Flip'n Events

Video killed the radio star.
 - The Buggles

When you work so hard on an event, you desperately want to share with the people who couldn't be there with you! With the proliferation of Flip cameras and the like, more and more event managers are sharing their events with everyone.

I just bought two Flips last week for my team. We haven't had the chance to play with them onsite yet, but I'm looking forward to some great internal vlogs and maybe even some snippets that we can share externally (a little tricky when you might not have permission of people in the video).

Some of our colleagues recently shared some fun event interactivity with their Flip and a quick blog post. In this clip, they are sharing Snibbe, a fun interactive projector and screen that gets event attendees engaged with the content.

So buy yours today ($100 on Amazon), and get to movie-making!

Make an app

I speak for the trees for the trees have no tongues.
 - The Lorax, Dr. Suess

I was just looking at a budget the other day for a 4,500 person event and noticed the line item of $120,000 for printing conference programs.

Two thoughts occurred to me: 1) wow, we are using the wrong vendor! and 2) why do we have paper at all? All of our attendees will have some sort of smart device. Whether its an iPhone or an Android-based phone or a Blackberry, all of our attendees will have one. So why aren't we just building an app for them to access to find what they need?

I just saw an article in Texas Meeting & Events (meetingsmags.com) about MacroView Labs who have built a new app allowing event managers to share news, videos, and schedules via cell phones, and they can include a password to keep the info private.

I have no idea what this costs, but I'm thinking I'm about to save $100k.

Diets to worry about

I am not a complete vegetarian. I eat only animals that have died in their sleep.
 - George Carllin

Vegetarians have been on the event planning radar for a very long time. BBQ events are the worst - really, what do they get to eat? Potato salad and some beans? *Maybe* a salad, if you remembered to order one.

Kosher has also been a common request and we have to rely on our venue to prepare for those requests.

The latest and greatest, though, is gluten free. This isn't just an old Atkin's Diet fad coming back. This is a real health hazard - Celiac's Disease as well as a simple gluten intolerance means that your immune system cannot process wheat products. You would actually be surprised to learn what contains wheat products. Soy sauce, for one! Work closely with your chef to ensure that you have options for gluten free lifestyles.

One of my team members recently did an event where a registrant listed as a dietary restriction, "Averse to large quantities of lard." That was a new one.

Be cheap, but look totally 5-star

What we obtain too cheap, we esteem to lightly.
 - Thomas Paine

While speaking with a chef at a hotel a couple of months ago, I asked his secrets on creating a champagne meal on a beer budget. He gave me some fabulous suggestions, and all of them ended with "let the chef have a little fun."

Hotel menus are great. They give you pricing guidance and ingredient lists. What's even better is to set up a meeting with the chef and tell him your budget. He will then create a masterpiece by working with local vendors to procure the freshest products. If you tell him you need appetizers and desserts, too, he may suggest taking the portion size down on every item, but increasing the beauty on the plate.

Imagine going to a 5-star restaurant. The serving sizes are usually a third of what you'd get at TGI Fridays, but still four-times the cost. Pure margins. Your hotel chef can go crazy on the fancy serving, while cutting the chicken cutlets in half, serving more (but smaller) appetizers, and REALLY rich (but tiny) desserts.

You can also save money at your receptions by using butler service. It seems like it would be much more expensive, but you are more able to control the number of appetizers your guests are eating by having the servers roam around the reception. Just remember to never serve shrimp with tails on or anything with a skewer or toothpick (guests never know what to do with the tails or toothpicks!).

How to get free meeting space

I'd like to live as a poor man with lots of money.
 - Pablo Picasso

Yep, free meeting space. It's easier than you think. I'm sure you already know a bunch of the tricks... the first one being:

Ask for it. No, really! If you ask your venue what their F&B minimum is to get the meeting space comped, they will tell you. Combine that with your room block, and you should only being paying for your meeting space on extremely rare occassions.

Ask to exchange marketing for space fees. If you're event gets huge marketing buzz, you might be able to negotiate additional marketing money being spent on the venue, in exchange for paying meeting space fees.

Get someone else to pay for it. Sponsors make the world go round. Just make sure to do your sponsorships right. 

Go somewhere that doesn't charge fees. Yeah, that sounds really dumb, but if you can find a venue that makes their money off of the food (which you'd have to serve anyway) or is a public venue, you can easily avoid any meeting space fees. Not so easy when you need A/V, but there are ways to make it work. You can also use unique spaces, like customer's offices or meeting facilities.

Barter your services. If your company offers products or services that could benefit your venue, offer to trade/swap/share in order to avoid meeting space fees.

The point here is to not assume that all of your meetings will have a meeting space fee. You should actually go into every venue search surprised that you have to pay a venue fee, and then work your way back from there!

