The majority of your conference attendees believe that their conference learning is all about self discipline. They think that the more conference education sessions that they attend, the more information they can absorb. The only strategy they know is to strive hard and fast to physically hear as many speakers as possible. That intentional effort rarely works. Usually, it backfires. Part of our challenge is that we don’t understand our own brains. License To Drive To help your … [Read more...]
Conference Education Should Drive Business Growth
The only reason that conference education sessions exist is to drive a business’ outcomes. (paraphrase author Rita Smith.) Ok, sure some conference education sessions exist for personal development, hobbies or pleasure. But most of us attend conferences to learn and grow professionally. Yet, in many cases, the business, meaning an attendees’ employer and business, is the primary customer of a conference’s education. That business paid for the employee to attend the event. And they expect … [Read more...]
Turning Attendees Into Repeat Loyal Customers
Most conference organizers focus on meeting their paid attendee goals for their upcoming annual event. They are so focused on that one event that they rarely take time to step back and think about the sustainability of the event for the next several years. They concentrate all of their energy, time and resources on meeting that year's event goals only. What they fail to recognize is that if they were to focus on creating loyal customers, who wanted to attend every year, they could then focus … [Read more...]
Are You Using Up Your Event Customers?
The scarcest resource you have is a customer. You can't manufacture them. You can't outsource them. You can duplicate them. You can't make them from a recipe. Your conference and event attendees are the scarcest resource you have. Money Or Customers? Which Do You Need? Which do you need more to have a successful event? Money or customers? Well, you probably said money. One of the basic flaws with the metric return on investment (ROI) is an assumption that money is in short supply. ROI … [Read more...]
Measuring The Value Of Your Conference Attendee
One of the purposes of a business to business event is to build and strengthen customer relationships. Just as one of the purposes of a trade association's annual meeting is to build and strengthen member relationships. So how do you quantify the value this brings to your organization? How do you quantify the value of an event when the goal is to maintain and increase loyalty? Alphabet Metrics In the past decade, we've heard a lot about return on investment (ROI) and return on objectives (ROO) … [Read more...]
The Participant Value Game: Time to Go Deep & Wide
It’s a whole new ballgame for associations and their conferences, particularly when it comes to building long-term loyalty. New realities are taking shape, disrupting previous value models and perceptions. Reality #1: Senior executives are more involved in attendance and membership decisions. They’re scrutinizing ROI more closely and pushing back on fuzzy estimates. Reality #2: While learning, networking, and business leads are still the “Big 3” reasons why organizations choose to … [Read more...]
