A new social commerce platform is set to reinvent an industry. It’s all about reputation management, game-changing technology and hard work, says Stephen Johnson, founder and CEO of www.eunev.com.

It’s difficult to find an online niche which hasn’t been tapped into. What were the unaddressed needs that inspired you to create www.eunev.com?

In a world where social commerce is transforming how entire industries buy and sell goods and services, build reputation and create competitive advantage, the meetings, incentives, conferences and exhibitions industry is in need of a game changer. There were several unaddressed needs that inspired us. For instance, the industry’s estimated trillion dollars in global revenue, with no end-to-end solution to find, plan and book venues and talent for business events.

The Eunèv journey began in late 2011, with four friends with complementary skills and expertise and one big idea. Having previously owned and operated a successful venue finding business, Corrie Stathis, Eunèv co-founder and director of sales, sought our advice to reinvent the laborious and manual processes associated with her business.

At the time, I was unfamiliar with the intricacies of the MICE industry, although not entirely. I was invited in 2010 to give a keynote presentation at Meetings & Events Australia, one of the most prestigious business tourism events in the Southern Hemisphere. The topic was building social capital, exploring trust in a digital age and how this plays out in the form of peer-to-peer social endorsement, which is now known as social reputation management.

The emphasis of my presentation was social capital and how this context would ultimately transform the nature of transactions in the business events sector.

To your point about an untapped niche, as a social business strategist my work is focused toward industries in transition, so when it came to conducting feasibility for what is now Eunèv, the natural inclination was to explore best practice and identify who in the world was innovating in the MICE industry. Surprisingly, we discovered a glut of copycat advertising-centric venue finders, along with a few online talent directories using social media.

Yet the reputation imbalance at the heart of the MICE industry’s procurement process hadn’t been solved. As our idea quickly blossomed, we realised that creating a social commerce ecosystem aimed at narrowing the relationship gap between buyers and sellers of business event services, would solve this problem. The idea made sense and was so obvious – we were amazed nobody had attempted it.

One of our first glimpses of the opportunity was at an international business tourism expo. As Corrie and I spoke with exhibitors, the general sentiment was one of how quiet it was compared to years gone by – caused by a lack of active buyers in attendance. From a peer engagement and creative dynamics perspective, trade fairs are fun and very flamboyant affairs, providing an excellent canvas for event buyers to meet with and book suppliers.

However, like many industries in transition the MICE sector is not immune to the changing nature of business – the decreasing number of deals being closed evidence to the fact the industry needs to adapt to stay relevant. It’s not rocket science – buyers are getting savvy and engaging the services of venues and talent via other means, of which social commerce now presents a viable solution. The result is a dynamic group of vendors who go all out to profile their brands, only to question the poor outcome and overall return on investment.

With the value exchange diminished, the knock-on effect is that increasingly vendors are choosing to opt out of exhibiting. Given their support is a critical factor to an expo’s success –conveners are now scrambling to modernize the procurement model in an attempt to entice vendors back.

This includes offers of ‘keynote for sponsorship’,positioned as ‘value add’ for vendors and yet, is the pay-to-play mode of business that results in average presenters and which undermines true innovation and thought-leadership.

How does Eunèv bring together venues and talent on one transactional platform to create community?

In advertising and sponsorship-driven online venue directories, authentic exchange between buyers and sellers is rare and typically one of preferential placement. The context of referrals is gamified to position vendors who pay to be featured more prominently, with lead-generation rarely qualified, resulting in an industry-wide mode of commerce that dilutes the authentic reputation of vendor profiles. This context makes it extremely difficult for event planners to know if the suppliers they’re presented on these websites are the real deal.

From the outset, we knew Eunèv had to stand apart and provide an authentic environment. Following a year of workshops and constant iteration of features and tools, the result of our commitment to user-centred design is that Eunèv is smart, fun and contextually relevant to our audience.

How will you manage this community?

We couldn’t have made it this far without our stellar team, who are well versed in social media and online community management. Nanette Johnson, Eunèv co-founder and online community architect is the driving force behind our people strategy. With 10 years experience in online publishing, Nanette has deployed successful enterprise social media strategies for high profile clients, as well as managed bespoke online communities within the lifestyle and travel sectors. Then there’s Venessa Paech, who in a previous life managed the Thorn Tree travel forum for Lonely Planet – an enterprise community with just under a million members.

Eunèv is a professional network, where reputation management will be the principle catalyst to almost every action taken on the site, from recommendations and referrals, to content shared. Of course, we have robust systems in place to ensure cohabitation of members. If current activity on Eunèv is any indication of what’s to come, peer-to-peer moderation will play an important role.

Given the worldwide reach of Eunèv, what are the logistics, technology and human resources involved?

The logistics are enormous, with several critical, interdependent elements. The technology backbone of Eunèv is a virtual instance infrastructure hosted on Amazon’s elastic cloud in the US, known as eC2. Amazon provides us with the flexibility to scale servers on a dime, determined by how many people are active on Eunèv at any given moment.

