MEETING NEWS
March 4, 2002
Marshall Krantz

March 04, 2002 (Westport, Conn.) — b-there has added a feature to its Internet-based attendee-management application that allows convention and trade show attendees to receive "smart card" name badges.  A smart card is a name badge embedded with a computer chip that can contain a much greater array of information than name badges with bar codes or magnetic strips, according to Karen Vogel, b-there's vice president of strategic partnerships, who negotiated a partnership with smart-card maker bCard of Bethesda, Md.

The card face usually shows the card holder's full name and a 14-digit account number. The chip not only contains an attendee's profile, but also attendee payment information and the sessions to which he has access. With customized hand-held devices, meeting staff can admit attendees to sessions by scanning their cards, thus improving security and eliminating attendee tickets to events.

Attendees and organizations also can change the information contained on the chip, so the card can be used as an association membership card.

But perhaps the bCard's greatest benefit is for lead retrieval by trade show exhibitors, who can download attendee information into their laptops or bCard's customized hand-held, according to Vogel. They also can create customized attendee questionnaires and make notes electronically using bCard software.

Exhibitors also can initiate a reward program through the bCard to drive traffic to their booths, according to Vogel. For example, through an electronic marketing campaign, they can offer airline miles to select attendees as an inducement to stop by the booths.

"Instead of a key ring, exhibitors can offer something of value they can track to true potential buyers," said Vogel.

Vogel said the new arrangement with bCard allows greater integration between pre-registration online and registration onsite. All registration information, whether generated prior to an event or onsite, is entered directly into b-there's online database. bCards can be produced either prior to an event or immediately onsite.

b-there also has partnered with Events Digital, a New York-based company that produces webcasts of live events. People who prefer to attend an event virtually instead of in person can register for the webcast through b-there.

With b-there, all registration information, whether for attendance in person or attendance online, flows into a single database.

That database gives event organizers greater marketing power to potential attendees, said the company. Organizers can more easily determine which target audience members decline or fail to respond to invitations to the live event, and then in turn market the webcast aggressively to those people. In addition, event organizers can consolidate all payment information from both the in-person event and the webcast.