Every organizer who has launched an event app knows the moment. The app is live and the agenda is in, and on the morning of the event most of the room still hasn't signed in. Someone suggests a bigger sign at the entrance.
Low adoption is rarely about the app itself. It usually comes down to how people were invited and whether there was any reason to come back after the first look. Both are in the organizer's hands, and both are settled well before anyone queues for a badge.
Start weeks before, not at the door
The worst time to ask someone to set up an app is while they stand in a registration queue holding a coffee and a tote bag. The best time is when they are at their desk planning the trip, a week or two out, with a few minutes to spare.
Plan adoption as a campaign with dates, the way you plan ticket sales:
- With the ticket, or two to three weeks before: how to get in, in one line, with the email address to use.
- Ten days before: profiles and matching open. "See who's coming and who you should meet."
- A week before: meeting requests open.
- Two days before: "Your agenda and meetings are in the app. Here is where the meeting area is."
- Each morning of the event: one announcement with the day's highlights.
- During sessions: speakers and moderators point people to Q&A and polls.
- The last afternoon: look back through your connections, rate the sessions you attended.
Send each message on the channel it needs. In Conecta, announcements go out by push, email or both, to everyone or to particular roles or companies, and can be scheduled in advance. Email campaigns can be segmented by role or ticket type, so each group gets instructions that fit it. The communication tools cover both.
Choose the right way in
How attendees get access decides how many make it through the door. Pick the method that matches how they bought or received their ticket. Conecta supports the five below.
| Access method | Works well for | Watch out for |
|---|---|---|
| Ticket matched by email | Events ticketed through Eventino | People signing in with a different email than the one they bought with |
| Personal 8-character join code, emailed | Invite-only events and tickets sold elsewhere | Codes landing in spam, so send from an address people recognise |
| Shared 6-digit event code | On-site sign-ups and open community events | The code travels, so avoid it if the attendee list is sensitive |
| Team or mentor list | Accelerators and hackathons | Keeping lists current when teams change |
| Open to all | Public events where anyone may join | Anyone who joins can see the attendees who opted in |
The commonest failure is the email mismatch. Someone bought the ticket with a work address, signs in with a personal Google account and gets told they have no access. Say in every message which email to use, and have a fallback ready at the help point, such as the shared event code.
Whatever the method, the attendee list is only visible to people with access to that event, and it only shows attendees who chose to join networking. Say so in your invitation. It answers the privacy question before anyone asks it. The access options page has the details.
Write an access email people can act on
The access email is the most important message in the whole campaign, and it is often the one written in a hurry. It has one job: get the reader signed in within a minute of opening it.
- Make the subject line about the attendee. "See who's coming and book your meetings" gets further than "Download our event app".
- Say what it is for in one sentence. Meeting the right people, planning the agenda. Leave the feature list out.
- Give the exact way in. The email address their ticket is under, or their personal code, written out in full.
- Use one button. One link to open the event, with the store badges and the browser link underneath for people who prefer them.
- Add one date. When meeting requests open, so there is a reason to come back.
A version you can adapt:
Subject: See who's coming to [Event name] and book your meetings
The attendee list for [Event name] is now open. Sign in with the email you used for your ticket, [email address], to see who you should meet and plan your sessions before you travel.
[Open the event]
Meeting requests open on [date]. Book early: the best slots go first.
Send it from an address people recognise, ideally the same one that sent their ticket.
Make the first screen worth the effort
Someone who signs in and finds an empty list won't come back. The first visit has to show something useful within a minute.
- Fill the event before inviting attendees. Agenda, speakers, exhibitors, partners and the floor plan should be in place before the first invitation goes out.
- Bring in the early joiners first. Ask speakers, sponsors, mentors and your own team to join networking a few days before the general invitation, so the first attendee to sign in finds people worth meeting.
- Keep onboarding short. A handful of questions and a tight interest list. Every extra screen loses someone. Our guide to onboarding questions for matchmaking shows how to keep it short without losing match quality.
- Lead with recommendations. If matching is set up well, the first thing a new attendee sees should be people worth meeting, each with a reason.
Sign-in should be the easy part. An email code, a magic link or a Google or Apple account, and no password to forget.
Give people reasons to open it on site
An app that is only for networking gets opened by people who were going to network anyway. An app that is useful to everyone during the day gets opened by everyone, and then they notice the networking.
Reasons that work on the day:
- The agenda with their saved sessions, especially when rooms change or a session moves.
- Their meetings with table numbers, shown next to their saved sessions on the home screen.
- Session Q&A. Upvoted questions are fairer than a roaming microphone, and optional moderation lets you filter before anything appears.
- Live polls. One quick poll in the first five minutes of a talk gets phones out.
- Roundtables with limited places, so people check what is still open.
- The floor plan and exhibitor list, particularly at trade fairs.
Q&A and polls only work if speakers and moderators use them. Brief every moderator: questions come from the app, read the top-voted ones, mention it at the start of each session. If the moderator takes questions from the floor anyway, attendees learn quickly that the app doesn't matter. The engagement features only pay off when the stage is part of the plan.
Staff and signage
- A help point near registration, but not part of it. Registration should stay fast. The help point deals with "I can't get in" and "which email did I use?".
- Signs with a QR code that opens the app, including the browser version, so nobody has to install anything to take part. Conecta runs on iPhone, iPad, Android and the web.
- One line for every member of staff, including volunteers at the door, on how attendees get in.
- The meeting area on the venue signage, with the same table numbers attendees see in the app.
Give the help point a short script. Most questions will be the same three or four, and a volunteer who can answer them in one sentence keeps the queue moving.
What to avoid
- Forced downloads at the door. Making the app a condition of entry creates queues and resentment. Installing something under pressure is not the same as using it.
- Launching on the day. Profiles have had no time to fill in, so recommendations are thin exactly when people first look.
- Too many notifications. A push for every session start trains people to switch them off. Keep to a few announcements a day, each carrying something people need.
- A long onboarding form. Collect everything else at registration, where people expect forms.
- Treating the app as a replacement for signage. People with flat batteries still need to find room B.
Summing up
Adoption is a plan with dates, not a sign at the door. Invite people early through the access method that matches how they got their ticket, and tell them which email to use. Have the event filled in and the early joiners on board before the first invitation, so the first screen is worth seeing. Then make the app the place where the day happens, from the agenda to the questions for the stage. If you are still choosing a platform, our guide to what event networking software does covers what to look for, and what attendees see is worth a look from their side.