Certain Software

ICCA, International Congress and Convention Association, Hot Spot for global meetings industry network

Posted Wednesday, November 12, 2008 by Kimberly Enright

Last week the 47th ICCA Congress&Exhibition was held in Victoria, Canada. Comprised of global meeting, event and conference organizers, it was an opportunity for me to get to meet our customers who use Certain Events, our Amlink event management software product. Sharyn Ross, EMEA Sales Manager has been a member of ICCA since 2000 and introduced me to many of our European and Australian customers. Meetings and events technology guru, Corbin Ball http://www.corbinball.com/ spoke on key technology trends for the meetings and events industry. As always, Corbin is in the know on conference and expo management software and technology.

The overall message of the ICCA Congress was on point - focus on what we do best as meeting and event professionals, do it better, and with increased value. The tone was positive and focused on how to bring about value in these very turbulent economic times.

It was wild being in Canada on US Election Night - seeing the voting results unfold on the big screen through the eyes of the BBC was a good global perspective. I was very proud to celebrate being an American that night, along with my colleagues from around the world.

Certain Software awarded Top Technology Supplier of 2008

Posted Wednesday, November 12, 2008 by Gianni Lyle

Meeting Tech Online Summit 2008

Certain Software was recognized as a Top Technology Supplier of 2008 at the Meeting Tech Online Summit held this past November 5th and 6th in Chicago. Meetings Tech Online made its award decisions based on interviews with various show managers and association executives who implement technology solutions for tradeshow floors and conference rooms. Award winners were assessed on effectiveness, innovation, interface, ease of use and integration within show and event systems.

“Delivering innovative events management technology is a driving force in everything we do at Certain Software. It always makes the efforts of our team worthwhile when people in the meetings and events industry give us such positive recognition,” remarks Kimberly Enright, Director of Marketing.

Certain Software’s main product offerings have been carefully developed to provide professionals with easy to use yet powerful functionality delivered via flexible modules. Core solutions include Certain Registration ™, which leads the hosted online registration applications market, as well as eventsPro™ and eventsInteractive™, the top ranking enterprise events management solutions used by event organizers from corporate meetings to massive world events.

“This year we have done quite a bit to bring innovative features and ideas to the marketplace. This summer saw the international release of eventsPro and eventsInteractive Version 11, delivering new online survey, visual table allocation, conference website builder and sales&sponsorship functionality,” says Ms. Enright.

“Just when meeting planners are faced with the tough economic challenges, we are offering some free ROI tools including a cost savings whitepaper and ROI calculator. This winter, we look forward to the release of our latest strategic meetings management product, Certain Meetings™, which will give planners a new technology tool for managing meeting requests and approvals.”

> > READ THE FULL PRESS RELEASE HERE

Advanced Training for Certain Registration Users

Posted Thursday, October 30, 2008 by Lila Meyer

Next week we're launching another set of on-demand training videos for Certain Registration. This is an exciting milestone because it represents our first foray into advanced training topics using the on-demand format.

In the Building Events IV series, meeting planners will learn how to configure their program offerings in online registration forms. Here are some of the specific skills covered in the videos:

Enable users to request more than one of a selected program item
Enable program waitlisting in the form
Report on and manage waitlists on the admin side
Export and import program item lists into the application
Allow users to peruse a lengthy program list using a search tool

I hope you'll find these latest training videos helpful!

What's so hard about estimating event costs?

Posted Wednesday, October 29, 2008 by Rick Borry

Many Strategic Meetings Management Programs (SMMP) have a meeting request and approval process. What makes Certain Meetings different is that it only asks information on the Meeting Request form that the person who is requesting the meeting should be expected to know.

That may sound obvious, but existing corporate event planning software often asks the Requester to provide cost estimates, such as how much they expect to spend on food&beverage in their event. The typical non-professional meeting planner does not have a realistic idea about how to make these estimations, and the result is that the person being asked to approve the meeting request will either receive an incorrect budget estimation or no estimate at all.

Some professional meeting planners try to overcome this issue by reviewing all meeting requests prior to their submission to an Approver, however, this process is very time consuming and can quickly overwhelm the SMMP with administrative work.

Certain Meetings solves this problem by first asking the professional meeting planners to create a set of "budget estimation rules" that relate common event information (such as the number of attendees, number of days, or number of meals desired) to cost estimates based on recent event budgets. Then, when the Requester is completing a meeting request form, she does not have to guess at cost estimates, but will immediately receive a calculated cost estimate based on the options requested for the meeting.

That's all I'll say for now, but I'll continue this thread soon. In the meantime, I have to close the last half-dozen defect tickets before our planned Beta release next Monday. Today I saw the first user documentation draft and it's exciting to see a new product come together. Here's to effective meeting management!

