Your conference should be something to be experienced! It should be an action verb, not a passive experience. It should be something that participants do, not consume. The following four deeds are how to create an active unforgettable transformative conference experience for your participants. You need these deeds to grow your conference. They are the fundamental nature of an amazing conference attendee experience. Hat tips to authors and researchers Thom & Joani Schultz for their … [Read more...]
The Growing Majority Of The Conference Declined
Who are the people that don’t regularly attend conferences? What are the traits of those that devalue the traditional conference experience? It seems that what attracts some people to conferences actually repels others. Some see the traditional conference experience as stale and predictable. They are uninterested in spending $1,500-$2,000 in registration, airfare, lodging and expenses for an average experience. The Perspective Of The Conference Declined Here are some of the standard … [Read more...]
A Journey Down Conference Street
So go downtown Things will be great when you're downtown No finer place for sure, downtown Everything's waiting for you* *Downtown as sung by Petula Clark. Take A Mental Stroll It’s time to take a nostalgic journey downtown on Conference Street. Visualize yourself walking down a traditional city lane. Both sides are lined with the usual buildings. Each structure houses a long-established institution. What do you see? Think of your conference experience as one of these various … [Read more...]
Our Screwed Up Thinking About Creating Conference Experiences
As conference organizers, we need to learn about the power of experience. Well, we already know about experiences. We have them all the time. We’ve had experiences with our families and friends. We’ve had experiences with work. We’ve had school experiences. We’ve had experiences with institutions and organizations. We’ve had vacation experiences. Terrible, Horrible, No Good Bad Thinking About Experiences Unfortunately, we’ve made some very faulty assumptions from our own experiences. And … [Read more...]
Your Conference Audience Matters More Than You Think!
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. The audience matters. And the way you define your conference audience matters more than you think! Defining The Audience Most dictionaries define an audience as a group of … [Read more...]
Improving Your Conference Operational Effectiveness Is Not Strategic Positioning
It’s one of the biggest confusions in the meetings industry today. That improving your conference operations—registration, food and beverage counts, room capacities, room sets, project management, vendor practices, partnering, benchmarking, following industry best practices, conference management tools—improves your strategy. It doesn’t! Improving your conference operations is not strategic positioning! Sure improving your conference operations improves your efficiency and operations … [Read more...]
Growing Conference Technology Competency To Increase Your Value
As a conference organizer, how would you rank your competency regarding conference technologies like registration, speaker management databases, exhibits, conference apps, wayfinding signage, email marketing, CRM data bases and social media? Technology geek, technophobe or somewhere in between? The most effective and valuable meeting professionals are squarely in the middle. Why Two Tech Extremes Don’t Work Most geeks seem to prefer the next tech shiny object. Rarely do they align their … [Read more...]
Walk A Mile In Your Attendees’ Shoes To Improve Their Experience And Increase Your Empathy
Improving your empathy is a key to increasing your conference profit. Many conference organizers and hosts think that empathy has no place in their conference business. They believe that registration systems, schedules, speaker management tools, marketing, social media and conference attendee, exhibitor and sponsor forecasts are more important. But their view is wrong. At least that’s what author and Lady Geek CEO Belinda Parmar says. They are “unequivocally, unforgivably and irremediably … [Read more...]
