Almost 14,000 veterinarians and their staff members gathered in Las Vegas for the Western Veterinary Conference (WVC) in February, and with the show’s new WVC-Connect mobile guide, maneuvering across the floor and through the education sessions was easier than ever.

In an effort to offer a convenient guide for attendees and more robust exposure for exhibitors, WVC partnered with EventKaddy, a mobile distribution platform focused on enhancing the event experience for attendees, exhibitors and organizers. With its software, EventKaddy created the WVC-Connect tool, which was available through four different applications, including an iPhone app available at no charge through the iTunes Store; a mobile Web site for other smartphone users to browse via the Internet; a general Web site; and touchscreens located throughout the convention center.

“This allowed all attendees the ability to access WVC-Connect and experience WVC in a whole new way,” says Manolita Moore, WVC’s Annual Conference Director. “They were able to access session and exhibitor listings, maps and floor plans, up-to-the-minute notifications, a Twitter feed and much more.”

Because WVC launched its EventKaddy tool only a few weeks prior to the conference, all the traditional printed guides had already been produced. “However, it certainly eliminated the need to print additional handouts or last-minute announcements on-site,” Moore says. “In the future, I see this product as a potential replacement for the preliminary and on-site guides, thus reducing, even eliminating, printing and mailing costs.”

To promote the product, WVC sent an e-mail blast two months before and a couple of weeks before the conference, including a description and a short video tutorial about WVCConnect and how to use it. The organization also announced the tool in its Final Program and via the in-house WVC-TV circuit that was broadcast around the clock inside the convention center and in multiple hotels.

Attendees and WVC staff members said the mobile guides were easier to use than the traditional printed versions. For instance, if an attendee was looking for all the presentations to be made by one particular speaker, he or she could search under that speaker’s name and see a list of all the dates, times and session descriptions, rather than flipping through the pages for each day’s sessions and skimming for the speaker’s name. Upon finding an interesting educational session, an attendee could immediately access directions to that session. Attendees could also search for exhibitors by various criteria such as type of product, and immediately find an exhibitor’s location or access the exhibitor’s entire product list.

In addition to making the event hassle-free for attendees, WVC-Connect also gave exhibitors increased exposure. “By offering WVC-Connect to attendees, we were able to put the exhibit hall and exhibitor information in the hands of the attendee at all times, further increasing exhibitor exposure,” Moore says. “Attendees were able to choose from a full listing of exhibitors, read through a brief description, find the exhibitor’s booth number and follow the interactive map to their favorite locations, where they could talk with reps and even add the company listing to their favorites via the ‘My Kaddy’ feature to follow up with them at a later date.”

All 430 exhibitors received a basic listing and had the opportunity to enhance their listings through various levels of sponsorship, Moore says. They could add logos, links to their Web sites, contact information, social networking links, coupons or flyers highlighting featured products, and product videos. Even better, exhibitors’ listings are available all year long through WVC-Connect. If a show attendee decides they’d like to learn more about a product or place an order anytime before next year’s conference, they can log into WVC-Connect and easily access exhibitors’ contact information. Although WVC didn’t market the enhanced listings this year, Moore plans to use an outside marketing firm to market enhanced listings for the next show and will implement the tool as a revenue share with EventKaddy.

During and after the conference, the WVC-Connect iPhone app has been downloaded 1,001 times. On-site, the WVC-Connect touchscreens recorded 2,239 page views, and the mobile Web site had 2,704 page views. Twenty percent of those page views were directed to exhibitor pages. “Currently, our top-level exhibitors are very interested in sponsoring this product with the premise that they’ll be able to reach out to attendees on an ongoing basis during and after the conference,” Moore says.