SMS sender, usually the company name. This is great for increasing open rates as recipients will be familiar with the sender name.
Package SMS into proposals to customers as an additional service. When you purchase Qondor SMS, you could earn payback. Not only will you be providing an extra, convenient service that customers can buy, but you can also add margins to SMS to earn more revenue.
Combining SMS into your event communication plan is highly effective; it might even be the only means of communication you need for some events. SMS allows you to reach attendees and event organisers immediately and is great for sending reminders and alerts.
For fuss free handling of SMS, you need it in one platform where all your meetings and events handling is done. SMS handling is built into Qondor, and it is easy to set up in advance to save time. Recipients easily access relevant information, and it’s incredibly beneficial when needing to inform of last-minute changes.
If you want to differentiate your company from other meetings and events agencies, then using Qondor SMS to inform and engage attendees is a sure-fire way to do that.
Already using Qondor? ORDER QONDOR SMS HERE