Exhibition News September 2019 | Page 24

Feature Truly 365 How can event websites stay up to date? Media 10 has partnered with InLoop for an innovative AI solution H ow best to stay relevant to your audience is something every event organiser ponders. It’s increasingly difficult to even stay wanted, let alone relevant and informative, in such a content-rich world. Media 10, organiser of events including 100% Optical and UK Construction Week, has launched a new approach to this age-old question in the form of a partnership with tech company InLoop, an AI-powered content curator and publisher. The organiser has recently launched ‘Construction Buzz’, a news platform for UK Construction Week, following on from the success of ‘Optical Insider’ for the 100% Optical site. “If you’re an organiser and you want to be a source of news for your community, then you could employ someone who could write a story a day or two a day,” says Rob Nathan, marketing director at Media 10. “But a show can’t support a team of editorial writers, it wouldn’t make sense. This bit of kit does away with that. “Now we have on our website a constant news platform. That news platform is cleverly aggregated using artificial intelligence, so it’s not just a Google strafe. It’s based on preferences, on popularity and a whole host of factors. “You have a new feed on your page, and you can then have daily, weekly, bi-weekly newsletters, and it also gives us the ability, if we want, to write our own stories which integrate with the platform.” 24 — September “The platform helps associations and brands create professional publications, enabling engagement with their audience and ecosystem,” adds Oren Ahronson, president and CEO of InLoop. “Readers (visitors and the ecosystem) get a periodic update on what’s trending in their industry; exhibitors are afforded the opportunity to remain visible to their audience not only during the show, but all year long; and the brand/ show becomes a professional publisher (without the heavy costs) while generating revenue.” The process works with some initial preparation from the organiser followed by minimal oversight, with users able to customise and personalise their newsfeeds. “The process starts with curating the most relevant content from all over the web, pulling it, ranking it, tagging it, and storing it in our ‘Content Hub’,” explains Ahronson. “This is all done automatically and 24/7. We then produce the publication (newsletter, newsfeed, social post), aligned with our partner’s branding and deliver it. This is also done by our platform with nominal human involvement, if at all. We analyse industry trends and readers’ engagement and allow for personalisation – this helps people save time, and ensures they only get the most relevant content of interest to them. “We use technology to do the heavy lifting, freeing the content and marketing people to deal with work that machines cannot do. By using technology, our platform replaces the need for several tools (aggregators, CMS, designing tools, mail service providers, analytics tools and more) and many hours of monotonous work, that a machine can do better and faster.” Working with Google, SEO and search rankings have long been a source of concern. “Regarding the newsfeed, there is always a trade-off between cost and impact,” concludes Ahronson. “In an optimal world, where budget is a non- issue, writing original content often enough is the best way to drive SEO. However, most organisations need to find an alternative. This is particularly true for those who are targeting smaller audiences (a few tens of thousands of professionals) or for those who don’t have a large content team available year- round. “Creating a high-quality and well- targeted site that people see as the go-to place to get their fresh professional news is a great solution, which also supports SEO.” EN