With members signing on from four corners of the globe, the decision to deploy on eC2 has already paid off. The elastic cloud also reduces risk by enabling us to deploy Eunèv from other locations around the world in a matter of minutes. Should there ever be a problem with the US host, we can simply activate the eC2 on Amazon’s EU host in Ireland, ensuring minimal downtime.

With Eunèv open for business 24/7, our enterprise software-as-a-service system supports members with self-serve features and tools, engineered to eliminate much of the handholding typically associated with e-commerce.

One month in and with hundreds of active Eunèv members in multiple time zones, it was essential that we identify a support solution which can be managed from anywhere in the world. Zendesk is a cloud-based customer service software, seamlessly integrated into Eunèv. Unlike mainstream call centre technology, Zendesk is a streamlined and socialised contact centre that enables the fastest and highest levels of support to Eunèv members.

Given our multilingual member-base, we’re currently recruiting a highly skilled team of contact centre agents in Malta, where our Zendesk will be based.

As a social enterprise evangelist, you frequently describe our age as ‘the era of authenticity’ – is it really?

Absolutely. Consider the utter transparency and accountability which social media creates. From high profile political campaigns won through social mobilisation, to the consumer revolt against evil trade practices, the authenticity which social media creates is undeniable.

While the demand for authenticity is contextual, the crowd can be very unforgiving. People, brands and government agencies alike live and die by the sword in social media – authenticity being the determining factor to their survival.

Nonetheless, social networks are rife with faux personas and people living out loud online, which in a personal sense is deemed acceptable and at times, makes for good theatre. No matter what people are into, social media provides instant and authentic means to express it. For business, it’s an entirely different context.

Social commerce is largely based on trust and reputation – what are the main principles that will fuel and strengthen trust in Eunèv?

Firstly, Eunèv levels the playing field by offering free registration for all users. We are not a pay-to-play service and unlike Facebook and LinkedIn, will never charge members to connect with each other, or to amplify the reach of their content. Importantly, Eunèv seamlessly integrates social commerce to enable venues and talent to easily post and share offers, promote services and build their reputation. These aspects create a premise for shared value exchange and rapport between buyers and sellers, which in turn fuel trust in the Eunèv brand and encourage participation from people and businesses alike.

Our killer app is a unique software-as-a-service procurement process, which enables buyers to request proposals from venues and talent, then select the most suitable proposal – all while being able to validate the supplier through its reputation and reviews within the Eunèv ecosystem.

Talent on Eunèv is multidisciplinary and covers all sub-contracted services. Talent can be sourced and booked directly – this includes catering, audio-visual, photography, event technology, guest speakers, entertainment, event styling and team building companies. With their free Eunèv profile, venues and talent have the ability to present information and metrics, as well as receive testimonials and recommendations.

They can then respond through their profile to tenders placed by event planners, with the surety that these are genuine leads. This engenders trust and is a world first for the meetings, incentives, conferences and exhibitions sector.

What is Eunèv’s Malta connection?

Firstly, Nanette is Maltese and there’s a strong family connection. The real impetus though was Jean Claude Uhlenhaut, a good friend and commercial attaché with Malta Enterprise. I was having drinks with Jean Claude in Sydney one evening and sharing how we had embarked on an exciting journey and global business.

People, brands and government agencies alike live and die by the sword in social media

He suggested we consider establishing commercial operations in Malta, which at the time we had not considered, being unaware of the international investment programmes on offer. One thing led to another and in 2012 we incorporated Eunèv Inc. Limited.

We have since established strategic relationships with key legal, financial and technology partners in Malta, each who play a pivotal role in our ongoing vision and success.

Our foray into this mode of business began with John Falzon from Keen Advertising, whom Nanette and I met in Australia in 2011 during an international business delegation. John’s team designed a world-class website interface and user experience for Eunèv, which has become a much lauded aspect of our brand.

Strategic location was also a critical factor in our decision to incorporate in Malta. As a global business, Malta provides us with reach into Continental Europe, the US and Canada, plus offers a highly skilled workforce, whom we plan to recruit in early 2014.

Of course, Malta’s enticing Mediterranean aspect also played a role in our decision.

What has been the initial reaction to Eunèv?

Given the worldwide reach of Eunèv, we knew that social media would play a pivotal role in the uptake of our brand. In the two years prior to launching our business, we focused towards developing an extensive footprint and voice across the social web. A certain level of secrecy was essential throughout this process, which at times was challenging due to the enormity of what we were mobilising behind the scenes.

Since launching in May, activity on Eunèv has ramped-up significantly, to the point where we now have people requesting invitations and signing-on from four corners of the globe, establishing profiles, claiming and creating business pages, and learning how social reputation and commerce come together on Eunèv.

Beyond the homepage, there’s a lot going on inside and we’re working closely with members.

Ultimately, the success of Eunèv depends on the lifeblood of our community, so it’s certainly exciting and humbling in these early days to observe people beginning to own and run with what we’ve created.

And this is only the beginning.