Introducing the first-ever Gartner Event Technology Platforms Magic Quadrant, championing the biggest players in an evolving landscape. According to Gartner, this new quadrant reflects the evolving nature of the hybrid event environment and the growing demand for immersive technologies.
Analysts believe the use of events in the marketing mix is increasing and platform vendors are developing solutions to support in-person and virtual delivery models. According to a study by Gartner Tech Marketing Benchmarks, 69% of companies are now hosting digital events, and an additional 63% are hosting in-person events.
Gartner's Magic Quadrant typically divides vendors into four different categories. However, this initial report does not include any “challengers.” Instead, the analyst chose to categorize her 13 companies as “Leaders,” “Niche Players,” and “Visionaries.”
Gartner Event Technology Platform Definition
Before we consider the 13 vendors referenced in Gartner's report, let's review Gartner's definition of an event technology platform. According to analysts, these platforms enable B2B marketers to run in-person and virtual events with native capabilities for communication, engagement, logistics, and content distribution.
These include integrations with marketing and Salesforce automation platforms to help your team create comprehensive experiences for trade shows, roundtables, and field marketing. These tools typically provide features for event promotion and web design, attendee registration and engagement, and agenda management.
As a Gartner Event Technology Platform vendor, you need the following capabilities:
- Attendee management tool for registration, check-in, and communication.
- Participant experience management to connect with attendees during your event.
- Reports and analytics to track event and session performance.
- Agenda management for activity structure during events.
- A mobile application that helps attendees navigate the event.
- A role-based experience that controls participant access to content.
- Customer service and support functions.
- Martech integration via pre-built connectors or APIs.
Optional additional features include venue management tools, room reservations, managed services, and AI-driven content creation. These tools may also include budget and sponsor management features.
Gartner Event Technology Platform Leader
Gartner Event Technology Platform Leaders are vendors that support all the event technology capabilities needed for virtual and in-person experiences. The leader has high market penetration and recognition and a clear long-term strategic vision. This year's leaders are:
cuvent
Cvent's event marketing and management platform features everything from registration and participant hubs to unique mobile apps and virtual event packages. Gartner notes that Cvent offers highly customizable reporting and analysis tools, thought leadership solutions for in-person events, and superior ease of use. However, the mobile app is still in development, and 90% of Cvent's customers are still located in North America, indicating a need to diversify and scale.
rain focus
In the first Gartner Event Technology Quadrant, RainFocus stands out as a leader in robust platforms with capabilities for complex virtual experiences and small in-person events. The platform benefits from rich participant profile data aggregation and a strong focus on enterprises. Additionally, the company maintains high customer satisfaction rates. However, Gartner notes that the complexity of RainFocus' pricing may be an issue for some customers.
Bizabo
Bizzabo's Event Experience OS products are constantly evolving. The company is currently exploring the benefits of wearable technology and AI-based analytics. Already, the platform benefits from extensive on-site engagement tracking via Klik technology. Additionally, Bizzabo is industry agnostic and offers vertically specific products. However, of note, custom reports and dashboards are still technically limited, and virtual events do not include participant support.
Gartner Event Technology Platform Niche Player
In this first Gartner Event Technology Platform quadrant, Gartner defines niche players as companies that offer a basic feature set to a narrower market segment. Although they may lack the breadth of functionality that leaders offer, they may be able to provide better solutions for specific groups. This year's niche players include:
- eventmobi
- zoom
- stova
- Cultura
- brand live
- Cisco
- 6 connex
eventmobi
The EventMobi platform allows users to create engaging content experiences with powerful tools for attendee management and registration. Gartner praised the platform's advanced solutions for improving the customer experience and its wide range of onboarding and configuration tools. Additionally, the analyst noted that EventMobi offers a simple and budget-friendly pricing structure. However, administrator role-based experiences and access to AI innovations are limited.
