Fresh from the Event Tech Summit, Vanessa Lovatt speaks to us about data-driven events, the personalisation puzzle, and why collaboration trumps competition.
As technology advances at an unprecedented rate, the events industry struggles to keep pace. Vanessa Lovatt, Founder of tech buying community Event Tech World, is on a mission to close that gap. With 20 years in the B2B events industry, she has witnessed the growing chasm between available technology and industry adoption: “We are absolutely brilliant at people management and process, but we’re not very good at tech, and most businesses grow through people, process, and technology. The tech piece is a big gaping hole in the growth potential of the industry.”
Identifying this issue led to the creation of Event Tech World, a free mentoring community dedicated to making event professionals more competent with technology. Since its first meetup last July, Event Tech World has grown organically around peer-to-peer knowledge sharing: “Tech is exploding in the events industry faster than we probably need it to. There are some amazing tools popping up, but the knowledge and awareness of them is incredibly low.”
She illustrates this with a striking example – the head of an events business hosting 5,000 people was manually matching attendees for meetings through spreadsheets: “Sometimes that’s budget led, but very often it’s knowledge. They just don’t know what’s out there to help.”
Personalisation stands out as both the industry’s greatest aspiration and most elusive goal. At a recent Event Tech Council meeting, Vanessa asked 12 senior budget holders for real examples in action: “Truth be told, they didn’t really have much to share. There’s a lot of desire, but not much know-how on how to do anything really meaningful.”
The challenge requires striking a delicate balance: “You need technical competency and creativity. An event team might be really creative, but they don’t have the technical ability to deliver it, or they can deliver technically, but haven’t mastered being very creative or engaging.”
Vanessa identifies data as “probably the most exciting part of event tech today.” The amount of data available has exploded, yet she estimates only 20% of useful data is being utilised: “This represents nothing but opportunity.” Applications range from behavioural insights at exhibition booths to intent data revealing which sessions attendees participated in: “It’s going to take a step change in how people are prioritising this data. But I think it’s very exciting times for what we can do.”
Meanwhile, certain technologies are capturing attention. Post-event content tools like Voxo, Snapsnight, and Rozie Synopsis ingest microphone feeds to create summaries within minutes. Photo-sharing platforms such as Premagic, Memento, and Kampfire use AI to recognise and package photos for social sharing.
An impressive aspect of Event Tech World’s growth has been the collaboration it fosters. The Chatham House rules create a safe space where insights are shared: “People aren’t getting support from their workplace, so they’re looking elsewhere. They see that the more they share, the more their peers share with them. I’m seeing that happen, and it’s glorious.”
Through digital demo drop-ins, where suppliers present 12-minute demos, even competitors benefit: “Suppliers need to pull their socks up a little bit, because it is their job to know what their competition is up to.”
A central theme Vanessa returns to is using technology purposefully: “I don’t use a lot of tech for my own events because I don’t need to. You’re much better off using a couple of things well, or one thing really, really well.”
Vanessa has plans for Event Tech World to expand. A paid membership tier will be introduced, though it won’t be a barrier to participation: “For me, it’s about quality over quantity. It’s more important to have the right people in the right conversations than 100 people coming together just because it sounds big.”
As the industry grapples with rapid technological change, the mission remains clear – ensuring that the buy side and supply side speak the same language: “We’re all about helping people and making the industry better for everyone.”
Event Tech World offers free membership at
Eventtechworld.com