Special sponsorships

There are a handful of people whom money won't spoil, and we count ourselves among them.
 - Mignon McLaughlin

I have to admit, I HATE seeing sponsorship packages. It's a menu of boringness. You give me $150,000 and I'll give you a big-ass logo on a big-ass banner. How crappy is that? You know, one of coolest sponsorship stories I've ever heard was of the pharmaceutical company that made bladder control pills. They sponsored all the bathrooms at a medical conference. BRILLIANT. 

I also love sponsorship where the sponsor pays to play, but gets to do whatever they want - like the CEMA example.

I think that the absolute only way to build sponsorships is on a one-on-one basis. You can still have your sponsorship levels (Silver, Gold, Platinum or Tomato, Banana, Apple, whatever you do) to set the basic pricing structure to meet your goals, but let the sponsor decide how to use your conference's power to their advantage. Work with them. If they are a real company, they are using your event to reach an audience that is their target. Help them use their money wisely.

Do it Different

All progress occurs because people dare to be different.
 - Harry Millner

The Unconference. Speed Networking. PowerPoint-free presentations. All very cool trends in the conference industry right now. But I've got some new ideas.

While the Unconference is about 20 years old, it's just now gaining mainstream popularity, and more so with the rise of user-generated content. This format allows attendees to show to an event where there has been no agenda-setting. The attendees decide what they want to talk about and who should do the talking. The challenge with this, of course, falls on the meeting logistics organizer - you have NO idea hoe many people may end up in each breakout session. You have no idea if A/V will be needed, or just flipcharts. You have no idea how long each session will go! But the attendees love it!

Speed networking is about four years old and involves timed networking. It can be in a table setting where a sponsor or key stakeholder stays in one place and groups of people move from table to table, or in a 1x1 setting where people rotate around and get intimate time with each other. Either way, this method has been great for facilitating movement among attendees.

PowerPoint-free presentations, a la the TED conferences, are making a huge comeback. The focus is the speaker and their ability to craft a story. While it certainly saves money on graphic designers and PowerPoint experts, a lot more effort must go into writing the presentation. When done right, this is overwhelmingly powerful. When done wrong, it falls completely flat.

But what else could we do to change the way meetings and events happen?

Poken is fun - your social business card - but at $20 a pop, not the most cost-effective means of helping people engage with other.

What if you had a registration desk that wasn't a registration desk? What if there was no barrier between you and your attendees? What if they sat in a lounge and were waited on by your event staff?

What if you actually implemented Dr. Paul Radde's seating plan ideas? No one would really be able to pinpoint why the meeting was so much more comfortable, but it will be.

What if your centerpieces were really worth talking about and not just candles or cut flowers that are given to nursing homes at the end of the meeting? We've seen cool stuff like live goldfish, but what if you had an actual amazing cake? or what if the centerpiece is the appetizer? or an Edible Arrangement? or a bouquet of real money that you give away at the end of the night (think $20 worth of $1 bills - You'd spend $20 on the flowers anyway).

Now THAT would create a buzz.

Hey, wait a minute...

I'm good enough, I'm smart enough, and doggone it, people like me!
 - Stuart Smalley

I read this article about event professionals under 40 and thought, "Man, I'm such a loser! What have I done in my career?"

Then I thought this: Wait a minute. I'm 32 years old and a Senior Manager of Event Marketing over the Americas region for a Fortune 50 company. I manage 15 direct reports. We project manage and execute over 200 events a year and support over 2,500 events a year through equipment or other means. I activated the corporate Twitter account for events. I'm about to launch a corporate event blog.  I led the project that consolidated more than 16 individual registration tools across the globe down to just two. I have my own industry blog (that no one reads, but it's still fun to say). I'm on the Board of Directors of a major industry association (CEMA). I just led our team through the entire rebranding of our corporate booth property (they did all the work, I just said yes and no where appropriate).

Sadly, I am not fluent in 3 languages that first amazing chick. And I don't have a Vice President title like that second guy. But no, I am not a loser! In fact, I'm pretty freaking awesome!

Think about yourself for a minute. You are pretty darn awesome, too. You just have to admit it to yourself. Take a moment to write down your accomplishments - here in the comments, or somewhere else. Just do it. You'll feel happier than you did 10 minutes ago.

Where does your brand fall on this grid?

I don't like to commit myself about heaven and hell - you see, I have friends in both places.

 - Mark Twain

Brand heaven and hell:
http://www.flickr.com/photos/7855449@N02/2780450986/in/set-72157606844282993/

It's all about making memorable moments

A story to me means a plot where there is some surprise. Because that is how life is - full of surprises.

