Gartner Magic Quadrant for Event Technology Platforms 2024

The first-ever Gartner Event Technology Platforms Magic Quadrant has arrived, championing the biggest players in an evolving landscape. According to Gartner, this new quadrant reflects the evolving nature of the hybrid event landscape and the growing demand for immersive tech.

The analyst believes the use of events is increasing in the marketing mix, causing platform vendors to produce solutions that support in-person and virtual delivery models. According to the Gartner Tech Marketing Benchmarks survey, 69 percent of companies are now hosting digital events, and another 63 percent are hosting events in person.

Typically, Gartner’s Magic Quadrants divide vendors into four distinct categories. However, for this initial report, no “Challengers” are in the mix. Instead, the analyst has chosen to distribute 13 companies into “Leaders”, “Niche Players”, and “Visionaries.”

The Gartner Event Technology Platform Definition

Before we look at the 13 vendors referenced by Gartner’s report, let’s examine Gartner’s definition of Event Technology Platforms. According to the analyst, these platforms empower B2B marketers to execute in-person and virtual events with native features for communication, engagement, logistics, and content delivery.

They include integrations with marketing and salesforce automation platforms and help teams create comprehensive experiences for tradeshows, roundtables, and field marketing purposes. Usually, these tools will offer capabilities for event promotion and web design, attendee registration and engagement, and agenda management.

Must have capabilities for a Gartner Event Technology Platform vendor, including:

• Attendee management tools for registration, check-in, and communication.
• Attendee experience management to connect with participants during an event.
• Reporting and analytics for tracking event and session performance.
• Agenda management for the structure of activities during an event.
• Mobile applications to help attendees navigate the event.
• Role-based experiences to control attendee access to content.
• Customer service and support capabilities.
• Martech integrations, either via pre-built connectors or APIs.

Optional extras include venue management tools, room bookings, managed services, and AI-driven content creation. These tools may also include budget and sponsor management features.

The Gartner Event Technology Platform Leaders

The Gartner Event Technology platform leaders are vendors that support all essential event technology capabilities for virtual and in-person experiences. Leaders have high market penetration and visibility and a clear, long-term strategic vision. This year’s leaders are:

• Cvent
• RainFocus
• Bizzabo

Cvent

Cvent’s event marketing and management platform features everything from registration and attendee hubs to a proprietary mobile app and virtual event package. Gartner notes that Cvent offers highly customizable reporting and analytics tools, in-person event thought leadership solutions and exceptional 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.

RainFocus

For the first Gartner Event Technology quadrant, RainFocus stands out as a leader for its robust platform, featuring capabilities for complex virtual experiences and small in-person events. The platform benefits from rich attendee profile data aggregation and a strong enterprise focus. Additionally, the company maintains a high level of customer satisfaction. However, Gartner notes that the pricing complexity of RainFocus can be an issue for some customers.

Bizzabo

The Event Experience OS product from Bizzabo is constantly evolving. Currently, the company is exploring the benefits of wearable technology and AI-based analytics. Already, the platform benefits from extensive on-site engagement tracking via its Klik technology. Plus, Bizzabo offers an industry-agnostic focus with specific vertical offerings. Notably, however, custom reports and dashboards are still limited within the tech, and attendee support isn’t included for virtual events.

The Gartner Event Technology Platform Niche Players

For this initial Gartner Event Technology Platform Quadrant, Gartner defines niche players as companies that provide a foundational set of capabilities to a narrower market segment. They may lack the breadth of features leaders offer but can sometimes deliver exceptional solutions for specific groups. This year’s niche players are:

• EventMobi
• Zoom
• Stova
• Kaltura
• Brandlive
• Cisco
• 6Connex

EventMobi

The EventMobi platform enables users to create engaging content experiences with powerful tools for attendee management and registration. Gartner commended the platform’s advanced solutions for enhancing customer experience and its range of onboarding and configuration tools. Plus, the analyst noted that EventMobi offers a simple and budget-friendly pricing structure. However, admin role-based experiences and access to AI innovations are limited.