zoom
Zoom, which joined the Gartner Event Technology Platform quadrant for its new Zoom Events solution, offers a wide range of evolving technologies, including access to AI content creation tools. Gartner endorsed the solution's access to a rich collection of integrations through the app marketplace and its broad multinational appearance. Additionally, Zoom's security features are considered a major strength by users. However, reporting and customer support features could benefit from improvement.
stova
Stova's core event management platform provides a variety of tools for event planning and integration. The solution's toolkit includes automatic speaker submission functionality, and Gartner recognized the vendor's strong market responsiveness. Stova sources roadmap capabilities based on customer feedback and provides consumers with access to a wide range of valuable resources. However, it's worth noting that the lack of a comprehensive partner program and complex product packaging may be an issue for some users of the Stova platform.
Cultura
Kaltura stands out in the Gartner Event Technology Platforms Quadrant for its global reach and outstanding virtual event support. Kaltura Events offers great integration with a variety of marketing platforms and tools through our robust partner marketplace. The company also offers great sponsor management features such as lead reporting, branded virtual booths, and video players. However, Gartner noted that the platform's in-person capabilities have limitations.
brand live
Brandlive primarily focuses on high-quality broadcast virtual events, but also supports in-person roundtables and field marketing events. The company's roadmap is centered around AI, with plans to launch an AI assistant to help with event management. Brandlive offers in-house creative services, a clear and simple pricing model, and access to event production and innovation. However, this platform lacks some features for customized reporting and analysis.
Cisco
Cisco has a strong presence in the Gartner Event Technology Platform Magic Quadrant with Webex Events. The company has a strong roadmap, including public APIs and self-service platform purchasing options. You also benefit from superior customer feedback collection tools and next-level security and compliance features. Some drawbacks to this platform include limited marketing technology integration and fewer cross-event and customized reports.
6 connex
6Connex excels with its strong vertical strategy and diverse customer base, offering a combination of capabilities for a variety of industries hosting virtual and in-person events. The company's platform supports over 30 different languages and comes with access to regional partners and marketing programs. Additionally, you will benefit from superior participant ticketing and payment processing. However, 6Connex's customer churn rate is higher than some of its competitors.
Gartner Event Technology Platform Visionary
According to Gartner, visionaries set strategic direction and demonstrate unique and innovative capabilities that the market should ultimately adopt. Although these are promising, there may be gaps in broader functional requirements. In this Gartner Event Technology Platform Magic Quadrant, the three niche players are:
- v fair
- splash
- ring central
v fair
The vFairs event platform focuses on attendee management and session engagement. The company's participant experience management capabilities are extensive and provide access to social media walls and webinar content management tools. Gartner praises the company's strong vertical strategy and comprehensive approach to customer support. However, this platform lacks some features for content sharing between events and multilingual access.
splash
In this Gartner Event Technology Magic Quadrant, Splash was recognized for its superior approach to content management with the opportunity to share content across multiple events. The platform also offers easy subscription and pricing models, and excellent onboarding and configuration. Users are often impressed by the ease of configuration offered. Notably, however, sponsor management is not provided natively, and Splash's geographic presence is limited.
ring central
RingCentral, a relative newcomer to the event technology space, acquired Hopin to create an event platform. According to Gartner, this solution provides a superior attendee management configuration and enables advanced registration paths. We also benefit from a strong distributor network with access to over 125 partners and convenient pricing models. However, in-person functionality is somewhat limited, and reporting on the platform could be improved.
Gartner Event Technology Magic Quadrant Assessment
Because this is the first time the Gartner Event Technology Platforms Magic Quadrant has been released, we can't look back at previous editions to see what's changed in the industry. However, Gartner believes the demand for event solutions will only continue to grow as companies in the B2B industry look for ways to build stronger relationships with prospects.
Events are certainly a great way for businesses to engage their target audience, whether they are held in-person or online. In a B2B market where relationship building is key, the right event technology can make a huge difference in your customer nurturing ability.
