Convenient Consolidation
The Ellucian team worked with their RainFocus client success team to optimize the mobile experience for attendees. The mobile app featured elements of the existing attendee portal — including agendas, catalogs, and surveys — which reduced configuration time. All subsequent changes made to the attendee portal were automatically reflected in both the mobile app and desktop view. This feature proved especially useful for last-minute session changes, ensuring attendees always had the most up-to-date information at their fingertips.
“It was really nice to have one session catalog, one speaker catalog, and one exhibitor catalog. That was huge! We had the app set up in no time.” — Katie LeVasseur, Marketing Campaign Manager, Ellucian
Exceeding Networking Expectations
The event’s app was announced in Ellucian’s know-before-you-go email, which was sent to attendees a week before E-Live to encourage attendees to book meetings and begin scheduling sessions. The attendee catalog also enabled attendees to search for and chat with peers.
The app proved immediately popular. Ellucian found that more than 85% of attendees used the app and enjoyed its many on-site benefits. For example, booking a meeting with a product expert within the app rather than visiting the exhibit hall saved time on busy days and even allowed attendees to attend more sessions. The mobile meetings tool also saw wide adoption, significantly increasing the total number of meetings held at the event.
“People loved the networking feature. Even though we launched it only a week before the conference, our meetings were pretty much booked by the time the conference began.”— Katie LeVasseur, Marketing Campaign Manager, Ellucian
Driving Attendee Engagement
The mobile app was also tied to Ellucian’s on-site gamification, which allowed attendees to easily track their points in the E-Live game. The game incentivized attendees to complete key event actions such as scanning in at exhibitor booths, giving exhibitors greater visibility. App-based gamification increased session attendance — more than 90% of attendees included at least one session. The app also motivated attendees to participate in various event activations, including a memorable communal moment watching a rare solar eclipse during the event.
“Having a mobile app on-site that was very user-friendly was great! We had a ton of positive feedback.” — Katie LeVasseur, Marketing Campaign Manager, Ellucian
Full Flexibility and Customization
The RainFocus Mobile App lets each client build fully customized pages to best suit their event’s needs. Ellucian’s customized pages included a venue map provided by wayfinding solution MazeMap to help attendees navigate the venue easily. Another custom page supplied shuttle schedule information to further guide attendees’ daily journeys. App notifications provided helpful time-sensitive notifications of important conference activities, such as keynote sessions.
Following the success of E-Live, Ellucian plans to continue optimizing mobile experiences at future events. In particular, enhancing networking opportunities and adding more features for first-time attendees will be top priorities. With continued collaboration with RainFocus, LeVasseur and her team are confident that they will deliver.