The Conventa Crossover Festival, dedicated to event organisers and experience marketing professionals, celebrates its ninth anniversary this year. The Conventa Best Event Award competition for the best events will be hosted in Ljubljana for the 13th consecutive year.  

Attendees of Conventa Crossover know that life without events is boring – like a year without summer. They will thus convene in Ljubljana, transforming the Slovenian capital into the centre of the European meetings industry at the creative hub Rog Centre between 9 and 10 September. The organisers expect over 130 participants at the event. A central part of the festival is the competition of the best European events for the coveted Conventa Best Event Award competition. The central topic, titled “AUthenticity or AIthenticity”, will explore how to replace generic and dull events with holistic experiences and what is the right balance between technology and authenticity. The discussion will feature 20 outstanding speakers, as revealed in the final event programme. 

The event programme will feature speakers seeking answers and solutions to the posed dilemma. Among them is Canadian expert Genevieve Leclerc from Meet4Impact, who will discuss measuring the broader impact of events on destinations. In the context of current sports events, she will also explain how to measure the legacy of mega-events in practice.

Ljubljana will also host a pioneer in events gamification and experience marketing, Claus Raasted from Denmark. Claus describes himself as a mix of Thor, Mick Jagger and Lady Gaga. In his signature LARP style, he will push attendees out of their comfort zones and into the realm of authentic experiences.

When you browse the web for Djordje Jovanović, you will find numerous articles, interviews and podcasts related to the future of technology, marketing, and society. Djordje is also the Marketing Director for Xiaomi in our region. In an engaging conversation with the moderator, this self-proclaimed Che Guevara will explain the role of events yesterday, today and tomorrow. As technological companies increasingly dominate the world of events, Tomaž Valjavec, an authority in the field of AI, will join the speakers on stage. He is the leader of the Azure division at Microsoft for the CEMA region (109 countries). According to him, the dilemma is over: smart companies have already integrated artificial intelligence and technologies into their business models and value creation.

Gorazd Čad, the co-founder of Conventa, emphasised: “Giorgio Armani once said elegance is not about being noticed but being remembered. Doesn’t something similar apply to the most successful events? Less is more is a concept that champions more quality over quantity, advocating regeneration and generating less carbon footprint. Our industry, however, (too) often relies on the concept of “more and more”, wanting to influence participants’ sight, smell, touch, taste, feeling and hearing. Is less really more? That will be the central theme of this year’s event, and the finalists of the CBEA competition will also provide us with the answers.”

WHAT TO EXPECT AT THIS YEAR’S FESTIVAL?

Twenty expert speakers will discuss how technology will impact event organisation.

The organisers have structured the event’s three key themes circularly to build on last year’s content starting points.

The topics include:

AUTHENTICITY leads to EXPERIENCES CHANGES lead to TRANSFORMATION

EXPERIENCES are necessary for CHANGES

The organisers emphasised: “Think of the legendary Mick Jagger. He is certainly not the prototype of beauty or the best singer in the world. What he has is charisma and energy, which is exactly what the world’s oldest rock band needs. The same could be said for the most successful events worldwide.” The organisers also underlined additional reasons to attend the event.

FIRST MEETINGS’ INDUSTRY SLAM

One of the novelties rolled out this year is the first slam in our industry, aimed at introducing the general public to the beauty of event organisation. Slammers will have up to 5 minutes to tell a story on one of the selected topics. As is customary for a slam, the participants will choose the winner for the most creative story.

THE HUNT FOR EUROPEAN UNICORNS

The event will honour the best events (unicorns) in Europe. An eminent 23-member international jury will select the champions. Presentations of the best projects will take place throughout the day on Monday, 9 September 2024. Finalists will compete for four main awards in the B2B, B2C, B2E and Crossover categories. The projects will also compete for six special jury awards. The renowned event competition is an excellent opportunity to learn from best practices. This year, 47 events from 13 countries have entered the competition. The finalists will be announced on 30 August 2024.

SELECTION OF THE BEST SLOVENIAN EVENTS

Alongside the official competition winners, the jury will also select the best Slovenian event. Thirteen exceptional Slovenian events are in the running for the title.

GALA AWARD CEREMONY

Leading event organisers will walk down the green carpet and receive well-deserved recognitions in four main categories and special jury awards in eight categories. The ceremony will take place at Ljubljana Castle on Tuesday, 10 September 2024, at 8:00 pm.

HALL OF FAME

For the first time, the event will host winners of the most important European and global competitions for the best events. Exceptional award-winning events will be presented by Bartel VAN ISEGHEM from the Belgian agency Meet Marcel, Gergely “KOGE” KOROS from the Hungarian agency Universum 8, Christian POHLMANN from the German agency fischerAppelt, and Inese LUKAŠEVSKA from the Latvian agency Luka. They will explain what attendees can learn from their projects and how they convinced the juries of the most prestigious competitions.

F*!#UPS

Mr Murphy awaits you around every corner when organising events, underlined the organisers. They thus invited event organisers who have learned their lessons the hard way. In this segment, they will present some of the most typical examples of Murphy’s Law that can befall organisers in a format of 10 slides in 10 minutes. A discussion with participants will follow the presentation.

MEET THE ARTISTS

Crossover’s signature Meet the Artists segment continues in 2024. Without artists, events would be dreadfully dull, so the organisers will present select performers with whom participants can chat during lunch. They will also have the chance to meet creators in the Rog Centre labs.

 CROSSOVER WORKSHOPS

On Wednesday, 11 September, two practical parallel workshops will be dedicated to organising events sustainably. Exclusively for members of the Slovenian Convention Bureau, Genevieve Leclerc from Canada will lead the workshop on “The Impact of the Meetings Industry and its Legacy in the Local and Wider Environment.” Another workshop, led by Planet Positive Event co-founder Gorazd Čad, will focus on how to organise more sustainable events. Participants will have the opportunity to get certified as internal experts on Planet Positive Events after this workshop.

THIRD MEETING (SREČA-NJE) OF SLOVENIAN EVENT ORGANISERS

As part of the event, the third meeting of Slovenian event organisers will take place. The meeting has become a key point of connection, socialising and education. The meeting will take place on Wednesday, 11 September 2024, as part of the Planet Positive Event workshop.

 CROSSOVER = PLANET POSITIVE EVENT

The organisers will organise the event following their Green Pledge (link) and principles of sustainable event organisation according to the “Planet Positive Event” methodology. In addition, the organisers commit to accurately measuring the event’s carbon footprint and setting goals to reduce it based on the collected data. The carbon footprint will be measured using the Planet Positive Event calculator, which allows precise calculations under the GHG protocol (Scope 1, 2, and 3) and ISO 14064 (1-6) Standard for the entire lifecycle of the event.

Attachments:

• Green Pledge
• Green Action Plan

MODERATOR

The event will once again be moderated by Juraj Holub, a member of the legendary collective of moderators, Masters in Moderation. This guarantees that the event will be interactive and that they will fulfil their promise of “No more boring events”. For his masterful moderation, Juraj received the highest rating from participants in 2023.

QUALITY GUARANTEE

We all want the time and money invested in meetings to be spent wisely and usefully. Measuring event outcomes is thus crucial. The organisers demonstrate their seriousness with a quality policy: “If you are not satisfied with the event, we will refund your registration fee.”