Event management software showcased in New York and Chicago in November

Posted Monday, October 27, 2008 by Gianni Lyle

The Certain Software Team is hitting the road again to talk about the technology issues facing meeting, conference, training and event planners. On November 12th, Certain Software will be among other events management software providers present at the Meetings Technology Expo in New York. Certain Software's Chief Software Architect Dr. Rick Borry will be on hand to present the session Security for Web 2.0: Staying on Top of New Issues in Meetings Technology.

Meetings Technology Expo NY
Meetings Tech Expo (MTE)
When: November 12, 2008
Where: New York, NY
www.meetingstechexpo.com

Certain Software will also showcase its online registration and event management software innovations at the Meeting Tech Online Summit on November 6th in Chicago.

Meeting Tech Online Summit
Meeting Tech Online (MTO)
When: November 6, 2008
Where: Chicago, IL
www.summit.meetingtechonline.com/

Online Registration Best Practice Tip #1 - TEST YOUR FORMS!

Posted Monday, October 20, 2008 by Bob Osborn

Before going live with your online event registration - TEST YOUR FORMS! Although this may seem obvious to most, it's not uncommon for meeting planners and event coordinators to be in such a rush to go live that they don't thoroughly test their forms. This is particularly important when managing an event that is fee based and has multiple attendee types and price points.

Going live with untested forms can result in registrants being allowed to successfully register, without submitting payment. Once this is realized by the planner, it can make for an embarrassing situation when you are forced to follow-up with that client with an email or phone call. To prevent this from happening, TEST YOUR FORMS!

Be CERTAIN before going live!

Bob Osborn
Director of Product Support
Certain Software, Inc.

NBTA plans SMMP Certification

Posted Thursday, October 16, 2008 by Rick Borry

Successful Meetings October 2008 issue reports that the National Business Travel Association plans to debut a new SMMP certification for independent and corporate meeting planners. Strategic Meetings Management Programs have been a focus for group travel executives since 2004, and this certification program is another step in the maturation process of this business practice.

Certain Software shares NBTA's view of Strategic Meetings Management, as summarized in the following diagram:

Components of a Best in Class Strategic Meetings Management Program (SMMP) - from National Business Travel Association (NBTA)

Our new product, Certain Meetings, will address the first two steps in this process: Registration of Meeting/Event and Approval. In between these two steps, we added an automated budget estimation process. This will be the topic of a future post - stay tuned.

(Note that Certain Registration and Certain Events Pro provide our solutions for the last 3 stages: planning, payments, and reporting.)

P.S. The Meetings code is going into pre-Beta release testing this week. We're getting close!

Taking a different approach to Strategic Meeting Management Programs

Posted Thursday, October 16, 2008 by Rick Borry

I've been holed up for the past few months developing a new product for Certain Software called Certain Meetings. We're known in the events industry mainly for our event management software applications, Certain Registration and Certain Events Pro, but we haven't been considered for most of the planning and budgetary aspects of event management.

Certain Meetings takes a different approach towards Strategic Meetings Management than most of the existing applications. My survey of the marketplace showed me that many products require the people who make meeting requests to know more about professional meeting management than is typical in most organizations. Also, these products are heavily invested in site selection and RFP work flow in an attempt to become the next "Expedia" or "Trip Adviser" for the events industry. Our anecdotal experience is that less than a third of events in most organizations go through a site selection process, since the rest are in locations too remote or local to consider more than a few sites. Many meeting "requests" in practice are really a notification of an event that has already been held. Granted this is not an ideal situation but it is the reality, especially in the early years of a Strategic Meetings Management Program.

Over the next few weeks I'll be discussing our take on this problem, and how we hope to help customers solve it with Certain Meetings.

Conference software, abstract management software, event management software....what do they have to do with planning meetings in a bad economy?

Posted Wednesday, October 15, 2008 by Gianni Lyle

Cost justification.Meetings spend reduction. Issues with travel costs. Scrutiny on number of meetings. Making external clients or other internal departments see the value a meetings and events planner can contribute during difficult economic times......these are the things that a cross section of meeting planners recently voiced to Medical Meetings Magazine in a recent video interview.

Medical Meetings Magaazine Economy and Meetings Video

Tracking cost effectiveness and cost savings is something that events management technology can help meeting and event planners to address already. Meeting planning automation, reduction of labor, streamlining of conference marketing materials and communications, online registration, abstract management, comprehensive reporting and budgeting - these are all things event management software and other meetings technologies can do to prove return on investment as invaluable tools and in turn help meeting planners reinforce their value.

