B2B Events are Wending toward Wow

Once upon a time, a hotel ballroom sufficed to fill the conference producer's need for a space suited to parking 300 butts, and maybe 30 booths, for a day or two.

But Millennial attendees have crabbed so much, for so long, about B2B events' blandness producers are rethinking venue, hoping to provoke a wee more wow.

According to Skift, B2B events are now being situated in many privately owned "alternative venues," including factories, warehouses, mansions, museums, boats, restaurants, cocktail lounges, wineries, art studios, work spaces and incubators. (Aside: With my partner producers, I just chose the latter type of venue for a new conference myself).

But blocking the way to wow is convention. For decades, producers have worked cozily with hotels.

"They’ve always met in the same hotel meeting rooms with the same carpet and the same white walls,” says Jan Hoffmann-Keining, CMO of an online matching service named Spacebase.

Producers' cherished comfort comes at a cost—to corporate innovation and creativity.

"People are realizing that if you keep meeting in the same rooms and thinking the same thoughts, then it’s going to be hard to find that innovation and creativity,” Hoffmann-Keening says.

Patric Weiler, Head of Strategy for American Express Meetings & Events, thinks more producers will gradually buck tradition.

“The meetings industry is changing, and the classic silos are breaking up about how to plan a meeting,” he says.

Event-Goer: Won't You be My Neighbor?

Are you an adventurous event-goer?

Airbnb wants you.

Room-sharing represents the ultimate way for event-goers to personalize business travel, says company exec Chip Conley.

While she once aspired to stay in a predictably clean and conveniently located hotel, today's event-goer seeks “discovery”—a craving Airbnb satisfies by providing rooms in every sort of neighborhood.

The company fills a need that's not without precedent, Conley says:

• Home-swapping dates to the 1950s, when the Dutch teachers' union suggested members could swap houses to save on vacation rentals.

• VRBO web-ified peer-to-peer vacation rentals in 1995.

• Boutique hotels surged about the same time, proving “there was a growing number of customers for whom predictability and ubiquity were not the right model."

Airbnb targets “customers who are a little adventurous, especially in locations that they know already,” Conley says.

To accommodate event planners, Airbnb is hawking widgets planners can embed in their websites. The widgets link attendees to blocks of Airbnb listings available during the event's dates and in proximity to the event's venue. 

Following in the footsteps of Amazon and Netflix, the company plans to use algorithms to become a global hospitality giant, according to Conley.

How to Guarantee Gate-Shut-Panic

It is a hopeless endeavor to attract people to a theatre unless they can be first brought to believe that they will never get in.

—Charles Dickens

"Of all the thousands of events that exist, only 5% represent those that I’d consider as ‘must-attend,’" says event designer Warwick Davies.

"These are the events where your absence will be noted, whether you are an attendee, speaker, sponsor or exhibitor. They are the kinds of events that prompt a ‘fear of missing out'—FOMO—the fear that it will somehow cost you in some way if you aren’t there."

Germans have a word for FOMO, Torschlusspanik, "gate-shut-panic."

The word dates to the Middle Ages, when peasants had to scamper from the fields at dusk, to guarantee they got home before the city gates were shut. The ones who dawdled could be eaten by wolves, beaten by robbers, or killed by the cold.

You can't loose wolves or release the Kraken on resistant attendees. But you can instill FOMO by offering a must-attend event.

Davies says these six actions guarantee it:

Make sure influencers show up. Buzz about your event only occurs when "influentials, connectors and mavens" attend, Davies says. Be sure to find ways for them to see value in attending.

Make sure you connect with influencers. Connect with 10 influencers, and you can't help but spark FOMO. "It will help not only your event, but also your own personal industry profile, and potentially your career."

Make sure you know the next big thing. You can't be clueless and run an irresistible event. Become a trend-spotter and build the next big thing into your event.

Make sure to connect with your Top 10 sponsors.  To create FOMO, you need tight connections with all the decision-makers at your leading funders.

Make sure to offer 10 networking activities. "Have 10 really dynamic and interactive things on the schedule that allow the movers and shakers, as well as their followers, to get together." Activities can include receptions, community projects, roundtable sessions and morning runs.

Make sure to market your event as a "must-attend." But don't just claim it. Prove it. Publish an agenda that shows you're leading your industry.

HAT TIP: James McCabe inspired this post.

5 Game Designs Guaranteed to Boost Event Traffic

Almost always, games score big as traffic-boosters at events.

