The Event Tech Showcase spotlight is shining on Glisser today! Mike at Glisser has also decided to provide The Meeting Pool readers with a special offer, which I’ll write more about at the end of this post, so check out what Glisser is all about now and take advantage of this offer if you’re interested:
1. Why and when did your company get started? What was the inspiration?
Glisser is an idea that has evolved over many years of working in marketing in a range of industries, primarily B2B. Events have always formed a key part of the marketing mix because they are so effective at communicating information to a well-targeted audience. We used to attend events and run loads of them ourselves – generating attendees, delivering useful content and following up as effectively as possible. However, I always felt that while other marketing activity became easier to track and evaluate through technology, events, and particularly the effectiveness of presentations, did not. Glisser solves this – it’s the product I desperately wanted to use to enhance, to evaluate and improve our events, but it simply didn’t exist.
2. How did you come up with the ‘name’ and concept – what’s the story behind the name?
When we named our company and product, we wanted something that was relevant to what we do, but not necessarily obvious. There’s something great about being part of the ‘club’ that knows why something is called something, when perhaps not everyone else does. Plus we wanted something memorable, unique, and snappy.
‘Glisser’ was about our 4th or 5th idea, but when we had it we knew it was perfect. ‘Glisser’ is the French verb ‘to slide’ – great for a product that focuses on delivering slides to audience devices, and then adding social features on those slides.
It’s also a beautiful sounding word (both in French and a literal English pronunciation) that is short and memorable – potentially as familiar as Twitter. Since then, I’ve found more and more connections with what are doing. ‘Glisser-déposer’ is the French for ‘drag and drop’ – the method by which you add social slides to a presentation in the app. Plus, it’s already enabled us to extend the brand to the community of customers we’re building – the pun-tastic ‘Glisserati’.
3. What is your “big innovation?” What’s the coolest features of your tech?
One of the big plus points about Glisser is the number of useful features it combines into one app. There are so many app options out there and event planners can’t use them all, so we felt part of our role was to consolidate. We’ve chosen to focus on the content slides and presentations and socialising that. That means live slide distribution (delivering slides to audience devices one-by-one as presenters reveal them), and then incorporating audience voting, polling, questions and Tweets. All in one app, on one screen, without the need for tech guys to keep swapping between feeds.
And it’s around the presentations that we will continue to innovate – leaving the broader event apps and registration technologies to the companies that specialise in those areas.
As for the coolest feature? I really like something we’re just adding to the next release. We’re calling it ‘tweet-a-slide’ and it’s exactly that. During a live presentation, Glisser allows audience members to instantly insert a presenter’s slide into a Tweet. We add the event hashtag and they can add a comment just like a normal Tweet. It’s a great way to push your content and advertise your event beyond the physical location in which it’s taking place.
4. How does your technology change the game for event professionals?
We’ve created something very simple to use that provides powerful insight into audiences and the effectiveness of presentations. While all of the interactive and social features are really cool, the most powerful part is in the background. Through Glisser event professionals can manage presentations, quickly distribute content electronically, collect audience feedback and review presentations without creating a whole load of extra work. It helps to shortcut a lot of the processes that might currently be happening manually, like making slides available after the event or reviewing speaker quality, and provides data that is useful in planning and improving the next event.
5. Is it possible to measure ROI on your product?
Absolutely. In very simplistic terms event planners could look at the number of pieces of data generated from audience interaction, and put a value on that feedback to their business. They might also think about the value placed upon that information by each speaker and presenter – particularity those that have paid to take part. The opportunity to speak at events is really important to businesses that want to convey their message to an interested and engaged audience – what better than to be able to quantify just how effective they were, and demonstrate ROI back to them?
Alternatively, a planner could just look at the time spent distributing slides after the event, or typing up and consolidating paper feedback forms and speaker scores. Glisser would easily start showing a positive ROI for most events for these things alone…
6. What do your best customers love about you?
I think our customers like the simplicity of the idea, executed well in a strong solution. We’re totally focused on presentation content, which is fundamental to a good conference that people want to come back to year after year. Our job is to make that content easier to access, through the personal devices that audiences are glued to throughout the day, and beyond through things like Twitter. Once we’ve engaged the audience in that way, the ability to collect their views and opinions is then invaluable to event organisers and speakers.
7. What industry trends and shifts are you following that you think are important?
At the heart of what we do is the notion that the second screen is here to stay. Rather than turning them off during presentations, audiences want to actively use them to interact and connect with each other. Just as I use Twitter whilst watching TV, I see the future of conference audiences using Glisser while watching a presentation. They’re just as engaged with the presenter and content, but in a different way.
8. Any lessons learned from the trenches?
Absolutely. Always double and triple-check your technology. Become really familiar with it and try to understand it rather than assuming someone else has that covered. Not only does this mean you can often solve a lot of the little issues yourself, quickly and easily, it also massively decreases stress levels as you’re more in control!
Have to ask: What’s your favorite app? (Not your own)
I live in London and totally rely on Citymapper. It provides an amazingly detailed set of routes between two places by every mode of transport available, plus timings, delays, etc. I try to walk and cycle as much as I can and it’s just so intuitive to use. Again, a simple idea, executed really well.
SPECIAL OFFER: Currently everyone who registers gets three free presentation uploads on Glisser. If anyone drops Mike an email (mike@glisser.com) after registering, saying they found Glisser through The Meeting Pool, he’ll double that up to six free uploads.
Leah Layzell
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