For the last few months we’ve been working with Mattress Firm to build a customized application for BEDTalks 2013, the company’s National Leadership Conference. Mattress Firm is one of the nation’s premier specialty bedding retailers and is incredibly progressive in how it’s integrating mobile solutions into the lives of its sales team. Given the time the sales team spends on the road, Mattress Firm is dedicated to improving the way they access and leverage information to enhance overall performance and sales.
The application, BED Talks, is not only a great example of how apps can be customized to fit unique customer needs but also of our Salesforce Chatter integration. In a recent webinar with Salesforce.com we had the chance to sit down with Mattress Firm to talk about how the app worked at their event. We thought people might benefit from hearing more about why Mattress Firm created a customized app for its event and the benefits they saw as a result.
Increased audience engagement
Whether hosting an event that brings together 50 or 800 people, logistics can change up until the very last minute and, in many cases, during the actual event. Event attendees want quick and easy access to information without having to shuffle through a million handouts or programs. Through its app, Mattress Firm was able to provide attendees access to the most up-to-date information on presentations and send notifications about schedule changes.
By incorporating Salesforce Chatter into the app itself, the Mattress Firm sales team was able to interact with other attendees and presenters in real time through a dedicated Chatter feed. The audience was able to check out presenter profiles, share relevant documents and post pictures from the event.
Social
The Mattress Firm sales team is a young, socially savvy workforce. Employees were already sharing information socially and the company wanted to replicate this experience, but in a way that was safe and secure. Chatter and other social tools like Twitter, Facebook and LinkedIn were incorporated directly into the app and helped to drive engagement and open lines of attendee communication.
Life beyond the event
One of the greatest parts of an industry event or sales conference is being able to connect with your peers, share best practices and come away feeling like you really learned something new. Many of our clients have shared that their attendees want access to all the great videos, presentations and people they met after the event. By creating a customized events app participants are able to easily continue the conversation for weeks and months to come. Additionally, it provides a way to share relevant information with members of the organization that were unable to attend the event but would benefit from the shared knowledge.
Chris O’Connor is co-founder and CEO at Taptera. A builder at heart, Chris enjoys creating teams, systems and companies. He is passionate about improving employees’ relationships with their software and had 15 years’ experience bringing innovative IT solutions to Fortune 500 companies. During his eight-year tenure at Genentech, Inc., Chris held various senior roles including associate director of cloud and mobile solutions and principal systems architect. For more info please contact: hello@taptera.com and follow along on Twitter @Taptera.