Industry: Event and Conference Management
Services: Airtable Database Design, Airtable Interfaces, Airtable Automations and Integrations
Airtable Use Cases: Event Management System, Collaboration, and Reporting
Intro: The Bitcoin Conference’s Need for an Airtable Event Management System
BTC Inc. The Bitcoin Conference organizer and parent company to Bitcoin Magazine – is the oldest and most established source of news, information, and expert commentary on Bitcoin and blockchain technology. A beacon of insight and analysis, the organization prides itself on providing in-depth research, education, and thought leadership about topics that live at the intersection of finance, blockchain, and technology.
In addition to their primary business of producing high-quality journalism, BTC Inc. orchestrates multiple global high-profile events each year, including “The Bitcoin Conference”, the world’s largest Bitcoin event (with tens of thousands of yearly attendees from around the world).
When we met BTC Inc., the team was feeling significant limitations with their previous event management system. Operations relied heavily on Google Sheets, and they were looking to align their four internal event teams—programming and speaker management, marketing, finance, and sales—under a single comprehensive solution that could act as their single source of truth.
Join us in this success story as we explore how The Bitcoin Conference transformed its event management process and brought clarity and automation to their organization’s internal processes.
The Problem: Centralizing Data and Aligning Teams.
BTC Inc. is renowned for organizing the world’s largest Bitcoin event, a complex and multifaceted process that requires seamless coordination and collaboration among various internal teams. Each team plays a crucial role in ensuring the success of the conference, from planning the agenda to managing speakers, promoting the event, handling finances, and securing sponsorships. This intricate web of responsibilities highlights the importance of effective data management and communication within the organization.
The Bitcoin Conference team has four internal functions, each responsible for a different aspect of conference organization:
Programming & Speaker Management The programming team curates and manages the agenda, sessions, and speakers. They ensure topics are coordinated across multiple stages, and their work revolves around the significant amount of work and coordination related to session planning, speaker details, and event logistics. This team handles the onboarding processes, bios, session topics, communications, and last-minute changes with all speakers at the conference.
Marketing: The Marketing team is tasked with promoting the event. The marketing team relies heavily on the data entered by the speaker and programming teams for up-to-date information to create campaigns, manage social media, and communicate effectively with potential attendees.
Finance: The Finance team allocates budgets, manages sponsorship deals, and ensures financial accuracy across all event-related transactions. Accurate financial data is crucial for maintaining the integrity of the event’s budget and managing sponsorship levels.
Sales:The Sales team is focused on securing sponsorships for the event. The sales team works closely with sponsors to determine their involvement in the event, often tied to specific speaking slots or promotional opportunities. The sales team’s work often has significant overlap with the programming and speaker teams.
Before implementing Airtable, The Bitcoin Conference event team faced significant limitations with their existing tools. The complexity of managing such extensive operations using Google Sheets led to inefficiencies and communication breakdowns. Multiple teams needed to coordinate rapidly changing details, and the absence of a unified data system resulted in serious challenges. Frequent miscommunications, version control issues around the most up-to-date data, and constant “broken-telephone”, was resulting in constant inter-departmental meetings to resolve.
“Our marketing team was often left trying to chase down the latest event information. It was impossible to tell with certainty if anyone was working with the most up-to-date information. Getting the correct data was really a challenge.”
Internally, it was unanimous, the team knew they needed a single source of truth and a unified, accessible, and customized event management system for their team.
The Solution: A Comprehensive Event Management Base
When the team met with Claribase, they first sought to deeply understand the complexities and interconnectedness of their internal conference operations. After a collaborative discovery process, The Bitcoin Conference and Claribase aligned on a clear shared objective: to fully represent their internal event planning and data structure within Airtable, and build out a full event management system tailored to their unique needs.
The Claribase team began by identifying which systems and processes would be replaced by Airtable and developed a shared vision for the system overhaul. They identified three core objectives:
- To create a centralized data hub and speaker management system for Bitcoin Conference,
- To develop interfaces to streamline the process of updating and sharing speaker and event details with various stakeholders
- To streamline and automate communications with team members about event status, progress, and critical updates.
Phase 1) An Airtable Event Management Base:
Claribase started by developing a base that could house all the key event, agenda, and sponsor data in one place:
Agenda Planning: The first aspect of the base had features that assisted with The Bitcoin Conference’s robust agenda-planning process. These features allowed for the organization of all session-related data, including setting topics, assigning speakers, and task management. Additionally, the base allowed for speaking slots to be tied to sponsorship packages, enabling the programming team to easily update the status of sessions and speakers, track confirmations, and make necessary adjustments as changes occurred.
Speaker and Sponsor Management: The second aspect of the Airtable base created a centralized repository for speaker and sponsor-related data including speaker notes, status updates, pictures, bios, social media profiles, and professional affiliations. Similarly, to the agenda planning table, the base streamlined sponsor management by linking contributions from each sponsor to specific speaking opportunities or promotional activities. This allowed the finance team to monitor sponsorship amounts and manage details related to sponsorship package deliverables.