Help for Meeting Planners in a Tough Economy: Online Registration Software ROI

Posted Tuesday, October 14, 2008 by Gianni Lyle

MeetingsNet put out a special report recently, "The Economic Impact on Meeting Planning", filtering the latest news stories springing from the Wall Street meltdown for the meeting and events planning industry. These are interesting times frought with both great perils and hidden opportunities for everyone, and meeting planners and event organizers are no exception.

The perils include a heavier scrutiny and pull back on travel, hotel and event spending in general. The travel industry from airlines to hotels to venues is bracing for a slowdown. Organizations are looking hard at their spending to make inevitable cuts.

For meeting and event planning professionals, opportunities will exist for possible increased negotiating power with venues who are struggling to book meetings and events.

Planners also can look to better technology solutions that will save them money in the long run over more costly planning methods of the past. Online registration software is one solution that planners in the U.S. and internationally are making a standard, not just because its more modern and convenient for attendees, it actually can reduce labor and resources needed.

Certain Software recently published a whitepaper, entiled "Save Money with Online Registration" that gives planners an example scenario that compares the savings.
Labor spent, event marketing materials, postage - all are areas that technology can help save planners money. In this economy, we all walk a tight line above the crocodiles of economic ruin and have to look out for solutions that help us get across soundly.

What is new with event management software, Barcelona and Certain Software's global meetings and events technology solutions....

Posted Friday, October 3, 2008 by Gianni Lyle

The world of event management software is Certain Software's domain in 2008, having launched its full product suite with the latest Version 11 release of its top ranking events management and online interactivity products, eventsPro and eventsInteractive, in addition to its stand-out Software as Service online registration software, Certain Registration.

Certain Software's Director of Marketing, Kimberly Enright, gives some highlights on what is new with the Certain Software product family and Certain Software's excitementt for the EIBTM show this December in Barcelona, Spain.

New Features Video Demonstration

Posted Wednesday, October 1, 2008 by Lila Meyer

Our development team is working on releasing some new features and changes to Certain Registration in version 4.16.3. You will be able to view your imports while your event is in testing mode without making the event live. We've also added a "test" watermark to registration forms in events in testing mode.

In a few weeks, administrators will also have an account usage report available in Setup > Administration > Account Usage. The usage report will provide summary data for your accounts, including number of events, registrations, imports, and test registrations.

After the upcoming release, you'll find a video demonstration of these new features and functionality changes on the landing page of Certain Registration. Look for the video and changes soon!

Event planners can reduce costs with online registration software

Posted Wednesday, September 24, 2008 by Gianni Lyle

It is true. Times are tough for the economy, and meeting and event planners are feeling the effects on their events planning strategies. What can be done while stocks are tanking and company's are locking down meeting, events, training, travel and entertainment spending? For many planners the key may lie in their events management software.

Certain Software recently put out a piece to help meeting and event planners learn about reducing costs and increasing revenue through online registration software. The whitepaper is available on Certain.com. Check it out, and see what you can do to save some money.

Mission and Vision

Posted Friday, August 29, 2008 by Rick Borry

My local electric utility offers an online business academy for small businesses (Small Biz U), and I've been taking some of the courses at lunch time.

One program on business planning states the importance of having a written expression of why the organization exists, and what it is going to accomplish. They define four levels of planning:

Mission - this is the timeless reason for an organization to exist. Missions state the never-ending path a company will follow.
Vision - this should be a statement of where the company will be in the next one to three years.
Goal - goals are things that employees in the organization should strive for, in order to achieve the Vision.
Objectives - these are specific tasks that the organization will accomplish. An objective must have a single owner (who may be supported by a team), a specific definition of success, and a deadline.

Missions do not change unless the organization shifts courses. The Vision should be updated every few years as past ones are (hopefully) realized. Goals are often permanent and lofty, e.g. "Treat employees with respect." Objectives should be monitored and graded frequently, at least weekly if not daily.

How are we applying these lessons at Certain?

At Certain, our Vision is "to be recognized as THE Global Technology Solution for the Events and Meeting Planning Industry."

Our Mission is "To be unsurpassed in the world as a software solutions provider that provides:

innovative and comprehensive technology solutions
unparalleled customer value
best in class customer service to the event and meeting industry

It looks like we fit the textbook material fairly well. Our mission is the reason that we exist, but we could never really say that we've achieved our mission. Our vision, on the other hand, is something that can be measured, yet will be very difficult to achieve, and once we achive that vision with one segment of the events market, there will always be others to pursue.

Slow economy got you down? Event managent software delivers ways to greater ROI....

Posted Sunday, August 24, 2008 by Gianni Lyle

With the slow United States economy casting a shadow over business strategies for all industries, meeting planners and event organizers are increasingly looking for solutions that reduce costs while increasing Return on Investment.

Fortunately the bright minds at Certain Software have come up with some solutions to maximize meeting spend and create positive ROI for meetings, events, conferences, and training programs. Listen to what Vice President of Sales & Marketing, Ken Voss has to say on the subject.

