A room change, four places
Two days before a conference, a breakout session moves rooms because the expected numbers doubled. Your team updates the event app. Someone else updates the website session page, but not the downloadable agenda PDF. The printed programme has gone to print. The room signage outside each breakout was designed from an earlier export.
On the day, delegates holding the printed programme go to the old room. The app is right. The sign outside the old room is wrong. The session starts late and half full.
Why the agenda splits into versions
Every channel was set up on its own tool, and none of them talk to each other.
- The app and the website are separate systems, updated by different people.
- The programme is designed in a layout tool from an export at a point in time.
- Room signs and screens outside rooms are created from another export.
- Speaker names and titles are typed in several places, with small differences.
- Nobody owns the agenda as a single thing; each channel has its owner.
When channels disagree
Delegates lose trust in all the channels when one of them is wrong, and they start asking staff instead, which crowds the registration desk. Speakers notice when their name or title is wrong in one place. Sponsors whose sessions are listed differently across channels ask why. And your team spends the day before the event cross-checking four versions rather than preparing.
There is a print cost as well. Programmes are sent to print earlier than anyone would like because the designer needs time to rebuild the layout from a new export, and every late change after that becomes a reprint, a sticker or an apology. Room signage is often reprinted in full because nobody is sure which signs are affected.
Session attendance data suffers too. If the app and the room signs disagree about where a session is, the scans at the door are spread across two rooms and the session counts in your post-event report are wrong.
One agenda source feeding every channel
- The agenda is held once: sessions, times, rooms, tracks, speakers and descriptions, with speakers' details drawn from the speaker record.
- The website's agenda pages are generated from it, whether your site is WordPress or something else, and update when the source changes.
- The event app reads it through the app's import or API, if the app supports one, so changes reach delegates' phones.
- The printed programme is produced from a template with the agenda filled in, and the file is stamped with the time it was generated, so everyone knows which version went to print.
- Room signs and screens outside rooms are generated the same way, and can be reprinted for just the rooms that changed.
- Changes after the print deadline are listed as a changes sheet for the registration desk and a push message in the app.
- A change log shows what moved, when, and who changed it.
| Channel | How it gets the agenda | After a change |
|---|---|---|
| Website | Generated from the source | Updates automatically |
| Event app | Import or API | Updates, optional push message |
| Printed programme | Template fill at a cut-off | Listed on a changes sheet |
| Room signs and screens | Generated per room | Reprint only changed rooms |
The day before, with one agenda
The breakout moves rooms. The content lead changes it once. The website and app update, a push goes to delegates who saved the session, the two affected room signs are reprinted, and the registration desk's changes sheet gains one line. On the day, the printed programme is out of date for that one session, and everyone knows it, because the desk says so and the app shows it.
Does your agenda live in four places?
- You update the agenda separately in the app, website and print.
- Delegates have gone to the wrong room because of an old version.
- Speaker names and titles differ between channels.
- Room signs are designed from an early export.
- Nobody owns the agenda as one thing.