Malmö Kongressbyrå - Empire

M almö Kongressbyrå AB, or MKON, is a professional congress organizer (PCO) organizing national as well as international congresses and scientific meetings. The assignments are mainly in the medical field, and each congress receives 100 to 5000 participants.

With their words:

In order for the congress to work optimally - effective and secure IT solutions are needed. Therefore, we have invested a lot of time and thought to develop an advanced congress data management applicaiton that handle participant registrations, hotel reservations, abstract management, etc. Our system is custom-built for us and links the online participant registration with underlying reservation and financial systems. This way we secure the entire information process.

— MKON

The solution described here by MKON is called Empire and is the third generation of a system designed in close cooperation between us and MKON over the years. A system that is the heart of information management that surrounds the organization of complex meetings with stakeholders from different parts of the world.

Client

Malmö Kongressbyrå AB

Client since

2001

Launched

2016

Category

Desktop, Mobile, FileMaker, Web

Each congress has its own web site

A basic feature of the solution is the ability to create unique websites for each congress. The system acts as a modern Content Management System (CMS) for designing these sites, which is quickly launched without the need for new servers or other components installed. (As an example, MKON established some thirty sites during the first two months after deployment.)

Basic functions

  • Design pages for presentation of text and image
  • Hierarchical structure of menu navigation system
  • WYSIWYG-editor for the design of content
  • Modern tools for setting up sections and columns
  • Of course, the result is fully responsive to work well even in a smartphone

Tailored support for building forms

In addition to these basic features (as you can expect from any CMS)
                 Empire has unique support for the type of forms that a congress organizer / PCO has use for.

The system supports

  • Participant registration with
    • integrated hotel reservation and
    • payment card payment
  • Abstract submission with the ability to
    • upload files and
    • post submission edit of contributions
  • Abstract assessment
    • for logged in assessors and
    • selected abstracts
  • Stand order
    • for exhibitors
  • Submission of symposium proposals

MKON can build a registration form aimed at specific groups of delegates to make them relevant to that particular group. For each form, it is possible to control which sessions and hotels are available, specify if an option may end, whether the option should be displayed or given a specific date, etc.

When a certain type of hotel room at a specific hotel expires, this option will automatically expire.

Whether a field requires input can be set by field and form and which language they should have is easily entered into the system.

Etc...

Processing of incoming data

Since the system is both a CMS and an administrative system for managing and processing the information coming from each congress site and the respective forms, MKON may, in the same way as they specify how many seats there are for the big banquet, in realtime, see how many participants already registred to it.

All incoming data is live and available, and MKON can therefore report the number of registered delegates, number of submitted abstracts, number of bsold exhibition stands or other relevant information to its client.

In the system there is support for:

  • Inbox for review of posted forms
  • Automatic generation of confirmation in PDF format
  • Send confirmation email
  • Statistics per congress, per day and per form
  • Guest lists to the hotels
  • Printing of certificate to participants
  • Sales support
  • Room reservation

Sharing is caring

From Empire, relevant data will flow to the financial system for billing and accounting. If a participant registration changes, updated information is sent to VISMA and the previous invoice will be credited or a new and complementary will be created.

Gallery

Below you will find a selection of pictures.
Click picture to see animation.