Phase 2) Interfaces
The second phase involved the introduction of custom interfaces.
Speaker Onboarding: The first set of interfaces were related to improving the onboarding process for speakers – and collecting and organizing all necessary information. This included session descriptions, speaker bios, and social media links, ensuring that all relevant details were captured and readily available. The streamlined onboarding process reduced confusion and enhanced communication between the speaker management team and the speakers, providing a seamless experience that kept everyone informed and aligned.
Sharing of Speaker Details: The second set of interfaces were related to the sharing of select pieces of event and speaker data with other members of the team. These interfaces provided a user-friendly way for team members to navigate and share event, speaker, and sponsor data in the base; facilitating the finding and sharing of pertinent information. For instance, the programming team could quickly share session updates with the speaker management team, while the marketing team could access the latest speaker bios and session topics to craft more effective promotional materials. This interconnected approach not only improved internal communication but also reduced the likelihood of errors and miscommunications, as all teams were working from the same, up-to-date information.
Furthermore, the custom interfaces allowed for role-based access, ensuring that only authorized personnel could view or edit specific data.
Phase 3) Automations
To further streamline the base, Claribase implemented several custom automations to assist with automated emails and year-to-year planning.
Automated Emails: The first set of automations revolved around, enabling the team to send informational emails to event speakers, providing them with all the necessary details to be well-prepared for their sessions. These emails included connecting session hosts with speakers to foster open communication and sending event assets such as maps and floor plans to hundreds of speakers quickly and efficiently.
Data Entry Automation and Migration: Using Zapier, Claribase also created a custom process to seamlessly migrate returning speaker data to new event bases for future years. This automation ensured continuity and saved time by eliminating manual data entry. The automation also included a process to allow the Bitcoin Conference team to easily spin up a new base for every conference, with the ability to duplicate it and make minor customizations as needed.
The Result: Stronger Processes, Cleaner Data, Happier Teams
Thanks to Claribase, Airtable has now grown to become the backbone of The Bitcoin Conference’s event management process. Team members are no longer running around at the last minute, engaging in context switching, and struggling to keep track of the latest information.
“The Airtable base you have built has been instrumental, especially during the pandemic lockdowns when the organization pivoted to producing digital-only shows, to staying organized and our team’s success.”
By leveraging Airtable, the organization has continued to run hugely successful events with substantially better internal experience; it’s even assisted in the event division’s scalability, increasing the number of events it could manage without compromising quality.
When asked if the team had any other comments about the result of their project they had this to say:
“We’ve been able to run hugely successful events that receive great feedback based on our strong organization, which is really thanks to Airtable.”
Experience Working With Claribase: Thoughtful and Professional
Bitcoin Conference had high praise for its experience working with Claribase. One team member highlighted the great internal improvements the new system had on their organization:
“Your work has allowed us to successfully integrate within our team, and improve clarity around task status and ownership. It’s helped us integrate with new partners, and help us scale the number of events we can manage at a given time. It’s been great.”
They commented on the professionalism evident throughout the project and the considerate approach taken by the Claribase team. The Bitcoin Conference team went on to share more about their positive experience:
“It was clear from the beginning that your team was set to build a solution that would work for us as an organization. From the questions to the process to the implementation, it was clear you were trying to get to know our unique circumstances and weren’t just copying something from a previous client.
It’s been really amazing to see how you’ve shortened the distance between what we could have only imagined being our dream software, and the system that we are now using every day.”
For those considering a similar transformation and migration to Airtable, The Bitcoin Conference has a clear message:
“We can’t imagine running any complex project without Airtable.”
Key Takeaways: A Transformative Airtable Event System
The implementation of the Airtable system, tailored by Claribase, has fundamentally transformed Bitcoin Conference’s event management capabilities. By centralizing data, enhancing communication, and improving operational efficiency, the conference has been able to deliver highly successful events that receive excellent feedback:
A Custom Airtable Event Management System: Claribase built a comprehensive and customized event management system that created a single source of truth for The Bitcoin Conferenceprocesses and data. This system improved agenda planning, speaker management, accounting, and sponsor tracking through a centralized Airtable platform.
A Single Source of Truth for Data: The Airtable system provided a single source of truth, improving efficiency and communication while reducing last-minute chaos and context switching. It streamlined internal communication and clarified task ownership and responsibilities.
Scalability and Flexibility: The flexible and customizable Airtable system allowed The Bitcoin Conference to scale the number of events managed without compromising on quality. This scalability ensured that as the conference grew, its event management processes remained robust and efficient.
Financial Accuracy and Accountability: Claribase enhanced sponsor management by accurately tracking contributions and linking them to specific opportunities, ensuring financial accuracy and accountability.