The document discusses the use of Buzzmaster to create interactive experiences at events, transforming attendees from passive listeners to active participants through various engagement formats. It presents multiple interaction strategies, such as icebreakers, brainstorming sessions, networking games, and panel debates, emphasizing their objectives and benefits for fostering audience involvement. Each method is designed to enhance conversation and collaboration, ensuring participants feel heard and engaged throughout the event.

1. BuzzMaster Formats:
How to integrate interaction
into your event using
BuzzMaster

2. So what can you do with BuzzMaster?
You can organize your conference in one of two ways: You can herd your audience in and have
them listen to what you have planned for them for a few hours, or you can turn your audience
from attendees into participants! Which would you prefer?
In order to get people out of their ‘couch potato mode’ and get them to listen actively, they have
to feel that they too are being listened to! By involving the audience in the conversation it’s not
only fun for them, it’s also informative as they really take the material to heart. Plus, as an organi-
zer, it’s a chance to learn from your audience, as they are likely to have a lot of knowledge on the
subject matter.
We believe that the power of an event lies in the format. So: How much time do you give the
speakers? What do you do with the audience afterwards? How do you ensure - through sufficient
variety - that the public remains involved in the event program constantly?
Below are some examples of interaction that you can use during the preparation of your event.
Our suggestion: include them in your event script, and we will gladly help you with all details!
BuzzMaster Juliette buzzing on stage (19 april, 2018)

3. Index:
1. Icebreaker p. 4
2. Superbrainstorm p. 6
3. Matching game p. 8
4. The dilemma p.10
5. Quiz show p.12
6. Panel debate p.14
7. Find your destination p.16
8. Teaching tool p.18
BuzzMaster: Customizable to your brand, usable on any smartphone

4. Icebreaker
Icebreaker
Energy ****
Content ***
Difficulty **
Time frame: 10 - 15 minutes
Goal: Open your event with interaction, wake up your audience and catch their attention
Applicable functions: Multiple choice questions, Open questions, Catchbox, Microphone, Com-
ments, Polls
It can be quite difficult to get a conference room going. So: how do you open up a conference,
break the ice, and get a large audience to actively listen to your message?
In that case, BuzzMaster can be used to break the ice and warm up the audience! For example, if
you organize an network event for a multi-national, ask the public to talk to their neighbor about
where their expectations for the event, or the difference between offices in different countries.
Ask them to enter this on BuzzMaster (through their smartphone) so that it shows up live on the
BuzzMaster screen. The result: within the first 10 minutes the entire audience is talking to each
other about your subject matter!
When all the answers have been received, the BuzzMaster can pick out 2 or 3 interesting people
to explain their comment (you can do this with more people of course, but we recommend not to
do this with too many). The chairman of the day, or BuzzMaster, can then walk to these people
with a microphone, and ask them to expand on their comment. A CatchBox, a throw-microphone,
can also work well here, and can be rented at BuzzMaster.
4.

5. Based on previous answers from the public, such as gender, job title or work sector, we can create
very specific data pools and show how selected groups in the audience think about a particular
subject.
It is also nice to get opposing opinions from the audience to highlight both sides of an issue and
come to a conclusion together. Or use our system to identify which issue is most important to the
public, and show the summary in a word cloud, for example.
At BuzzMaster we believe that a good event tries to answer one
or two main questions. So: “What are the challenges and best
practices when it comes to ultimate customer satisfaction?”
Or “How does artificial intelligence influence the construction
sector, and how do we embrace it?”. With BuzzMaster you have
the unique opportunity to not only discuss this question, but also
answer it. Later in the conversation you can also refer to, and show,
answers or comments that were given in the beginning by the public.
Often the audience remembers the start and end of your event very well. A good --interactive--
icebreaker will certainly increase your audience’s appreciation of your event!
5.

6. Superbrainstorm
Energy ****
Content ****
Difficulty ***
Time frame: 7 - 10 minutes
Goal: Reflection moment and Crowdsourcing
Applicable functions: Comments, CatchBox, Microphone and Word Cloud
The super brainstorm is for those moments when there have already been a number of speakers,
it’s not yet time for a break, but the audience is really starting to crave an energy boost! Take
back their attention by asking them: “What is the most important thing you have heard so far,
and what have you learned from it?”. You can also describe a problem in line with the subject of
the day. For example: “What is the most customer-centric company in the Netherlands? And what
can we learn from this?”.
It is important to really trigger your public to brainstorm. The BuzzMaster or chairman encoura-
ges participants to discuss the suggested issue with a few people in their immediate environment,
and enter the results in the BuzzMaster system.
This way you let the audience really think about what has already been shared by the speakers,
and let them work together to form their own, perhaps new, opinions. The BuzzMaster can do al-
most anything with answers that the public gives. They can look at what is thought per segment,
what all marketing managers think of a certain statement compared to all sales managers for
example.
6.

