How Freeman's ADLM keeps 16,000+ attendees safe and informed during their flagship event
Challenge
A false alarm with no way to call it off
Going all the way back to the 2019 Association for Diagnostics & Laboratory Medicine conference, amid the bustle of 700+ exhibitors and 16,000+ guests, a large glass bowl full of raffle tickets shattered on the show floor. Someone panicked and shouted "Active Shooter!"
Everyone immediately ran for the exits and later, a SWAT team responded. Thankfully, there was no threat, but organizers had no effective way to reach thousands of their scattered guests.
"They didn't have an effective way to communicate to all attendees that it was a false alert, or that it was safe to come back to the building."
The lesson was clear. At an event of this size, the gap between an incident and a trusted all-clear is where confusion, risk, and lost program time pile up.
Approach
Konexus as the dedicated emergency channel
ADLM adopted Konexus for one express purpose: emergency preparedness and communication with every attendee. It serves as a fail-safe that sits ready throughout the meeting.
The setup is deliberately simple:
- No guesswork when it comes to safety. Because ADLM uses Konexus solely for safety and emergency communication only, every alert goes to the entire conference population, reaching attendees within seconds of an incident. That is a deliberate choice, not a limit: Konexus supports as many recipient groups as an event needs, so organizers could also target staff, exhibitors, vendors or specific areas of a venue separately.
- One trusted voice with customizable controls. ADLM also chose to allow only three people can send an alert: the conference's directors. A short sender list means every alert comes from someone with full context, and any one of the three can act immediately if the others are tied up on site.
- Clear roles. Flexible, role-based access control sets who can send which communications, who can refine messages ad-hoc, who can join Secure Chat sessions, and how recipients can respond to two-way safety polling alerts. ADLM keeps its setup lean: the meetings team confirms the facts on the ground, and the communications director can tailor the wording before any alert goes out.
Solution
A safety solution that also solves disruptions
At this year's 2026 conference in Anaheim, an attendee vaping indoors set off a fire alarm during a session. The alarm sounded on the affected floor only, and the entire second floor evacuated.
Though completely prepared, ADLM was hoping not to use Konexus that week. But because it was in place, the team sent an all-clear within a couple of minutes telling attendees it was safe to return.
"When a fire alarm cleared a floor in Anaheim, we had an all-clear on every attendee's phone within a couple of minutes. Konexus gives us one simple, reliable way to reach all 16,000 people at once, and because we only use it for emergencies, they know to pay attention."
Without Konexus, staff would have been outside scrambling to direct people back one group at a time. Instead, a single message reached every attendee's phone at once, and the program got right back on track.
Why emergency-only works for ADLM: no alert fatigue
Because ADLM has a dedicated app for conference sessions, and keeps Konexus strictly for emergencies, an emergency alert always means something.
This separation fights alert fatigue. When a Konexus push arrives, attendees know to read it right away. There is no blurred line between routine updates and safety instructions.
Day-to-day operational issues, such as a broken freight elevator during move-in, are handled by Freeman and the venue over radio and phone. Konexus stays reserved for moments that affect everyone.
"Because we had our tailored solutions with Konexus in place, it was only about 10 minutes before everybody knew they could come back safely, and the sessions didn't skip a beat."
Results
What’s next
Konexus gave ADLM what it lacked in 2019: a fast, trusted way to reach every attendee at once.
- Clear resolution, not chaos. The all-clear went out within a couple of minutes of the Anaheim alarm.
- Faster recovery. Everyone knew they could return within 10–15 minutes, limiting disruption to the session.
- Less manual crowd control. Staff did not have to round up and redirect attendees by hand.
- A credible signal. Keeping Konexus emergency-only means attendees take its alerts seriously.
- No gaps to fill. Asked what he would improve, leaders said the current feature set covers everything ADLM needs.
