Reducing event posting time while increasing event traffic
The bottom lineThe Missouri University of Science and Technology’s (Missouri S&T’s) old events calendar was a complete pain to use.
The outdated calendar was difficult for staff to manage. For example, once they posted events, the staff couldn’t edit them after publishing.
Students did not find the old calendar very user-friendly, since searching and posting events was a challenge. For example, the search function was ineffective and did not always yield results. Plus, the event submission form was so long that many students abandoned the process.
The old calendar received about 200 visitors and 900 page views per week, but 65% of those visitors were people creating events. It took an average of four minutes for people to submit events – or get frustrated and then drop off the system.
Less than 100 people per week accessed the calendar to find out what was happening on campus.
Joshua looked into modifying the old calendar, but because of the way it was built, he couldn’t make any meaningful changes without disrupting the system’s core code. He knew that Missouri S&T needed a user-friendly calendar that would make it easy for people to post and learn about events.
Discovery: Finding a user-friendly events calendar that allows for complete customizations
Joshua looked into several events calendars but felt that most of them had static, clunky interfaces.
“We saw that the University of Missouri was using Localist Events,” said Joshua. “Of all the event calendars that we looked at, Localist Events had the best, most modern interface out of the box. We were also impressed that Localist Events would give us access to so many expert-level options within their HTML Theme Editor, so we could match our calendar to our website.”
It took Missouri S&T less than two weeks to launch the new calendar – including coding the calendar so it would perfectly match the school’s website.
Once the new template was ready, it took just 10 minutes to upload 192 events from the old calendar into Localist Events.
From 108 to 1,285 visitors in just one week
Missouri S&T launched Localist Events in January 2016. In the week before the launch, the old events calendar received just 108 visits. In the week after the launch, the new calendar received 1,285 visits.
Slashed event uploading time by 75%
It used to take people more than four minutes to upload a single event to the old calendar – that is if they didn’t get frustrated with the long, complicated form and give up.
Now, the average session time is just one minute and three seconds – approximately a 75% decrease.
“The decrease in time spent on our calendar is a good thing,” said Joshua. “It shows that the calendar is easy to use.”
Thanks to Localist Event’s user-friendly interface, more departments and student groups are posting events. In the semester prior to Localist Events, people uploaded 192 events. In the semester of Localist Event’s launch, people posted 856 events – a 345% increase.
Increased event engagement, shares and attendance
“Two-thirds of the users who visit our calendar’s home page go on to perform another action,” said Joshua. “For example, tons of our users are logging in and sharing events on Facebook. We’re very pleased!”
Joshua feels that Localist Events is boosting event attendance on campus, as people can now easily find out what’s happening when they look at Missouri S&T’s website. They can also log in through Facebook and quickly RSVP to events that their friends are attending.
In the future, Joshua wants to get more groups – such as the campus theater – to use Localist Events. He also wants to add event registration to Localist Events to further boost attendance.
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