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How to run an event… without tears

Terry Freedman, Guest Author, ICT in Education — Tue, 09 Feb 2021 12:05:06 +0000

So you’re considering running a thought leadership style event, with guest speakers, hot ticket debate panels, and energetic social chatter?

It looks easy enough from an audience perspective. But organising such an event…well, let’s just say the journey is not to be taken lightly.

What’s the purpose of the event?

Think through the event purpose. Will the energy expended = good returns for your company/brand?

Is it to provide useful content for the community at large, or only your customers?

Is to generate interest in your product, or to position your company as a thought leader?

Or is it a combination of all of these?

The corollary of these questions is: who do you see as your target audience?

Is it subject leaders? Technical support people? School leaders? Or school finance officers?

Answering these kinds of questions about your audience is the first step in running a successful event.

Who will be the main speaker(s)?

There’s a huge temptation to go for big-name speakers in order to draw in the crowds.

However, apart from the high fees often charged by such people, I think there’s an additional, and possibly even more important, consideration: authority.

Everyone, especially teachers, is time-poor at the moment. Does anyone really want to spend a day, or even an hour, listening to people who clearly have no direct experience of what they’re talking about?

I’ll never forget once at a conference where the organisers, rather unfairly I thought, put on a talk by an unknown teacher at the same time as a keynote speech by a big name speaker.

The latter’s talk was on the challenges faced in running a school, and what to do about them – even though he had never run a school.

The unknown teacher’s talk was about how to teach computing to children with special educational needs.

That’s the one I attended, with no regrets: she was both engaging and well-informed.

Organising a panel event

It is a sad fact of life that no matter how brilliant your speakers, and how relevant their talks, it will all be for nought if the event is badly organised – or if it even looks badly organised.

Scheduling talks

For example, if there are two or more streams going on at the same time, with back-to-back talks, it’s frustrating if the end of one talk in stream A comes slightly after the start of another talk in Stream B.

This is not just a matter of timetabling: I’ve organised very complex conference timetables without any overlap at all (my weapon of choice is a simple spreadsheet).

It’s also a matter of discipline.

The people chairing the sessions need to be willing to end the session if, after several requests to wrap things up, the speaker fails to do so.

Obviously, though, you need to tell speakers and chairs in advance that this might have to happen!

The roles of the Chair

I have assumed that your sessions will have a chair as well as a speaker.

Apart from the fact that it’s polite to introduce the speaker, it’s useful to have an extra “body” in the room who can keep an eye on the chat area or Twitter stream, select people to ask questions and, if necessary, make frantic attempts to contact technical support behind the scenes.

Event times

Another consideration regarding time is whether you can run the event twice, at different times.

This should be possible if the event is an hour-long webinar.

If you have an international clientele, putting a webinar on at different times is, I think, essential – unless you think people in some parts of the world might be prepared to come along in the middle of the night!

In this respect, you will find the world clock useful.

Registration

Registration is important because it means you will be able to contact attendees afterwards, and perhaps persuade them to sign up for your company newsletter or your product catalogue.

Events are a great way to build your list.

Technical support

It’s axiomatic that when you’re using technology, sooner or later something is going to go wrong.

Do not underestimate the need to have one or two people on standby to sort out issues like people not receiving the link to join the event, or a video not playing properly.

Should you charge for your event?

Obviously, there is a business cost to hosting an event.

Virtual events are cost-effective but lose the networking potential. In-person events create a buzz but can cost a lot to run.

Cost is symbolic of value. If you bring an event together that offers value your audience can’t get elsewhere then it’s OK to charge.

You could differentiate your ticket pricing with e.g. early bird prices, exclusive merchandise, post-event ebooks, and invite-only panels.

Publicise it well

There is some low-hanging fruit in the world of edtech, and you’d be silly not to pluck it.

I’m thinking in particular of educational bloggers who are often more than happy to publicise an event that looks potentially useful. Think about what you could offer them to make it easier for them to write about it.

For example, graphics and logos they can put on their website, speaker bios, and perhaps the opportunity to interview some speakers in advance.

If the event is a paid-for one, offer them a free media pass so they can attend and, hopefully, write about it or tweet about it during the event itself.

Social media for panel events

It’s easy enough to spin up a hashtag for the event, but unless you are expecting serious attendee numbers or President Obama is speaking, don’t hold your breath for big numbers.

Some events also have an associated Facebook group. Is that likely to be useful and cost-effective (bearing in mind the ongoing commitment to moderate it)?