The reasons why are well understood: games satisfy attendees’ innate needs to compete, win recognition, and bring home swag.

But today—with a slew of tech-enabled amusements at our fingertips—games are undergoing a renaissance at events.

To create a memorable and buzz-worthy game, you need a design that's aligned with your goals and that attendees will find alluring. Here are some design alternatives:

Skills competition. Suppose you want to increase traffic at some specific location. You could design a game that challenges attendees’ physical or mental skills—anything from hitting a target to taking a quiz. An attendee could play by completing an action (answering a trivia question, for example), for which she earns a token. The number of tokens awarded for repeat plays could increase as the difficulty of the challenge does. After playing, the attendee redeems all the tokens won for a matching-level prize by visiting a winner’s station.

Treasure hunt. Suppose you want to offer exhibitors a traffic-building sponsorship opportunity. You could design an old-fashioned treasure hunt. Attendees could earn points toward prizes by visiting a series of exhibits, where each participating sponsor rewards them with tokens. After the series of visits, the attendees would visit a winner's station, where they would enter a prize drawing by redeeming their tokens.

Game show. Suppose you want attendees to actively listen, while you communicate a lot of information. You could train a presenter to act as MC, and design a game show that challenges players’ knowledge. Attendees would play and, based on their game-show scores, be awarded variously valued tokens, which they could redeem for the corresponding prizes.

Mission. Suppose you want to collect market research from attendees. You could send them on a “mission.” Under this scenario, attendees would earn tokens by visiting a series of kiosks, where they complete your research surveys. Players who take part in the mission (even the ones who don’t complete it) would receive real-time recognition on a leaderboard and through social-media posts, as well as collecting tokens they can redeem for rewards.

Chance. Suppose you want to draw a crowd and maximize word-of-mouth throughout the event. You could design a game of chance. Attendees who play would win tokens worth a various number of points that they could redeem for the corresponding prizes.

Your Event is Either an Experience or a Waste of Time

Event no longer describes the work of planners, Kevin Jackson says in Event Manager Blog.

Planners no longer merely organize events; they design experiences.

What's the difference, he asks?

"An event is a one-off moment in time and an experience is a whole campaign that builds a community of interest around the subject or topic we’re promoting," Jackson says.

The difference becomes clear when you consider where the two words come from.

Experience comes from the Latin word experientia, a "trial" (as in a "trial run"); event, from the Latin word eventus, an "occurrence."

Your event is either a memorable experiment or a forgettable incident.

A reveal or a recap.

A verb or a noun.

A festival or a funeral.

An experience or a waste of time.

As They Like It

All the world’s a stage, and all the men and women merely players.

As You Like It, Act II, Scene VII

As Adrian Segar says in The Power of Participation, given everything we know about active learning—and everything today's attendees crave from a conference—it's "almost unethical" to focus on an event's stage, where speakers control the content.

But how do you shift attention from a handful to many players?

Do your homework. The whole of attendees' perspectives is greater than the sum of speakers' parts. So ask attendees through a pre-event survey what content matters most. And consider using professional telemarketers to conduct the survey. The findings will surprise you!

Demand more. Insist your emcee lets attendees know you expect participation and highlight the opportunities attendees have to participate throughout your event. You can technologize participation by adding a second-screen experience.

Offer carrots. Ignite your audience by building in rewards for participation. Chances to win gift cards and sponsors' swag will bring out attendees’ competitive urges.

Deliver an experience. Provide content in contexts that sensually engage attendees (brands do it all the time). Use A/V, lighting, decor, aromas, and professional talent to boost audience involvement.

Continue the conversation. Extend participation after your event through online forums, hangouts, and social media. Create post-event videos and e-books, send them to attendees, and solicit feedback.

Childish Tchotchkes

Want to win over a jaded audience at your next trade show?

"Appeal to the inner child," says marketing consultant Jill Amerie.

Amerie recounts a midnight film screening at this year's SXSW.

A house full of film journalists sat waiting for Keanu, an action-comedy about a kitten, to finally begin. The mood was sullen and bitter.

"Then something interesting happened," Amerie says. 

"The comedic team of Key and Peele came on stage with a basket of toy kittens. They started throwing the stuffed animals into the audience, and suddenly, those tired, grouchy journalists were jumping to catch them like a bunch of bridesmaids going after the wedding bouquet. 

"A lot of those kittens will end up going to the children of those attendees, but it’s a safe bet that a significant number of them will end up in their offices, too."

What, No Online Community?

