Alex Patriquin from Circa talks about the role of event in B2B Marketing and how today’s Virtual events differ from physical events.
Events are a massive driver of leads and sales across many industries. With the move away from physical events to virtual events, technology is more essential than ever
1. Tell us about your role in Circa?
I’m the founder and CEO of Circa, formerly known as EventGeek. I wear a lot of hats here, heading up strategy and product development and helping to drive sales.
2. Can you tell us about your journey into this market?
Prior to starting Circa, for about a decade, I worked in or ran field marketing groups inside tech companies such as HubSpot and Squarespace. While doing that, I realized the industry lacked a good platform to help those teams manage all their events in one place – physical in-person events and virtual events. We originally built EventGeek to meet that need, and then when COVID-19 hit, we upgraded the platform to focus on virtual and hybrid events, to meet marketers’ new need to create and run amazing virtual events. When we upgraded the platform in August 2020, we changed the company name to Circa.
3. How do you think technology is upgrading marketing Sector?
Events are a massive driver of leads and sales across many industries. With the move away from physical events to virtual events, technology is more essential than ever.
So many people and companies need to massively upgrade their skills and tools. Prior to COVID, very few marketing pros specialized in virtual events. Now, all events pros need to be highly literate in virtual events. Since March 2020, Circa has helped enterprise marketing teams transition 40,000 in-person events to virtual.
4. How is digitalization redesigning event management?
The skills needed for virtual events are often very different than the skills needed for in-person events. The organizational aspects may be less complicated, but the technical aspects are far MORE complicated A platform like Circa’s can help make sure all the details are covered so that events run smoothly.
5. Can you explain how does your event management platform helps marketing and sales teams?
Circa is the company that helps you understand how attendees engage with your company though events and then points you towards specific steps your sales and marketing teams can use to turn interest into revenue.
We do that by:
(a) Gathering event engagement data. We gather data on what event attendees actually do, where they spend their time, where they get involved, and what catches their eye.
(b) Generating actionable insights. We turn engagement data into insights about attendees’ real interests and likely buying habits.
(c) Recommending targeted sales actions. We show your sales and marketing teams how they can take personalized actions to engage customers further and lead them towards a sale.
6. Do you agree that COVID situation has acted as a boosting element for virtual events?
COVID has absolutely driven massive demand for virtual events. Companies have to replace all that pipeline-building activity, and virtual events are the best option.
7. What are your predictions about the future of event management with prospective of marketing?
I think massive in-person events like Mobile World Congress will come back, but will look very different, and be much less crowded and more efficient. I also think we’ll see a move towards smaller, regional in-person events, but it may be another year or two before that happens. Virtual events are working well for most companies, and most will be reluctant to go back to the old way of doing things.
8. What advice would you like to give to the technology Start Ups?
Make sure the people you hire for field marketing are well versed in virtual events best practices, and give them the technology tools they need to succeed.
9. What work-related hack do you follow to enjoy maximum productivity?
Gmail snooze button – it’s not the sexiest hack, but one of the most effective ways I maintain inbox zero and high productivity is snoozing emails.
10. What are the major developments you are planning, in recent time?
In the coming months, Circa will enhance its ability to gather event engagement data, generate actionable insights and recommend targeted sales actions. We’re constantly innovating on how to go deeper and farther in each of these areas.
11. Can you tell us about your team and how it supports you?
I try to set the direction and get out of the way. We have a great team.
12. What movie inspires you the most?
Steve Jobs (Aaron Sorkin screenplay). Sorkins’ portrayal of Jobs as divinely driven yet humanly flawed inspires me to push for excellence yet remain compassionate.
13. We have heard that you have a very joyful work culture, so can you share with us some of the fun pictures of your workplace?
We recently moved our company headquarters from Berkeley, Calif. to Santa Fe, New Mexico, and right now our staff is fully remote. We had to postpone our trip to Ghost Ranch, where they filmed City Slickers, but we will go when we can.
14. Can you give us a glance of the applications you use on your phone?
That’s a new one. I have a screen set for interesting scientific and artsy apps, like MyShake which monitors seismic activity and D’efekt, which turns video glitches into cool fx.
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Alex has a decade of marketing and events management experience working at leading technology companies such as HubSpot and Squarespace, and is also founder and CEO of events management platform provider Circa (formerly EventGeek). He holds a BA from George Washington University and an MBA from Cornell University.
Circa is the world’s only #eventmarketing platform built for #demandgeneration and #fieldmarketers. They help sales and marketing work as one on events anywhere, so you can unlock the value of your #experientialmarketing everywhere.