Following up

What will you offer attendees after the conference?

A recording of the webinar, or recordings of all of the sessions?

The latter can be quite useful if the conference was organised into two or more streams, as most people can’t be in two places at once.

Finally, don’t forget that your company doesn’t necessarily have to do all the work. Once you know what you hope to achieve from running the event, you could hire an event organiser to get on with it.

But remember not to skimp on the research: caveat emptor – let the buyer beware!

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11 Marketing trends in 2021

Terry Freedman, Guest Author, ICT in Education — Mon, 18 Jan 2021 11:10:34 +0000

It’s difficult to predict the future, so please regard this article as a reflection of what may happen and probably should happen in the area of marketing in the coming year.

Do a search on the internet and you will discover that there are many, many articles on this theme, most of which agree with each other only in one or two areas.

The eleven trends suggested here are based partly from that research, but also on the edtech trends identified in Reflections on Technology in Schools in the time of Covid Part 1 and Reflections on Technology in Schools in the time of Covid: Part 2, and the education market.

1. Availability

Now that all of us have been involved in online education, virtual events, and meeting with friends on Zoom, the availability of technology when and where we need it has become more important than ever.

This has been highlighted by revelations that the much-trumpeted laptops for digitally disadvantaged pupils scheme have resulted in fewer devices than promised being delivered, and devices being delivered that were not entirely fit for purpose.

As a general point, then, we have all become more digitally savvy – do you know anybody who has not used Zoom? – and our expectations have been raised.

From a marketing point of view, I think companies would be wise to consider their availability for customers and potential customers. More and more company websites have a live chat option or a chatbot.

They also furnish the visitor with the opportunity to email the company, with a response promised in the next two or three days, but there are those of us for whom that sounds like a lifetime.

In short, we’ve become savvier, more demanding, more used to technology and people being available, and more used to interactivity.

2. Greater use of VR and AR

According to The Times, sales of virtual reality goggles have risen by 350% since the outbreak of the pandemic, in order to escape the reality of staring at four walls day in and day out.

In other words, one beneficial side effect of coronavirus is that the barriers to entry to the world of VR have been lowered. It is no longer the province of geeks and gamers.

How long will it be, then, before we start to see more and more advertisements that cannot be fully appreciated without first donning some VR goggles or a VR headset?

3. Direct appeal to parents

The increased sales in VR headsets and goggles have occurred in the consumer market.

Given that, and given the fact that so many youngsters are now having to be educated while at home, it would make sense for edtech companies to target parents directly.

Arguably, the need for inexpensive but powerful devices has never been greater, nor vast swathes of the population more receptive.

4. More use of AI

I’ve noticed a growing number of services that automate or semi-automate online research, and then either draft an article based on that research and identification of keywords, or provide a list of main points the article ought to cover.

Using AI in this context means, potentially, that more research can be done in less time.

5. More use of AI in both research and crafting content

This is one of the trends suggested in an article on digital marketing in 2021. According to the article:

“67% of marketing leaders already leverage marketing automation tools. Though marketing automation software has existed for years, developers regularly release new digital capabilities. In 2021, this technology will further evolve, allowing marketers to better convert leads, generate personalized content, and track results.”

6. More use of social media

According to search engine watch, the use of social media has “surged” in recent months, so savvy businesses should devote more time and resources into social media marketing.

Large edtech companies do this already of course, but the article is aimed mainly at smaller businesses.

7. Use of ultra-niche keywords

The same article also advises (small) businesses to target ultra-niche keywords in their marketing.

This means acting on the suggestion made in 10 Tips for launching your 2021 strategy, to find out who your typical customers are and the challenges they face.

In other words, general marketing has to give way, to some extent, to much more highly focused marketing.

8. Free content

There is so much free stuff out there that companies will almost certainly need to make more use of high-quality free content, in order to compete.

The quality of some of these freebies is difficult to overstate. For example, some companies (not in mainstream education) have been offering free virtual tours and talks as a lead magnet for their paid-for services.

The free tours are of the same length and high quality as the paid-for ones.

It means that anyone pondering whether or not to buy a tour doesn’t have to go by the reviews and hope for the best. They can literally try before they buy.

9. Reflection of, and accommodation of, the trends of edtech usage in schools

The trends in edtech use in schools covered in the “technology in the time of Covid” articles mentioned earlier suggest that marketing to schools in 2021 should take into account the greater use of flipped learning (which might indicate a demand for short videos, for example), accessibility of technology, and seamless integration with a school’s MIS (because nobody now has the time or inclination to have to re-enter data or export it and import it from one application to another).

