Michael Hart, the industry renowned journalist and thought leader is back! I asked him to provide his views on what attendee marketing mistakes he is seeing, and here’s what he had to say, enjoy!
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Look at the latest tradeshow industry news reports and you’d get the impression problems are officially solved for all the show organizers who told me a year ago they were worried about attendance. According to the Center for Exhibition Industry Research’s report on fourth-quarter performance, overall attendance at shows was up 4.9 percent over the same period the previous year, the greatest jump since before the recession.
The news only gets better as we work our way through the first quarter of this year. According to press releases from organizers of shows held in February, NY Now at Javits had a 6-percent increase in attendance over last year, World of Concrete in Las Vegas 8 to 10 percent, and the North American Intl. Toy Fair a whopping 16-percent attendance increase!
And yet, as recently as this week, I’ve talked to organizers who tell me the No. 1 complaint they continue to hear from exhibitors concerns the dearth of qualified attendees on the showfloor. Despite all the rosy news emanating from a handful of large, well-established events, don’t assume all is well in every corner of the industry. There is still time to screw things up.
Attendance remains fragile at many events, with many ways for organizers to go astray. Here are a few of the easiest mistakes to be made right now:
- Believe that what worked so well last year will work again. Attendees are a fickle bunch and they have every right to be. Annual event organizers cannot sit back and assume companies have no other way to introduce new products to the market other than on their showfloors. They cannot expect that last year’s wildly popular keynote speaker will draw the same crowd this year.
There are too many sources of quality education and too many channels marketers can use to reach your attendees. People will not show up if your pre-event marketing materials elicit a sallow “But they did that last year” reaction.
- Go too far in the other direction too. If the old-school poolside networking reception with an a capella choral group from the local college is a big hit with your crowd year in and year out, don’t dump it for a late-night electronic dance music extravaganza. Find the two or three elements that have become event traditions, the ones people say, “I always come for,” and stick with them.
- Don’t ask attendees what they want immediately. If the e-mailed post-event survey a few days after the show closes with a 10-percent response rate sounds good to you, get over yourself. Keep in mind how much impact a canceled flight on the trip home or a piece of bad news when the attendee gets back to the office can have on those surveys.
Ask attendees what they like while they’re at the show, constantly but in small bites. Invest in some Second Screen technology (and if you don’t know what that is yet, find out) that allows you to poll people halfway through the keynote session, the second each conference session wraps up, before the last desserts are served during the networking break, while they’re on the showfloor.
Then watch those response rates go up.
- Consider the conference program an added value. I don’t really have to be the one to tell you that information is the most valuable commodity in a modern economy, do I? Every industry is changing at breakneck speed, everybody feels their job could be in jeopardy any minute – and they want to know what to do.
So stay current on what your community needs to know (actually, stay more than current), don’t depend on the same popular speakers every year and invest in some innovative programming – before your attendees start sniffing out other, more convenient and affordable, ways to get the information and education they need.
- Finally, think nobody will notice a $10 increase in the room rate. Don’t worry, they will. A dozen or two factors go into the thought process when the average person is trying to decide whether to go to your event. Some you can control, some you can’t. Maybe the room rate is one of those you think you can’t control, but you’d better try.
Michael Hart is a business consultant and writer who focuses on the events industry. He can be reached at michaelhrt3@gmail.com.