Is your annual meeting more like a time capsule or a time machine? Conferences that are like time capsules promote and preserve nostalgia and the past. Conferences that are like time machines teleport people to the future so they can discover what’s next. Conferences that resemble time capsules defend the status quo and traditions. Events that are like time machines invest in preparing their audience for what’s coming around the corner. Ultimately, our conferences should be where the … [Read more...]
Hone Your Radar To Seize These Conference Innovation Invitations
Innovation may be a tired word. There is no doubt that innovation has become an overused and confusing buzzword. It is riddled with an excessive number of meanings from authors, dictionaries, experts and our personal experience. Ask ten people to define innovation and you’re probably going to get a dozen or more responses. Innovation is change that creates a new dimension of performance said management guru Peter Drucker. Within the conference arena, innovation is the process through which … [Read more...]
Why Your Conference Needs An Intrapreneur
Are you making some changes to your annual conference? Trying to upgrade your participant experience? Or introduce some new innovations? If you are, you need a conference intrapreneur! More than just one intrapreneur, you need a conference planning culture of intrapreneurship. Ultimately, you’ll want to develop a conference team of intrapreneurs. Perplexed About Intrapreneurs? Ask Yourself Ask yourself this: Do our conference planning teams have the willingness, capability and … [Read more...]
Innovators Network Differently
After studying a whole bunch of professional conferences, it’s very clear to me what separates a thriving event from one on life support. For multi-day conferences, a growing number register and return because of who else will be there. Our attendees have more choices than ever for professional development and acquiring purchasing intelligence. Today, it’s difficult to differentiate and grow without strong networking value and a tribe-like vibe. It’s no longer enough to just attract the … [Read more...]
In Today’s Economy, Significance Precedes Momentum
So many people ask me, “If ______________ (fill in the blank) is so important for conferences, why aren’t more conferences implementing it?” “So you wait to make changes to your event once you see other conferences are already doing it?” I respond. “You wait to copy someone else instead of being the leader?” Frequently, conference planning teams wait until others have tried something before they’ll embrace it. They are risk-averse followers, gripping on to the status quo instead of … [Read more...]
Your Conference Needs A Customer Vision Statement
What is your vision for your conference customer? In case you are confused by the term conference customer, I mean your paying attendee or registrant. What is your vision for your conference customer, the paying attendee? How do you hope to help your paying attendee to grow, evolve or transform? What traits and characteristics do you desire to create in your customers through your conference experience? Those are some tough questions we need to consider. Many conference organizers have … [Read more...]
Designing Conference Customers, Not Just Traditional Conferences
We are thinking about conference innovation from the wrong perspective. We usually think about conference innovation as something we create for our paying attendees. Or we think about innovation as something we design with attendees through crowdsourcing. We need to make a critical leap. Conference innovation is a way to design attendees! Innovation should be treated as a medium and method for (re)desigining customer. ~ HBR author Michael Schrage. Evolving Your Conference … [Read more...]
Using Empathy Mapping To Create Conference Target Market Personas
We could all use a little more empathy…and a little less yelling! And your organization could definitely cultivate more empathetic team members who help plan and design your conference and education offerings. Why We Need More Empathy For Our Stakeholders Empathy is walking in another person’s shoes and understanding life through their eyes. It is trying to experience and feel what they are feeling. When we experience empathy, we are known to increase our helping behaviors. It’s … [Read more...]