10. Flexibility as requirements change

I should think a good selling point for a company itself, regardless of its actual product, is flexibility.

Given that we don’t know from one day to the next whether all, some or none of the kids are going to be in school, or learning from home, or whatever, companies will need to offer a high degree of flexibility in what they offer and how they offer it.

11. Awareness of the changing consumer

Just as we mentioned as a general point at the start of this article, it’s probably the case that even the most technophobic and tech-sceptic teacher has become more confident with technology, more reliant upon it and, crucially, savvier about what it can help teachers and pupils to achieve.

This increased savviness is bound to make potential customers more demanding. Edtech companies who ignore that likelihood in their approach to marketing will do at their peril.

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10 tips for launching your 2021 strategy

Terry Freedman, Guest Author, ICT in Education — Wed, 13 Jan 2021 12:48:18 +0000

Before considering any ideas, we ought, perhaps, to consider the question: why bother?

After all, the situation is so fluid that any strategy you prepare now could be rendered out of date by next week.

If one thing has proven to be certain about the pandemic, it’s that nothing is certain. It’s almost like trying to build a house on sand.

Nevertheless, I am still firmly of the opinion that to quote that old adage, failure to plan is equivalent to planning to fail. You might have to adjust your strategy, or even rethink it all together, but that’s no reason to not develop one in the first place.

A strategy is useful because it enables you to consider priorities. By having a written strategy, you also make those priorities explicit.

That’s not a bad idea: you might know what they are, but do all the members of your workforce, or your customers?

Aims

A good starting point is to decide what your aims are before you can begin to prioritise them.

Some aims to consider might be:

Keep in business. This is clearly a key issue given the general state of the economy, the state of uncertainty, and the plethora of free edtech and other resources available for free.
Gain more clients.
Gain more “fans”.
Gain more newsletter subscribers/video channel subscribers.

10 Ideas to think about

Here are 10 examples of approaches to consider, once you’ve decided what your aims and priorities are.

1. Reactivate old customers

In their quest to gain new customers, companies sometimes forget about their existing ones.

Apart from the fact that it costs much more to acquire new customers than to retain existing ones, the existing ones are your biggest advocates.

They’re the ones who have been using your products or service, and hopefully will be engaging in word of mouth marketing on your behalf without even having been asked.

Bryan Plumb, CEO of Bee Digital Marketing, has a simple 9-word email he uses to re-engage existing or past clients.

2. Find out who your typical customers are, and what their challenges are through a questionnaire

This is much easier to do if you already have a company newsletter, but even if you don’t have one you could still run a survey from your website.

Many companies offer a freebie in exchange for useful information, such as an exclusive report or a white paper.

A few things to bear in mind here are:

Be mindful of the fact that when you offer a freebie you may get nonsense responses from people who just want the freebie.
Be aware of data privacy (GDPR) issues when contacting people. Basically, you’re not allowed to send emails to people who haven’t signed up top receive emails from you.
It’s a well-established fact from research in the field of economics that some people’s purchasing decisions are different in real life to what they say they will buy when asked in a survey.

3. Identify the influencers and the decision-makers

It can be quite useful to try to find this out when running a survey, but it can be difficult.

This is because in real life, the influencers may not be the budget-holders or hold a position of authority within the school. Nevertheless, it’s worth asking questions like, Who makes the purchasing decisions?

4. Carry out research among students and parents too if possible

This is quite difficult to do these days, but one approach is to ask your customers if they could run a student survey on your behalf, making provision to anonymise the data.

5. Whip up some white papers

Reports and white papers were mentioned earlier.

These don’t have to be very long. What they should be is insightful, or a useful summary or collation of information.

6. Step up that Twitter presence

If the idea of a white paper sounds too demanding or time-consuming, a presence on Twitter could be worth considering.

For example, useful websites, or suggestions on how to translate DfE updates into action, or perhaps just some lighthearted comments or activities to take people’s minds off things.

For example, every Wednesday at 8 pm Gladstone, the Treasury cat, invites cat owners to take photos of their cat in a particular position and then post it to Twitter.

This is pointless but fun! It provides welcome light relief from our current tribulations. See #GladdersYoga.

7. Choose your freemium models wisely

Many companies attract new customers by offering freebies or a cut-down service. At the 2019 Marketing to Schools Summit (M2SS), Jodie Lopez said that the quality of your lead magnet (free giveaway) should be as good as the actual product.

