Think about it : What’s the worst that can happen when you’re planning a major business event? When nothing happens.
If you’ve coordinated a business event, you know first-hand that an event’s success is measured by its active and engaged participants. Passive attendees, and even worse, absent attendees, not only dampen the mood and spoil the social dynamics, they can ruin your efforts to generate a positive impact on your community, and even damage your credibility.
You’ve seen these types of participants before. Passive attendees are the ones who didn’t prepare for their visit, who may simply be too shy or who aren’t the best people to represent their organisations. When we talk about “absent participants,” we’re not just talking about the total “no-shows,” but also the participants who go out shopping the whole afternoon, while others are expecting them to contribute.
In most cases, passive and/or absent participants are the result of a breakdown in the events manager communication chain. As you’re working and making constant efforts to raise quality and build long-term loyalty, part of your task is to work on engaging your people—long before the event has even started.
Nodily recently visited the IBTM World event in Barcelona* and, we must admit, we were quite impressed with the way in which they managed to connect the crowd and create links among all groups of attendees. Curious to find out just how they did it, we met with the organizer to ask about her methodology. Wanda Tholon, Senior Marketing Executive at Reed Travel Exhibition at the time kindly answered our questions.
Strategic preparations: before your event
IBTM World’s concept is face-to-face meeting, and that means networking is an essential piece of their strategy. “IBTM World is a platform that allows people to meet face-to-face, network, shake hands and do business,” said Wanda. "Long before the event takes place, we start reaching out to our potential attendees. We raise the awareness through marketing and PR campaigns, and through continuous communication on social media, letting participants know exactly what they will get at the show.”
To motivate people to engage on social media before and during the three days of the event, IBTM World launched the #beawsome Best Picture Contest and created a hashtag on Twitter. Tons of imaginative tweets started to buzz. A brilliant move! “Enthusiastic and passionate people are the best ambassadors of the show,” affirms Wanda. “And this kind of approach doesn’t require a lot of resources.”
Many people think this approach doesn’t apply to their specific sector or industry. We at Nodily know it does work … only differently. And we’re here to help you find out how. When you manage an event you take on the responsibility of bringing new practices and ideas to the table. This means being open-minded and ready to innovate—we’re not talking revolution, necessarily, but evolution.
Creating opportunities for connection: during your event
IBTM World works hard to understand the interests of their community, facilitating meetings and discussions on popular and hot industry topics. Said Wanda, "Every year, we try to bring new and innovative ways to facilitate connections at the show to ensure that professionals with similar interests can meet in-person. We provide zones to technology for tech fans, on sustainability to discuss green and social issues, or an Association Hub so that Association buyers can gather, network and share best practice, etc. We develop a lot of initiatives on site to make it easy for attendees to connect and do business with the right people.”
Wanda then told us that IBTM World puts a lot of focus each year on bringing 4.000 qualified hosted buyers from all over the world to generate busy meeting agendas with exhibitors and providers. The word “qualified” is a crucial aspect to the event ingredients. Indeed, if you want to run a successful event in a smooth manner, you have to implement a strong qualification process you bring the relevant participants.
Maintaining the Momentum: After Your Event
“To keep up the momentum after your event, the challenge is to prolong it into an ongoing platform for the industry,” says Wanda. You’ve probably faced the same challenge. As the event manager, it’s your job to continue helping attendees connect with each other, even weeks after your event. How do you do it? One effective way is to promote further exchanges on blogs, or through social media. Don’t hesitate to ask for comments and feedback from your participants, share event content from education sessions, interviews from industry leaders… This not only keeps people thinking and talking about the event, it can provide valuable tips for improving your process for future events.
We had one last question. Since, we’re all flooded by emails, how do you make sure your recipients don’t blacklist you after few notifications? We got a humorous answer from Wanda: “You are right. It is indeed a very complex problem for any marketer. I would advise going back to communication by fax. Since I only receive a few faxes a month, I consider this being really innovative! More seriously, the secret resides in content and good timing. You need to position yourself as part of the community and avoid repetition and ‘self-oriented’ messages. Most of our participants start to think about us only a few months before the event, while we think about them all year long, our messages have to be relevant according to their interest, objectives and professional agenda.”
And yes, it takes a year of effort to generate a successful event that connects participants and keeps them coming back for more.
*Interview took place in 2014
