Attract With Content; Keep Them With The Experience March 23, 2017 by Jeff Hurt The internet has made world-class content front, center, mobile and affordable—often free. Anyone can hear the best experts for free (or nearly free) on almost any device they own. Anyone can get thought leadership at their fingertips. And your conference audience does. They have access to the same information you do. They can hear, watch … [Read more…] Filed Under: Experience Design Tagged With: , attracting attendees, conference experience, conference experience design, content, content marketing
Getting Attendees Wrong: The Age Of Discontinuity September 28, 2015 by Jeff Hurt Some conference planning teams get their attendees wrong! So why do we get it so wrong? It has everything to do with the rapid pace of change—the age of discontinuity as Drucker called it—and our default thinking. The heart of our current organizational challenges is that we rarely diverge from our default thinking. We assume … [Read more…] Filed Under: Event Planning Tagged With: , Attendee Acquisition, attracting attendees, conference audiences, conference best practices, conference planning team, Qualitative measures
Your Conference Needs A Customer Vision Statement July 17, 2014 by Jeff Hurt What is your vision for your conference customer? In case you are confused by the term conference customer, I mean your paying attendee or registrant. What is your vision for your conference customer, the paying attendee? How do you hope to help your paying attendee to grow, evolve or transform? What traits and characteristics do … [Read more…] Filed Under: Event Planning Tagged With: , Attendee Acquisition, attendee growth, attracting attendees, conference audiences, conference best practices, customers, Innovation
Designing Conference Customers, Not Just Traditional Conferences July 16, 2014 by Jeff Hurt We are thinking about conference innovation from the wrong perspective. We usually think about conference innovation as something we create for our paying attendees. Or we think about innovation as something we design with attendees through crowdsourcing. We need to make a critical leap. Conference innovation is a way to design attendees! Innovation should be … [Read more…] Filed Under: Event Planning Tagged With: , Attendee Acquisition, attendee growth, attracting attendees, conference audiences, conference best practices, customers, Innovation
What Do You Want Your Conference Customers To Become? July 9, 2014 by Jeff Hurt “It’s not the attendees’ job to know what they want,” paraphrase of Apple cofounder Steve Jobs. “Larry [Page] is into making people what he wants them to be—which is a little smarter,” former Google Executive (from author’s private correspondence).” So who do you want your conference customers to become? Adopting The Ask In Conference Design … [Read more…] Filed Under: Event Planning Tagged With: , Attendee Acquisition, attracting attendees, conference best practices, transformation
Who Is Your Conference Really Attracting? February 11, 2013 by Dave Lutz Attracting first-class, first-rate, quality attendees is one of the most complex and important keys to your conference’s business model. Too many conferences attempt to be all things to all people and end up with a watered-down offering. You need a process to help you identify your various attendee segments and who your target market is. … [Read more…] Filed Under: Attendance Marketing, Business Model Tagged With: , attracting attendees, conference best practices, conferences, decision makers, economic buyers, market segmentation, target market
Your Attendees Are More Than Transactions. They Are Unique Individuals! July 17, 2012 by Jeff Hurt The traditional approach to understanding your conference attendees has been to consolidate and analyze their transactions, attendance and activities at various events. Knowing the customer has been confined to segmentation, statistical averages and historical inferences. This is no longer enough! Organizations need to have a much more holistic view of their customer based on how … [Read more…] Filed Under: Event Planning Tagged With: , attracting attendees, conference best practices, conferences, customer, meeting planning best practices
Using Content Marketing To Grow Conference Attendance May 14, 2012 by Jeff Hurt Joe Pulizzi shares how he uses content marketing to grow attendance at the Content Marketing World Conference. Here’s a rundown of his video if you want to fast forward to a specific area. 00:10 – Who Is Joe Pulizzi & What Is The Content Marketing World Conference 01:00 – What Is Content Marketing? 02:07 … [Read more…] Filed Under: Attendance Marketing Tagged With: , attracting attendees, conference marketing, conference tips, conferences, content marketing, event marketing, growing attendance
Three Conference Mindsets (And More Research You Need To Know) October 13, 2011 by Jeff Hurt People’s behaviors, needs and preferences online reflect their offline actions. Understanding some of their online human activity can help conference organizers understand and connect with their onsite conference attendees. Ultimately, securing the right kind of conference content is exactly what your attendees seek. The Research In Spring 2011, About. com partnered with Latitude to examine … [Read more…] Filed Under: Event Planning Tagged With: , adult learning, adult learning principles, attracting attendees, conference best practices, conferences, content, content marketing, meeting planning best practices
Using Social Media To Generate Conference Attendee Registration October 12, 2011 by Jeff Hurt “This year we are going to start engaging with more people via social media,” your boss says at the staff meeting. “We’re going to have a conference blog, a Twitter feed, a conference Facebook page and a Linkedin event. And I need each of you to contribute some weekly content.” Hearts drop. Eyes roll. Some … [Read more…] Filed Under: Social Media Tagged With: , attendee growth, attracting attendees, conference best practices, conferences, event, social media for events, social technology for events