I came across a service recently in which the free version had the same functionality as the paid-for version.

The only difference was that the latter didn’t have the company’s branding on it.

8. Collect those case studies

Case studies of your product in action can be quite useful, especially if they have been written by a third party or by the people using the product.

(In the interests of transparency and credibility, the case study is open about any extra assistance the school was given, such as being given the product or service free of charge.)

The beauty of a case study is that it can go into more depth, and can be more objective than an advertisement. (But note that sponsored blog posts or advertorials must be identified as such.)

9. Get that blog up-to-date

On the subject of blog posts, a blog is a good way for a company to keep its website fresh by adding useful and interesting content at least once a week.

A regularly updated blog has been found to keep people coming back to the website to find out what the latest article is all about.

10. Don’t forget to leave room for flexibility

Whatever you decide to concentrate on, it’s crucial to leave “wiggle room”.

Strategy documents that are so full of so-called SMART objectives that there is no flexibility lend themselves to cheating in some way.

Even without blatant cheating, targets can easily create a perverse incentive to achieve the target rather than the thing the target is meant to represent.

An example I came across was the Head of Computing who told me that he teaches the easier stuff towards the end of the school year because his students will do better on tests as the year goes on, making it look like they’re making progress.

Cynical, perhaps, but understandable too.

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Reflections on Technology in Schools in the time of Covid: Part 2

Bryan Plumb — Mon, 14 Dec 2020 08:06:29 +0000

In Reflections on Technology in Schools in the time of Covid Part 1, we looked at how some technology has become or might become, a feature of school education as a result of our (post)Covid experience.

But what might we expect in the longer term?

Unfortunately, “expect” is perhaps too strong or too optimistic a term to use.

New technologies have to have time to prove themselves before schools en masse will be willing to adopt them.

There are also financial constraints and, above all, the day-to-day pressures.

What headteacher, after all, is going to fret about how blockchain might be implemented while half the students have had to be sent home to isolate and an Ofsted inspection is around the corner.

Nevertheless, a bit of “blue sky thinking” is often enjoyable, and sometimes even useful.

Artificial Intelligence (AI)

In principle, this would be a life-saver in schools.

Just in terms of the amount of new data being generated in schools because of recording new kinds of attendance (see the previous article), having a piece of code working on the data and not merely reporting but predicting likely student outcomes would enable schools to be even more proactive.

There are many potential benefits of AI in schools, and some potential pitfalls, but perhaps this is largely academic at the moment.

Why? Because by and large, the technology is not really there yet in my opinion.

At least, it doesn’t seem to be robust enough to trust it to make predictions that could affect how you provide schooling to some of your students.

Besides, there are issues of bias and legality too. It’s no longer news to assert that many computer algorithms, far from avoiding human biases, have embedded them.

As if that wasn’t bad enough, much of the time when AI comes to a conclusion, it doesn’t know how it did so.

That means, it cannot be challenged in any meaningful way.

Imagine AI telling Student A that she doesn’t have the aptitude for university, and then the school and her university choices acting on this “Computer says ‘no’” advice.

One of the stipulations of the GDPR is that people have the right to question decisions made automatically by an algorithm.

Add to that requirement the fact that companies regard their AI code as a closely-guarded secret, and you can see why it will be some time before AI is a major part of the education landscape.

Chatbots

Chatbots, or automated assistants, are beginning to find their way into education, especially HE.

A well-designed chatbot in schools could be a godsend in these times.

If some of a school’s admin staff are having to self-isolate, a chatbot could answer many of parents’ queries and concerns.

Chatbots could also assist in students’ learning. For example, they could chat with a student to determine how well he has understood a concept, and record a grade accordingly.

Or a chatbot could ascertain a student’s needs, and then suggest online resources she would benefit from consulting.

All-in-all, the potential for chatbots in education seems to me to be more realisable, or realisable sooner, than that of more general AI.

Blockchain

The potential for the education of this technology is huge.

It’s largely associated with cryptocurrencies like Bitcoin, but it has far wider implications.

Without delving into the technicalities, blockchain enables a great deal of information to be stored in a decentralised fashion such that if one part gets compromised, the information is still intact.

These “nodes” are linked, and conditions can be applied. For example, students’ achievements can be recorded and stored in a blockchain, with accreditation (perhaps in the form of badges) being given when certain conditions are satisfied.

If a student changes schools, the record of what they have already studied, and how it differs from what the new school offers, can be very easily ascertained.