Event planner: What, no online community?

If true, you're falling behind, says BrightBull's Ricardo Molina.

Worse, you are:

• Wasting money on attendance promotion. Like lists and media partnerships, online communities provide a direct road to your target audience. But unlike those roads, communities don't need as much maintenance. "Once built, a community will thrive with just a little care and attention."

• Letting competitors poach your attendees. First-movers usually win. "When your competitors start a community first, all they have to do is say that it’s there and people will join because it’s something new."

• Forgetting about brand loyalty. Communities provide value added. So members "automatically feel good about your brand."

• Failing to lead. "Why would they think of your event as being 'the one' when you don’t run THE online destination for your niche?"

• Skipping customer insight. Insights from a community let you read the industry's pulse, and drive product development, marketing and sales.

• Leaving money on the table. Exhibitors are eager to brand themselves year-round on communities. Why not offer them yours? One large international bank spends half its marketing budget on content partnerships.

Capturing Millennials

The American Society for Association Executives this week shuttered its decades-old "Springtime in the Park" and announced a new un-expo, "The Xperience Design Project."

The move typifies every event producer's urge to capture Millennials, who'll comprise half of all prospective attendees by 2020.

Like event producers, travel companies are "scrambling to capture the business and loyalty of this new breed," Jordan Forrest says in Forbes.

Forrest notes five ways Millennials differ from their predecessors:

They travel. Millennials average five business trips a year, compared to only two for older professionals. They're also more likely to extend a business trip into a vacation.

They tinker. Millennials "expect mobility and crave convenience," Forrest says. They're more likely to use apps to book business travel and streamline travel plans.

They splurge. Millennials have expensive tastes, "as long as they’re not the ones paying." They're more likely to spend company money on fine dining and room service than seasoned colleagues.

They freewheel. Millennials are far more likely than older colleagues to book trips and change travel plans at the last minute. In response, "many airlines and hotels have begun offering last-minute online travel deals targeted at digitally savvy Millennial travelers."

They grouse. Millennials trust online reviews and aren't shy about posting negative ones. "It’s no wonder that businesses are eager to meet Millennial demands," Forrest says.

Conference Planners: There's No Sin in Syndication

Last year, Hulu bought the streaming rights for all 180 episodes of Seinfeld.

The price tag: $1 million per episode.

The $180 million Hulu paid came on top of $3 billion in syndication fees that Seinfeld had already generated from other outlets.

While conference planners take pride in staging profitable "first-run" events, unlike the creators of Seinfeld, most turn their backs on the profits to be made from "re-runs."

That's a pity, says Mark Gross in MarketingProfs.

"Your organization is building a valuable repository of content waiting to be deployed in new ways for new audiences," Gross says. 

"Commercial event producers, corporate conference organizers and professional associations can all benefit from reusing conference content."

With all the affordable technology out there, repurposing conference content should be a no-brainer.

But conference planners in the main still see repurposing as virtual "double-dipping."

Something odious and "not for us."

Gross urges planners no longer to think of conference content as perishable, but instead think of it as a marketing asset.

"Approach this content like you would any other marketing asset and use it at every stage of your marketing strategy," he says.

Re-purposing your conference content can open "a world of possibilities," Gross says.

A few include:

• Marketing packaged proceedings to non-attendees.

• Reusing visuals from technical presentations in online tutorials for newcomers to the field.

• Delivering "gamified" online training modules to team members of attendees' organizations who do not attend the conference.

• Offering an e-book compiled from transcripts of the keynotes to promote a future conference.

• Offering an e-book that collects the best presentations from the same field to create inroads into niche markets.

• Publishing a series of blog posts based on the abstracts from a set of related technical papers, to spotlight an industry issue or trend.

Repurposing conference content not only extends the shelf-life of your event, but opens new doors to increased revenue, brand loyalty and market share.

Vitalizing Trade Events

Trade shows have "outgrown" learning, networking and party-going, says Holly Barker in Event Manager Blog.

Trend-setting organizers and exhibitors are re-caffeinating mature events with these five ingredients:

VIP treatment. They're treating attendees to "all-star access" to special events and lavishing them with "gifts of information."

Personalization. They're tailoring touch-points by "listening to attendees and creating a customized plan that appeals to their interests and needs on an individual level."  Attendee feedback is essential to the effort.

Data. They're letting data drive new ideas for deepening attendee engagement, as well as personalization.

