Many associations struggle with the right strategy for involving students in their organization and events. Some attract students to join and participate in the organization’s programs and services while still in college. They offer significant membership and registration discounts as well as ample presentation opportunities. They usually have a “get them while they’re young” and “let’s put the kids in the show” mindset. They invest in these young professionals with the hope that doing so … [Read more...]
Burn Conference Traditions Immune From Criticism
People don’t trust institutions today says sociologist Dr. Josh Packard. We don’t think institutions have our best interests in mind he says. We believe they serve the interests of the professionals who created and run them, and they serve the interests of perpetuating their own existence. Your association, annual conference, and governance are all institutions. As such, you’ll need to earn more trust and loyalty from your members, attendees, and suppliers, who now have higher expectations … [Read more...]
Your Conference Needs a Hub To Entice Customers and Prospects
At a recent conference consultation with a client, a millennial made me think that I wasn’t keeping up with the times. We were discussing their marketing and communication strategies for their event. I voiced my strong opinion that conference organizers should embrace inbound marketing (pull) over traditional outbound marketing (push). I explained that a blog platform is worth considering as the home base or hub for the inbound strategy. Then she could use links in emails, newsletters and … [Read more...]
Your Conference Content Has Magnetic Pull
Content marketing has grown by leaps and bounds during the past five years. Unfortunately, too few event organizers fully embrace the long-tail, pull benefits of content marketing. Likewise, many conference professionals have no idea what embracing the long-tail, pull benefits of content marketing even means. It’s a foreign concept to them. Most marketing and communications teams agree that content marketing serves as the foundation to their conference marketing strategy. Still, very few … [Read more...]
The Market Shifts That Led to Commission Cuts
Marriott, Hilton and IHG have announced reductions in group-booking commissions from 10 percent to 7 percent for their North American hotels, to take place over a period of time this year and next. Marriott’s has already begun for most intermediaries. A 30-percent cut in one’s business model is a tough pill to swallow for any company. It's even tougher for those independent meeting companies that survive on commissions. Only time will tell what impact these reductions will have on these … [Read more...]
Conferences Need More Sharing
One of the strongest intangible attributes of a healthy conference is how much sharing takes place. Too often, competition and self-interest get in the way of sharing what’s most helpful. Professions that deliver conference sessions with a high level of sharing – not diluted or generalized from the stage – are often in fields linked to prevention, healthcare, education and philanthropy. Protecting, curing, developing and caring are noble causes, and sharing the secret sauce is viewed as the … [Read more...]
Shifting from Delivery to Discovery Conference Education
So much of our commonplace practices and conventional wisdom about learning is wrong. Educators have been talking about Bloom’s Taxonomy, critical-thinking skills, executive functions of the brain and HOTS — higher-order thinking skills — for more than five decades. However, those foundational learning principles have not transferred to most adult education experiences. Conference organizers still have a tremendous amount of work to do to involve adults in cognitive learning practices. We are … [Read more...]
B2B Buyers Have Changed, Expos Haven’t
The way B2B professionals buy has dramatically changed, but our dependency on expo revenue hasn’t. There are two primary segments that leverage the traditional exhibit business model — conferences with an expo and expos with a conference. Based on our deep analysis of dozens of shows, the former are the event business models being disrupted most. From our view, most industry mega-shows continue to thrive. The slow death of expo revenue is not an indicator that meetings don’t mean business any … [Read more...]
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