7. The moderator or Buzzmaster can identify the most relevant or best input, and locate them in
the crowd,so that they can explain their comment or solution. You can also approach this more
personally by having the speaker approach them with a microphone and discuss the audience
member’s answer; You can show the solutions the public gives in a WordCloud, so you can see
which answers often contain a certain word; You can activate the chat function, which allows the
audience to ‘compare’ their ideas with others.
In short, are you afraid of a dip in energy in the crowd when you are changing over between
different speakers? Create a brainstorm aimed at how big you audience is, let the public talk
to each other for a moment, respond to the best ideas, and bring the energy level back up. The
BuzzMaster, together with the chairman, aims to make it a bit of chaos, but not a complete one.
Organized chaos is a good thing.
7.

8. Matching Game
Energy ***
Content ****
Difficulty ***
Time frame: 2 x 10 minutes and continues during the break
Goal: Networking
Applicable functions: Matching
Limitation: Up to about 250 people
Why do people generally come to trade fairs and congresses? They come to network, to find
like-minded people. But finding those nice & interesting people in a conference crowd is not easy.
Plus, not everyone finds it easy to network.
That is why BuzzMaster has created the ‘Matching Game’, a fun and efficient way to bring the
right people in contact with each other. For this format you need to block out two moments in
your event script.
In the first block, we look at which people you actually want to be linked with. For example, you
might be looking for an IT specialist, a lighting man for a concert hall or just someone who also
likes to cycle on Sundays. We match people based on the answers they have given to certain
questions up to that point. These questions could be anything, “What work do you do?” “Who
would you like to have a cup of coffee with?” “What superpower would you want?” “What do you
prefer on a sunny day?” Everything is possible, and the BuzzMaster can help you formulate these
questions. Because you let the audience answer questions ‘in session’, almost everyone joins in
with the fun.
8.

9. After these questions are answered, a profile is automatically generated for everyone, and eve-
ryone gets their potential matches on the phone. The audience gets a deck of ‘cards’ with their
personal matches. Those with the highest matching percentage are on top of the deck. This
allows people to browse through their matches, and also gives them the opportunity to chat with
the people with whom they have a high match score.
In the second round, the BuzzMaster actively matches people. For example, someone who wants
to reach a certain goal gets matched to someone else in the audience who has experience with
reaching that particular goal. The BuzzMaster can let certain people with the best match stand
up for a while, and ask them a few questions to make them chat with each other over the microp-
hone.
The result is that people see that networking is not scary, but it can be fun! In this way people are
encouraged to actually do something with their matches after or during the event. Because we
also show pictures, you suddenly recognize a lot of people through your matches, which makes it
easier to talk to other people. It is a push for people who find it difficult to take that first step.
9.

10. The dilemma
Energy ****
Content ****
Difficulty ****
Time frame: 10 - 30 minutes
Goal: Crowdsourcing
Applicable functions: Comments, Polls, CatchBox, Microphone
You are well on the way in the event program, probably after the break, and the public has already
learned a lot that needs to be put into practice. But you are still looking for something new, some-
thing to get the people on the edge of their seats. What if you let the public solve a real dilemma
for a speaker on stage?
It works as follows: Earlier on you have searched for a participant or speaker who would like to
pitch their dilemma, and is eager to receive advice from the audience. Have the person present the
problem or dilemma in about 3 minutes.
Let the audience work in pairs, and let them think for a minute about what substantive questions
they want to ask the speaker. These are mainly questions such as: “What is up with…..?”, “Why
did(n’t) that work?” “How did this and this respond to this and this?” Give the audience approx. 5
minutes to ask and answer these questions.
10.

11. The public is well informed about the dilemma now, and prepared to take on an advisory role. Then
the question is asked: “What is your advice to the speaker?”. In the BuzzMaster comment function
everyone can give their advice. After 2 minutes the the comments are tallied, and the best advice
is picked out by the BuzzMaster and explained via a (throw) microphone. This advice round takes
about 7 minutes.
You can choose to discuss one dilemma or several in succession, depending on the amount of time
that you have. The public is encouraged to actually think about the content that has already been
treated, and to come up with concrete advice on that basis. It really becomes a conversation in-
stead of a one-sided presentation.
Plus: the person who presents the dilemma gets very extensive input on their problem from many
different sources. Something magical happened at your event: people helped each other along. It
is the ultimate form of crowdsourcing and of creating an experience.
11.