Experience. They're abandoning "old school" insistence that bigger's always better and focusing instead on little things, like themed tchotchkes, better signage and handsomer staff shirts, to deliver a memorable experience. "You want to look like a complete, professionally pulled together package," Barker says.

Un-booths. They're turning exhibits into teen hangouts where attendees can "chill and mingle with booth staff." Food, fun, artworks and "blinky giveaways" make un-booths happening places.

Vitalizing an event takes study and a little chutzpah, Barker says. 

"It never hurts to test a new idea and see if it picks up or is a total flop. The best way to be a trendsetter is to get out there and just do it!"

Chili Pepper Burns

Mary Boone co-authored today's post. She is considered a leading authority on the design of meetings to incorporate engagement.

Bob:

For as long as I've been involved in event promotion, I've been stymied by the ubiquitous chili pepper brochure.

From time immemorial, every event planner who's ever held an event of any size anywhere in the American Southwest, it seems, has illustrated the cover of her promotional brochure with a chili pepper.

I understand why a B2C event planner might use the tactic.

But why—when attendees are time-starved, budget-conscious and results-driven—do B2B event planners persist in the belief that destination matters? That destination influences prospective attendees' decision to attend a B2B event, or prefer one event over another?

The answer: DMOs.

Destination Marketing Organizations (in quainter times called "Convention and Visitors Bureaus") have brainwashed two generations of B2B event producers.

And not for the better.

In the drive to "put heads in beds," DMOs have propagated the myth that B2B events are just a form of tourism.


Their sway over B2B event planners has cost the planners dearly—in attendance, income and career.

That's why I insist chili pepper burns.

Mary:

I don’t think the answer to this situation is to dismantle DMOs. I think the answer is to raise awareness and educate.


Imagine this. An event planner is putting together an event. She is trying to figure out, among a million other details, where to hold it.


What if she knows the “Flo” (think Progressive insurance) of DMO professionals? She calls Flo. “Flo, I need to hold this event somewhere and I’m not sure where.”


Flo: “Tell me more about the objectives of the event. What’s your organization trying to achieve? What type of environment is going to support those objectives? Tell me more about the culture of your organization…”


Then, after a great conversation, Flo says, “You know, I’d love to be able to say that Chili Pepper, Texas, has the perfect venue for you, but this one time I have to admit that Vancouver, B.C., might be better.”


Shock and awe. So this time Flo doesn’t get the business, but guess who our planner is going to call every time she needs help?


If DMOs are educated to be consultative, client-centric, and business-focused in their interactions with planners, they can be deeply essential to the process of strategically selecting a location that matches the needs of both the event and the business.

The Internet of Experiences

The Internet of Things is coming, David Pierce writes in Wired, "like a molasses tidal wave."

Not so the Internet of Experiences, if event marketers have their way.

Last year saw quantum leaps in product design by the tech companies that serve event marketers (firms like Cvent, DoubleDutch, Eventbase—even Facebook).

Those improvements practically assure event marketers will embrace event tech—and with gusto.

While gizmos galore have been dispensed at events, none ever became indispensable.

In 2016, finally, that will change.

DISCLAIMER: My employer is an investor in DoubleDutch.

Child Speed

Every week, my two-year-old granddaughter dashes past another developmental milestone.

She's unafraid to ask questions or state her observations. 

For their part, the googly-eyed adults around her make a willing audience. 

Of course, it does't hurt to be adorable.

Eighteen years ago, designer Bruce Mau wrote his 43-point Incomplete Manifesto for Growth to inspire the designers in his studio in Toronto.

Point 15 of the Incomplete Manifesto reads:

Ask stupid questions. Growth is fueled by desire and innocence. Assess the answer, not the question. Imagine learning throughout your life at the rate of an infant.

Were it possible to learn for a lifetime at my granddaughter's present speed, we'd all be geniuses. 

Unfortunately, brain physiology holds us back.

In fact, most minds fossilize before their owners turn 30.

But destiny shouldn't deter you from asking stupid, innocent, childlike questions.

Who knows?

Once in a while, you might get an adult answer.

Disclosure: Bruce Mau is now my employer's Chief Design Officer.

Expectations

Washington, DC-based freelance writer Dan Bailes contributed today's post. His clients include the MacArthur Foundation, National Geographic, the Smithsonian and the State Department. Between assignments, Dan explores storytelling through his blog, The Vision Thing.

We make assumptions all the time.

At a meeting we might say "yes" to an idea, a project or a goal, but what do we expect with that "yes?" We might assume we're all on the same page—but is that really true?