Certain Software goes to Washington...

Posted Wednesday, August 20, 2008 by Gianni Lyle

As Obama and McCain gear up for the final rounds of their U.S. presidential duke out match, Certain Software is on the ground in the nation's capital this September as well. The Certain Software Team will be at the Meetings Technology Expo in Washington D.C. on September 3. The MTE DC show attracts event organizers, meeting planners, training program coordinators, and information technology professionals from U.S. government agencies in addition to other East Coast meetings and events industry professionals.

Cetain Software goes MTE in Wasington D.C.

The international innovators in online registration and event management software solutions will be among select technology companies on hand discussing effective meeting management best practices. Certain Software will also provide demonstrations of its industry leading applications for strategic meeting management, including Certain Registration, eventsPro and eventsInteractive.

Earlier this year, Certain Software met with West Coast event planners at the Meeting Technology Expo held at the Westin Market hotel in San Francisco. I got a chance to talk to a government sector planner and valued Certain Registration customer from the California Judicial Council. She voiced her desire for session level wait list functionality, features that have since been incorporated into this past July's release of Certain Registration Version 4.16.

Certain Software will be getting some sun at the ASAE show in San Diego

Posted Monday, August 18, 2008 by Gianni Lyle

If you are an association event and membership program planner, odds are you will be at the ASAE Meeting and Expo being held this week in sunny San Diego. ASAE & The Center for Association Leadership brings out some of the best association organizers in the United States to compare notes and get fresh ideas for membership management, meetings, events and professional development programs.

Certain Software's Director of Marketing, Kimberly Enright, along with other Certain Software experts will be available on the tradeshow floor to discuss solutions for 21st Century online registration, event management and membership programs. From Certain Registration, used by large member organizations like FFA and Boy Scouts of America, to newly added products memberConnect and eventsInteractive, Certain Software has long been meeting the needs of associations of all sizes and focuses.

The ASAE Meeting and Expo is going on August 16 -19. Visit their event site for more details and news.

Certain Software will be at 2008 ASAE Tradeshow

Certain's world leading events management software brings new features to event planners

Posted Sunday, August 17, 2008 by Gianni Lyle

If you did not know already, Certain Software, the Bay Area based leader in meetings and events technology innovation, has expanded its software product family in 2008. Joining its original online registration Software as a Service application, Certain Registration, are the fully featured enterprise software solutions, eventsPro, eventsInteractive, eventsPro CE and memberConnect.

This July, Certain Software has been pleased to bring its customers even more of the features for which they have been looking, with the release of Version 11 of eventsPro and eventsInteractive. Event organizers have never had such an all around powerful software solution for complete conference management, including the ability to do more with their event websites.

If you organize large events, meetings or conferences you will want to know more about the features in the Version 11 release of eventsPro and eventsInteractive. Go ahead, read up on it in the press release now (originally debuted at the National Business Travel Association press room in July 2008).

On Demand Training Library is Growing

Posted Wednesday, August 13, 2008 by Lila Meyer

In just a few weeks, we'll be posting five new On Demand Training videos in the Support and Services section. The new videos will replace the Building Events III public webinar; which includes advanced training on how to add custom HTML sections, build event web sites, use logic rules, enable guest and additional registrations, and customize the entry page of your registration forms.

As we continue to design and build more training materials, we want to hear your feedback. If you have completed one or more of the training videos, please be sure to fill out the training survey. Every video contains a link to the training survey on the last slide of the video. You can also use this survey link to launch the survey now. The survey will only take you a few minutes to complete. We look forward to reading your feedback and improving our training curriculum.

New Features & Training Solutions

Posted Thursday, July 17, 2008 by Lila Meyer

In our upcoming release of Certain Registration 4.16, we're proud to present you with new tools to more effectively manage program item waitlists, as well as barcodes on the registration confirmation page.

The new program item waitlisting features in our online registration software enable event planners to:

Create waitlists at the program section level
Use new program item statuses and avoid over-booking
Move registrants from waitlisted to registered agenda status, as inventory becomes available
Run an event program item status summary report to see all of the program items with their registrants’ agenda status

In addition to the new program item waitlist features in 4.16, we’ve also provided you with the option to include a barcode in the registration confirmation. If you send the confirmation email in html format, the barcode will display properly and can be printed. Registrants can then bring the printed confirmation to the event and it can be scanned like an admission ticket for on-site access.

Training solutions:

Right now you can access a New Features Video that demonstrates how these new features work. To watch the video, login to www.certain.com and scroll to the bottom of the landing page. Then click the link for the New Features Video. Coming soon are a detailed tip sheet in the Support & Services section as well as context sensitive help.

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