Zoom

Joining the Gartner Event Technology Platform quadrant with its new Zoom Events solution, Zoom offers an evolving range of technologies that include access to AI content creation tools. Gartner championed the solution’s access to a rich collection of integrations through an app marketplace, as well as its wide multinational appearance. Plus, 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 offers a range of tools for event planning and consolidation. The solution’s toolkit includes features for automated speaker submissions, and Gartner noted the vendor’s excellent market responsiveness. Stova sources its roadmap features based on customer feedback and provides consumers with access to a vast range of valuable resources. Notably, however, the lack of a comprehensive partner program and complex product packaging could be issues for some users of Stova’s platform.

Kaltura

Kaltura stands out on the Gartner Event Technology Platform quadrant for its worldwide reach and exceptional virtual event support. The Kaltura Events offers excellent integrations with various marketing platforms and tools through a robust partner marketplace. The company also provides excellent sponsor management features, with lead reports, branded virtual booths, and video players. However, Gartner noted that the platform’s in-person capabilities are limited.

Brandlive

Focused mainly on high-quality broadcast virtual events, Brandlive also supports in-person roundtables and field marketing events. The company’s roadmap is AI-centric, with plans to launch an AI assistant to help with event management. Brandlive offers access to in-house creative services, a clear and simple pricing model, and event production and innovation. Although, the platform does lack some features for customized reporting and analytics.

Cisco

With Webex Events, Cisco has a strong presence in the Gartner Event Technology Platform Magic Quadrant. The company has a strong roadmap, including a public API and self-service platform purchasing option. It also benefits from excellent customer feedback collection tools and next-level security and compliance features. Some slight downsides for the platform include limited marketing technology integrations and fewer cross-event and customized reports.

6Connex

Offering a combination of capabilities for various industries hosting virtual and in-person events, 6Connex excels with its strong vertical strategy and diverse client base. The company’s platform supports over 30 different languages and comes with access to regional partners and marketing programs. Plus, it benefits from excellent attendee ticketing and payment processing. However, 6Connex does have a higher customer churn rate than some of its competitors.

The Gartner Event Technology Platform Visionaries

According to Gartner, visionaries set a strategic direction or demonstrate unique, innovative capabilities that the market should eventually adopt. Though they show promise, they can have gaps in broader functionality requirements. For this Gartner Event Technology Platform Magic Quadrant, the three niche players are:

• vFairs
• Splash
• RingCentral

vFairs

The vFairs event platform focuses on attendee management and session engagement. The company’s attendee experience management capabilities are diverse, offering access to social media walls and webinar content management tools. Gartner commends the company’s strong vertical strategy and approach to comprehensive customer support. However, the platform does lack some features for cross-event content sharing and multi-language access.

Splash

For this Gartner Event Technology Magic Quadrant, Splash was commended for its excellent approach to content management, with the opportunity to share content across multiple events. The platform also offers a straightforward subscription and pricing model and excellent onboarding and configuration. Users are often impressed by the ease of configuration offered. Notably, however, sponsor management isn’t offered natively, and Splash does have a limited geographic presence.

RingCentral

Relatively new to the Event Technology space, RingCentral created its Events platform with the purchase of Hopin. Gartner says the solution delivers fantastic attendee management configurations, allowing for advanced registration paths. It also benefits from a strong agency network, with access to over 125 partners and a convenient pricing model. However, in-person capabilities are somewhat limited, and the reports on the platform may benefit from improvement.

Assessing the Gartner Event Technology Magic Quadrant

This is the first time a Gartner Event Technology Platforms Magic Quadrant has been released, so we can’t look back over previous editions to see what’s changed in the industry. However, Gartner believes that the demand for event solutions will only continue to increase as companies in the B2B landscape look for ways to build stronger relationships with leads.

Events certainly offer companies an excellent way to engage their target audience, whether hosted in-person or online. In the B2B market, where relationship building is key, the right event technology can make a massive difference to your ability to nurture customers.