On the road to success, the easiest way to stumble is to ignore expectations.

We often run into unspoken expectations when we're asked to create something specific, like a report, a video or an event. Since expectations are rarely expressed, they don't come to the fore until you present your work. Then you might hear: "Oh, that's not what I had in mind at all."

We can have a conversation, agree on goals, move a project forward, and still hit a brick wall because we haven't asked key questions.

How do you tease out what your boss, client or colleague expects before you start on a project? You ask questions:

• What do you want to accomplish?
• Why are you launching this project in the first place?
• Who is the project for?
• How will the project meet unmet needs or solve a problem?
• Once this project is out there, what do you envision happening—how will people respond?

Asking the right questions up front will help you make better decisions down the road.

What's the takeaway? Don't assume—ask!

Why Experiential Marketing Rules

Fortunate folks can say, "Wow, I just had a peak experience."

But no one has ever said, "Wow, I just had a peak advertisement."

Ads can grab us, hold us, and charm us; but only experiences have, baked-in, the promise to unleash moments of self-actualization.

That's a prime reason experiential marketers keep pushing the envelope, as Lucasfilm did recently at Comic-Con.

Admit it or not, we all want to be "peakers."

In Religions, Values, and Peak Experiences, Abraham Maslow first described peak experiences as, "rare, exciting, oceanic, deeply moving, exhilarating, elevating experiences that generate an advanced form of perceiving reality, and are even mystic and magical in their effect."

Peak experiences can arise from simple, accidental life events, or be engineered.

Artists, in particular, are specialists in engineering them.

A peak experience of my own took place in 1991, when I worked on the crew that installed Christo and Jeanne-Claude's The Umbrellas.

I was one of 960 fans who labored for five days at minimum wage to erect 1,760 immense yellow umbrellas atop the brown hills that hug an 18-mile stretch of Interstate 5, 60 miles north of Los Angeles.

The morning of The Umbrellas' big reveal, we ran headlong, like kids on Christmas morning, from one giant umbrella to the next to crank them open.

That experience was indeed "exhilarating." But the luminous part came next.

Once the 1,760 umbrellas were open, curious crowds appeared.

Christo and his wife had engineered a wonder.

I saw young mothers gasp and their children chuckle with delight.

I saw crusty ranch hands gape from their jeeps.

I saw migrant workers skip and dance.

I saw a beefy tractor trailer driver stop on the interstate's shoulder, climb from his cab, take a long look at the hills, and burst into sobs at the beauty.

In their aftereffects, Maslow says, peak experiences leave us with the feeling the world's truly perfect.

We turn into "peakers," he says, and long for a chance to repeat the experiences.

Because we all seek perfection.

Your Event is Either an Experience or a Waste of Time

While they puzzle over details, many event organizers never grasp the key to a satisfactory event.

It has to deliver an experience.

In the same way a restaurant is not about food, an event's not about tables, chairs, booths, badges, busses, signs or even speakers.

An event is about an experience.

Restaurateur Danny Meyer says the restaurant's job isn't to serve food.

It's to create an experience of wellbeing: to instill in each patron the sense that "when we were delivering that product, we were on your side."

Delivering an experience justifies the patron's expenditure—not of money, but of time—Meyer says. "When they leave, are they going to say, 'That was a good use of my time?'"

"The most precious resource we all have is time," Steve Jobs once told a reporter.

Are you delivering an experience, or wasting your attendees' time?

The Booming Business of Selling Books

You can take the boy out of Madison Avenue, but not vice versa.

Earlier this year, madman-turned-author James Patterson launched his thriller Private Vegas with a bang, by selling a single advance copy rigged to explode 24 hours after the reader opened it.

Patterson asserted that the reader who started the book would experience a veritable "race against the clock" to finish it.

The novel's price tag: $294,038.

At the same time, Patterson offered 1,000 free copies of Private Vegas on his website, digital versions rigged to "cinematically" self-detonate 24 hours after they were opened.

Patterson's experiential social media campaign racked up 419.8 million impressions, and thrill-seeking readers spent 13,896 hours reading the advance copies of Private Vegas, according to CMO. 

Paul Malmstrom, a creative director with the author's agency, bragged in a news release, “For this launch, we aimed to create the most thrilling reading experience ever. One that takes the suspense of Patterson’s new novel to a crazy, new level."

Yup, crazy… like a fox.

Patterson has sold more than 300 million copies of his novels in the past 25 years.