12. Quiz show
Energy *****
Content **
Difficulty ****
Time frame: 30 - 60 minutes
Goal: Team Building, Teaching Tool
Applicable functions: Open questions, Maps, Multiple choice questions, Polls, Pie charts
This is our big quiz function. Because everyone can give answers, and people have the natural
tendency to compete, this guarantees audience interaction!
People can participate individually as well as in groups. Creating teams is possible in two ways:
Divide the audience into different segments, by profession or place of residence, for example.
These segments are formed by questions that are asked at any point previous to the quiz, and on
this basis all sales managers can compete against all marketing managers for instance.
The second way is to ask the audience a question to divide them into teams by giving colors to
certain zones in the audience. People have to indicate in which color zone they are using a multi-
ple choice question, choosing team blue, yellow, green or red. If the teams aren’t equal, and you
want the same amount of people per team, you can straighten that out with the sliding bars on
the big screen.
For each group you appoint a team captain and a few adjutants. The audience can then answer
questions individually in certain rounds. In other rounds they can serve as a “helpline”. You can
then have them come up with an answer as a group and have the answer be given by the adju-
tants and the team captain. It’s a really good exercise in collaboration for the public and not to
mention, a lot of fun!
12.

13. The questions can contain everything: Anecdotes about colleagues, asking questions about mu-
sic, questions about how a product works, the missions and visions of a company, everything you
can think of. They must be questions with an actual answer, you can’t choose a winner on the ba-
sis of subjective statements of course. Making up the questions is initially done by the customer,
and we will help you with tweaking it to perfection.
At the end of the quiz an individual winner and a group winner can then be announced. The indivi-
dual winner does not necessarily have to be in the winning team. Jimmy from team red can be
the individual winner while team yellow has won.
13.

14. Panel debate
Energy ****
Content ****
Difficulty **
Time frame: 20 - 40 minutes, per 10 minutes introduce a new position
Goal: To debate a proposition
Applicable functions: Poll, Sliding scale, Pie chart, Clusters
If you are not careful, a panel debate can be an energy sucker. But it can be so much more fun
by involving the audience in the propositions.
The public is presented with a statement and can vote for or against. These results then appear
on the big screen in a bar graph. Then the BuzzMaster can ask why people have made this choi-
ce. The for and counter arguments will then appear sorted on the screen.
There is also a possibility to move your selfie to the position you agree with. This makes it clearer
who is in favor of, or against the statement. As the debate continues, the audience can chan-
ge their votes and this can be seen on the screen in real time. So if a large part of the audience
agrees with a statement and there is a very good argument against that statement during the
debate, people start to disagree and therefore can switch their selfies from ‘agree’ to ‘disagree’
and see them float to the other side.
14.

15. Comments can be given, clarifications asked, or opinions given during the panel discussion
which will be displayed on the big screen, which allows the panel members to incorporate into
their discussion and react to immediately.
You can handle multiple topics in a debate like this. Our maxim is: a new position every 10 minu-
tes, which should not overlap with the previous statements.
Or take a headcount and select a few side topics of the main issue to debate. For example: sta-
tement: “The animals in the Oostvaardersplassen must get supplementary feeding”. Side topics:
“Shooting of weak animals is always undesirable”, “Feeding only brings benefits”, “We have to
introduce larger predators in the Oostvaardersplassen”. When these topics have been discussed,
you can perform a comparative analysis of the crowd’s opinion previous to when the debate star-
ted and at the end to see if the discussion has affected the outcome, or whether it has remained
the same.
15.

16. Find your destination
Energy ***
Content ***
Difficulty **
Time frame: 5 minutes
Goal: Creating a commitment/finding common ground
Applicable features: Maps
This is always easy to implement in between segments in your program, and it’s really something
else visually. Sometimes you want to know what kind of people there are in your audience. You
can make clear these differences by allowing people to choose a location on a map in response
to a question that links a certain location to someone.
All kinds of maps can be loaded: world, continents, country, region, city or even smaller if you
want. Then the audience is asked a question like: ‘Where are you from?’, ‘Where do you live?’,
‘Which place is at the top of your holiday bucket list?’, ‘Where do you recommend your neighbor
to travel to?’. The audience can then indicate the answer on the card with a pinpoint marker. Then
a certain pinpoint is picked out, and the relevant public member is asked to explain their answer.
This way you can give people a sense of connection, for example if they find out that someone
else lives near their homes, or work at the same big company but in different departments. People
always have more in common than is initially thought.
16.

17. ‘Find your destination’ is a fun way to bring agreements to the surface and connect the public in
this way. To be used in a quiz, a debate, or just as a nice question in between, it’s a great way to
break an event program open.
17.

18. Teaching Tool
Energy ***
Content ***
Difficulty **
Time frame: 5 - 10 minutes
Goal: Visual learning
Applicable features: Maps
Geographic maps are just the beginning of all different kinds of depictions which can be built in
a BuzzMaster set. It can also be a picture of the human body, the detailed picture of a car engi-
ne, a building plan, actually everything where you can point to a location.
It may be applicable for medical students to, for example, designate the location of a specific
vein, or to locate the distributor under the bonnet, or to visualize the history of a product with a
pedigree that has different branches. Whatever you can think of! Just as easy to implement in
between segments as ‘Find your destination’, and as easily applicable too.
18.