The Greatest Conference Story Never Told April 27, 2015 by Jeff Hurt It’s time to bring back the luncheon table at your next conference. When attendees break bread together at the table, community is born. It’s where the stories of our profession, our lives, our past and our future are shared, retold, relived and remembered. Too many conferences have made a catastrophic mistake. In the name of … [Read more…] Filed Under: Event Planning Tagged With: , attendee experience, community, connections, connexity, entrainment, food and beverage, images, metaphors, narraphors, neuroscience, stories, story sharing, storytelling, table talk, unforgettable events
Your Conference Audience Matters More Than You Think! January 22, 2015 by Jeff Hurt Having an audience at a conference is no longer a novel idea. It’s expected and a given. Unless you’re a speaker that didn’t resonate with this audience in a past meeting. Then you probably have a very small or limited audience if any. How you define your conference audience defines how you design your event. … [Read more…] Filed Under: Event Planning Tagged With: , co-creation, community, conference audiences, conference best practices, conference experience, participant-centric
Feeding Our Need For Community And Connection August 1, 2014 by Sarah Michel We’re living in a time where we’ve never been more connected with others than we are now. Yet most of us feel pretty disconnected from our personal and professional networks. Why? Because we were not hardwired for digital connection. We are wired for face-to-face connections. Maslow Had It Wrong: Connection Is A Primary Need You’ve … [Read more…] Filed Under: Conference Networking, Experience Design Tagged With: , community, connections, connexity, emotional connection
Increase Conference Attendee Engagement, Intimacy And Participation At Your Next Event October 10, 2013 by Jeff Hurt Have you ever attended a conference by yourself and you didn’t know anyone there? If you have, you’ve experienced a range of emotions from anticipation to anxiousness to concern. If no one acknowledges or welcomes you when you first step onsite, you may feel like an outsider. Conferences can be some of the loneliest places … [Read more…] Filed Under: Event Planning Tagged With: , active participation, association, community, engagement, participatory learning
Conference Connexity: Delivering On Your Networking Promise [free eBook] June 25, 2013 by Sarah Michel Networking is often the catalyst that prompts people to attend conferences, yet delivering on this expectation can be tricky. What’s even trickier – attendees are getting better at leveraging digital channels to find and connect with the people they most want to meet. They’re not as dependent as they once were on conferences to address … [Read more…] Filed Under: Conference Networking, Experience Design Tagged With: , community, conference best practices, connexity, engagement, networking
Why Your Conference Needs More Connexity: Community And Connections May 15, 2013 by Dave Lutz With information accessible 24/7 online, networking has become one of the primary reasons people choose to attend your conference. The opportunity to connect face-to-face is too critical to be happenstance. Creating Conference Connections That Matter Conference attendees want dedicated time that they can connect with individuals to share stories, insight and experiences. Speed networking is … [Read more…] Filed Under: Conference Networking, Experience Design Tagged With: , community, conference best practices, conferences, connect, connexity, meetings as connections, networking
Creating Community, Identity And Reflection With Your Conference Space May 17, 2012 by Jeff Hurt Have you ever seen a movie that starts with a fast action scene? Immediately, you are pulled into the middle of things. Screenwriters call this media res or in the middle of a plot. They know that they can pull their viewers into the story by placing the action at the beginning. This same principle … [Read more…] Filed Under: Event Planning Tagged With: , collaboration, community, conference best practices, conferences, horizontal peer learning, meeting planning best practices, meeting professional, meeting space, peer-to-peer, reflection
We Need a Little Community, Right This Very Minute! December 20, 2011 by Dave Lutz Your organization is no longer the only game in town. Unless your business has golden handcuffs like certification, you’re probably having a challenge with retention and attracting new members. Your business needs an effective strategy to increase value and grow loyalty. The most urgent and critical opportunity for membership organizations to increase value and grow … [Read more…] Filed Under: Attendance Marketing Tagged With: , community, community management, loyalty, online ecommunity
Your Association: The Living Organism March 18, 2011 by Jeff Hurt Nonprofit associations: institutionalized organizations or living, dynamic organisms? Which view do you embrace? The Human Factors Associations are not buildings. They are not organizational charts. They are more than institutions governed by sets of rules, processes and formalities. I believe that associations are living organisms…when we allow them to be so. Associations are groups of … [Read more…] Filed Under: Ramblings Tagged With: , association trends, community, engagement, nonprofit
Why People Join Social Networking Sites January 5, 2011 by Jeff Hurt What is the number one reason why people join social networks? Go ahead and think about that for a second. Now say your answer out loud. What was your answer? Networking, sharing, for a sense of belonging, to learn? Guess what, those are all good reasons but they are not the number one reason. If … [Read more…] Filed Under: Social Media Tagged With: , community, social identity, Social Media, social networking