One of the problems facing teachers who wish to make some money from the resources they develop in their own time and at their own expense is piracy.

With blockchain, it will be relatively easy to guard against that.

The post Reflections on Technology in Schools in the time of Covid: Part 2 appeared first on Bee Digital.

Are virtual conferences worth your time?

Chris Bradford — Wed, 21 Oct 2020 11:15:17 +0000

The pandemic has taught us to think more digitally… But does that translate to tradeshows going online instead of in-person moving forward?

If events weren’t cancelled in the past 2 years, some shows tried to go on by hosting events virtually… which has had a mixed reception.

Some say it failed:

“…the failure of virtual has nothing to do with platform technology, but rather the attendee psychology, motivation, and behaviour at physical B2B events.”

Others see the benefits but are still divided by the long-term impact, shown here in the Bizzabo survey:

93% of event professionals plan to invest in virtual events moving forward.
80.2% of event organizers were able to reach a wider audience with virtual events.
96% of event professionals do not believe virtual events will replace in-person events.

Exhibiting cost A LOT too.

Also, there’s a lot of travel and logistics to sort out… and are you getting the right people coming by your stand?

You may already know what I think about tradeshows from the video Education Tradeshows SUCK… but the desire to go back to business as usual is a fascinating part of attendee psychology.

So, is it FOMO… or have we had time to up our tradeshow game now we’ve been on this global sabbatical? (Kind of.)

"...those who are spending a good bit of money will want to attend in order to ensure they are getting the best products for their companies. Educational sessions may be less important now that people are used to webinars. Meetings that are primarily educational, rather than trade shows, will be more often virtual."

Bill Conerly, Trade Shows Will Regain Importance After The Covid-19 Pandemic

I agree with Bill Conerly in this Forbes article about a hybrid tradeshow future.

The show must go on, right? Because of the networking opportunities.

This is why I’ve been sharing this quick (and dirty!) tip on how to quickly and effectively get teachers to your exhibition stand.

Record a VERTICAL video of yourself at your stand inviting people to stop by. (Yes, VERTICAL. It takes up more real estate on Facebook and it’s more mobile-friendly for people watching it on their phones on the exhibition floor.)
Upload it as a Facebook ad.
Target an audience based on LOCATION to those who have visited ExCel London in the past day. (This will give your video ad maximum reach to trade show attendees.)

So are virtual events worth your time?

Some events have permanently transitioned to being online.

One of the main benefits of a “real-life” conference is the ability to network with other delegates. Indeed, it’s not such a flippant comment to say that sometimes the most important parts of any conference are the tea and lunch breaks.

Some online conferences build in networking as part of their timetabling.

Other events may afford opportunities for making new contacts in a less formal way.

For example, if the event is being held over Zoom, will the room be open before the start? Fifteen minutes for small talk can be useful for getting to know other participants.

Will there be opportunities to ask questions?

Another essential aspect of conferences is the chance to ask the speakers questions.

After all, each speaker has been invited onto the podium because they’re acknowledged as an expert in their field.

Therefore, being able to ask them a question is tremendously valuable.

Will the sessions be recorded?

There may be data protection reasons that the sessions cannot be recorded.

However, if they are, will you have access to those recordings afterwards?

Some online conferences offer a tiered structure, such as a small fee to have access to the recordings for a limited period of time, and a larger fee to have permanent access.

Will the slides be made available?

More often than not, presentation slides on their own are fairly useless, especially if, rather than having text, they have pictures.

However, they may act as an aid-memoire and in that way supplement your own notes from the event.

Is the conference fee cost-effective?

In normal circumstances, attending a conference usually involves a whole separate layer of additional costs: travelling time, fares, and possibly food and accommodation.

A virtual conference allows you to do other work right up to just a few minutes before you need to get online, and with none of the other costs mentioned.

What other “compensations” are there?

I think most people would agree that in spite of the time- and money-saving aspects of attending a conference online compared to attending a physical one, they’re not as good.

Even with networking opportunities built-in, you don’t necessarily enjoy the serendipitous chats over a cup of coffee.

Therefore it’s pertinent to ask if there are any additional things on offer that go some way towards making up for that.

For example, is there a delegates-only Facebook or Linkedin group? Will there be a special conference price for speakers’ books, in the form of a code to apply at the virtual checkout?

Ultimately, as with all cost-benefit analyses, only you and your colleagues can judge whether the potential advantages of a particular virtual conference outweigh the disadvantages of not attending at all.

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