 - Isaac Bashevis Singer


Random, but memorable: http://blog.jackmorton.com/post/815242908/i-realize-that-ive-mentioned-my-admiration-for

Imagine if this were actually about a brand.

Event Promotion in the Social World

It is more blessed to give than to receive.

 - Acts 20:35
 
Facebook launches new design for event pages http://ow.ly/2eslo

Post Share: The Zen of PowerPoint, Facebook, and Twitter

Thousands of candles can be lit from a single candle, and the life of the candle will not be shortened. Happiness never decreases by being shared.
 - Buddha

From Guy Kawasaki's blog and Open Forum:

I found a treasure chest in the back of a great book called Presentation Zen Design: Simple Design Principles and Techniques to Enhance Your Presentations by Garr Reynolds. It is a list of ten Japanese aesthetic principles. More...

The Truth About Event Marketing

All truths are easy to understand once they are discovered; the point is to discover them.


- Galileo

“Because I love people.” “Because I love to travel.” “I’ve always been really good at planning parties.” These are common responses I hear when I ask people why they are interested in events. While these are fabulous attributes to have in an event planner, the responses have prompted me to spend a little time on The Truth About Event Marketing. In a truly well-planned and integrated marketing program, events can play a pivotal role in the sales funnel.

An industry tradeshow like VMWorld or Oracle Open World can drive basic brand awareness, can generate targeted leads, and/or can be used to capture dedicated time with a particular target account. Not only can they provide a hands-on demonstration of technology, they can also drive thought leadership through keynote session opportunities. The objectives for participation should be determined based on the timing of the event and the message that needs to hit the marketing at that time.

A customer advisory council can not only allow customers to feel engaged in the product or marketing strategies of one of their key strategic business partners, but it can provide valuable insight into real concerns and opportunities in our customers’ environments. It can foster trust and even turn around a strained customer relationship.

A user group or user conference can unite IT operators who manage datacenters with Dell and partner solutions. It can create an ongoing community of advisors, content generators, and advocates for Dell in the IT and business world.

Executive hospitality events (golf, wine tastings, sporting events) provide dedicated time with targeted accounts, their account teams and partners, but also allow for the free-flow of information among colleagues and general relationship building for future business meetings. Trite but true, sometimes more work gets done on the golf course than in a week’s worth of meetings.

As business units create their marketing plans and campaign timelines, industry events with set dates can be used as launch pads for products or solution sets or marketing message initiatives.

As assets become ready for market and you move to a demand generation phase, webinars, roadshows and lunch and learns become part of the marketing mix.

When we need to shift perception and convey thought leadership, we strategically target keynote speaking opportunities and executive-level forum and networking events.

I want to stress that event strategies should not be stand-alone creations. They should be part of the annual planning process when mapping out a truly integrated marketing plan.

I also want to stress that everyone loves events. Everyone thinks they can plan events (and maybe they can!). But not everyone can create a truly great brand immersion experience. That's the key.

Revisiting Green

Don't blow it - good planets are hard to find.
 - Quoted in Time

We're revisiting the whole "Green Meetings" initiative at work right now. The conversation tends to center around the "what can we do," rather than the "why are we doing it." I want to revisit the Why part before jumping into the What.


So... Why? Because it's good for the enviroment. Because I work for one of the Greenest companies in the world and we're just bringing that brand philosophy to life in our events. Because I care about the planet. Yeah, yeah, yeah - great story to tell to the press, but being Green is not a determinate need when buying computer products (except in some government sectors).


How about this? Because it saves us money - both on printing costs, and on shipping all that paper to our events. Because our customers want it - they don't actually like to carry back paper with them after an event. They would much rather have a link or a file they can refer to later. Because it's easier to capture real leads - when someone actively wants your brochure, you have them email it to themselves from your system, thus capturing their email address. Harder to do when handing out paper!


NOW! On to the What: When you do print, use recycled and recyclable materials. If printing postcard-sized teasers, use that cool wildflower seed paper so your trash grows flowers in the landfill. Work with hotels to ensure leftover food goes to the appropriate charity of choice. The What is really easy!

The 2-Hour Mom

Some mothers are kissing mothers and some are scolding mothers, but it is love just the same, and most mothers kiss and scold together.
 - Pearl S. Buck

I work a lot. I also have a 2.5 year old and a husband and 2 dogs (well, they're poodles, so they're KINDA like dogs). A lot of my friends at work have similar stories. The kid part is REALLY important, but we've also chosen to work full time. Many of us work full days, get the kid and have that 6-8pm time with them before they go to bed, then we get back online and work some more. So how do you manage it all? You hear that other moms are going through similar experiences, but wouldn't if be great if they would share their stories, too?

Well now they are! At least my friends are! Join us over at The 2-Hour Mom Blog!