Conference Audiences Expect These Things [Updated] September 26, 2013 by Jeff Hurt Conference audiences of days gone by were satisfied with the gathering of colleagues, a mediocre experience and a few useful tips. Today’s audiences are more demanding and sophisticated. They expect to learn practical and useful information that solves their individual problems. They expect speaker presentations that are compelling and memorable. And they expect to be … [Read more…] Filed Under: Event Planning Tagged With: , audience expectations, conference best practices, conferences, meeting planning best practices, presentation strategies
Budget Benchmarking Drives Smarter Conference Spend Decisions September 25, 2013 by Dave Lutz It’s budget planning season for many meeting professionals. Many are poring over spreadsheets, as they seek out creative ways to do more with less. The burning question: What items can be trimmed without negatively impacting the attendee experience. One of the tools we like to use when we look at how to stretch a meeting … [Read more…] Filed Under: Business Model Tagged With: , Benchmark Data, Conference Budget, Conference Financials, conferences, Meeting Spend
Association Professionals And Conference Organizers: Embrace Curiosity To Avoid Stagnation September 24, 2013 by Jeff Hurt In today’s rapidly changing world, if you are not moving forward, you are falling behind. Our challenge is to keep pace with the changing tides of our profession. To do that, you have to constantly learn, unlearn and relearn. It’s your job to take control of your personal and professional growth to ensure that your … [Read more…] Filed Under: Event Planning Tagged With: , conferences, learning, meeting professionals, unlearning
Improve Your Conference Lecture By Using These Questions For Peer Discussions September 23, 2013 by Jeff Hurt Today, most conference audiences would prefer to engage in one-on-one peer-to-peer discussions than listen to another panel or lecture. It is also clear that employers today place more emphasis on securing employees that are good at engaging others in face-to-face interactions to problem solve, work together and interpret data. Ultimately, peer learning is highly valued … [Read more…] Filed Under: Conference Education, Speaker Coaching Tagged With: , adult learning, conference best practices, conferences, paragogy, peer-to-peer, peerology
Why Audiences Detest Presenters That Abuse Or Avoid PowerPoint [Revisted] September 19, 2013 by Jeff Hurt Revised and updated from original post about presentations and images published on October 25, 2011. Presentations are the business currency of today. PowerPoint is often the legal tender of those presentations. We trade and share PowerPoint presentations like baseball cards, stamps and money. And SlideShare is the largest online community for sharing great presentations! When … [Read more…] Filed Under: Speaker Coaching Tagged With: , conferences, presentation best practices, presentation strategies, speaker tips
Follow These Tips To Engage Millennials In Your Conference Experience September 17, 2013 by Jeff Hurt Millennials are eager to connect, participate and give says the 2013 Millennial Impact Report by Achieve. Since 2009, the report has focused on Millennial behaviors that would interest many nonprofits and conference organizers including trends in communication, service and giving. The report illustrates that the next generation is passionate about people not hierarchies, institutions, organizations … [Read more…] Filed Under: Experience Design Tagged With: , attracting millennials, conference best practices, conferences, generations, GenX, GenY, Millennial
Conference Organizers Should Be Great CEOs: Chief Experience Officers! September 16, 2013 by Jeff Hurt What do conference organizers really do? They organize all the aspects of the conference experience. I believe that title—conference organizer–doesn’t serve us anymore. It doesn’t convey the right information as putting together logistics is like putting together quilt pieces without any plan. It’s just stitching pieces together and crossing your fingers that it will result … [Read more…] Filed Under: Event Planning Tagged With: , conference best practices, conference experience, conferences, event experience, Innovation, meeting planner, meeting professionals
Bringing The Sexy Back To Conferences [And Conference Planning] September 12, 2013 by Jeff Hurt If you have ever attended a conference, you know how most of them feel. They start with a general session, followed by a break, followed by concurrent breakouts, followed by a lunch, followed by exhibits followed by an evening activity. Rinse. Lather. Repeat for a couple more days. They all feel the same and follow … [Read more…] Filed Under: Event Planning Tagged With: , conference best practices, conferences, Innovation, meeting planner, meeting professionals
The Evolution Of Onsite Conferences: 26 Trends Coming To An Event Near You August 28, 2013 by Jeff Hurt The traditional conference meeting experience is out! People today are looking for unusual, new, innovative conference experiences. They don’t want to attend last year’s annual meeting that just changed the filler. They want something that feels as fresh as their first conference experience. They want an original experience. 26 Trends Coming Your Way Here are … [Read more…] Filed Under: Event Planning, Experience Design, Hybrid & Virtual Tagged With: , conferences, meeting industry trends, sponsorship, trends
These Barriers Keep You From Conference Innovation August 27, 2013 by Jeff Hurt Things are changing faster than ever before. Conference owners used to get dominance through scale. That scale came from securing the most industry-related exhibitors, sponsors and attendees as possible for your event. Then, the conference became the industry’s go-to-place for new product announcements from exhibitors, breaking industry research, the industry’s experts and the latest, greatest … [Read more…] Filed Under: Event Planning Tagged With: , conference best practices, conferences, disruptive innovation, Innovation
