INDUSTRY INSIGHTS YOUR PEERS ARE READING
At a recent conference consultation with a client, a millennial made me think that I wasn’t keeping up with the times. I voiced my strong opinion that conference organizers should embrace inbound marketing (pull) over traditional outbound marketing (push). MORE
Putting the participant at the center of your conference programming by becoming more learner-centric, that is planning and offering education sessions that go beyond surface learning, is one of the biggest challenges facing conference organizers today. MORE
Yet deciding to abandon a conference programming element can clear the way for new successful traditions to take hold. It is creating a habit of regularly questioning every conference planning practice and programming component that we currently use. MORE
These mental models are deeply embedded in our conference planning and management practices. Savvy conference organizers realize that their mental models have much more influence over their outcomes than their decisions and actions. Surfacing our cognitive conference constructs. MORE
Here are nine mythodologies about conferences. At least half the sessions programmed at traditional conferences are not what attendees want. Mythodology: A “ conference curator ” can improve the quality of your conference content. Reality : Sadly, conference curators don’t exist. Mythodology: Conference programs should be stuffed full of sessions so there’s something of interest for everyone. MORE
But when it gets to “go time,” does that culture manifest at your conferences and meetings? Her boss apparently thought she should spend all her time out “doing meeting planning” and not hanging out in a hotel conference room. Conference staff are not able to do everything! MORE
It is much more effective to provide opportunities for conference participants to solve their own problems, then telling them how to solve it. Conference organizers automatically assume that if someone is attending their event, they expect the conference to help them solve their problems. MORE
Too often conference and meeting professionals assume that their role is best suited to planning and executing the conference. I get that from the education section or the conference technical teams.”. They own designing the conference customers experience journey. MORE
However, a conference at rest, tends to die. The enemy of most conferences is the way it’s always been. Cognitive and organizational inertia keeps an association on its current conference course even when facing disruptive or rapid external changes. MORE
Your association, annual conference, and governance are all institutions. One of the sacred cows for associations and their annual conference is attributing notoriety to the office of the president, board chair or annual conference committee chair. MORE
Once you’ve observed the conference through the lens of your target customer and gained insights from conference data, you can move to the next steps. These steps are critical for you and your conference planning teams to embrace, enlist and employ. MORE
Applying a story arc to the conference can activate participants’ brains. You can use the story arc concept to carefully craft the messages and issues you want your conference participants to explore, experience and learn. So exactly how do you use a story arc for your conference? MORE
When you’re in the events industry, you should know the main event management conferences for 2019 so you can visit them to improve your knowledge and share your own experiences of working long hours while trying to pull off amazing corporate events for your clients. MORE
One of the strongest intangible attributes of a healthy conference is how much sharing takes place. Conversely, conferences that have a higher deal-making quotient tend to hold their cards closer to their chests. The post Conferences Need More Sharing appeared first on Velvet Chainsaw. MORE
Your real conference competition is not that event held six months after yours. Today’s technology driven, hyper-connected, instant gratification, real-time world puts you as a conference organizer in a difficult position. Have you normalized conference mediocrity as acceptable? MORE
Conference organizers and their planning teams should understand, identify and quash organizational debt. Refactoring As A Metaphor For Conference Improvement. Thus we refactor to improve the conference experience for our customers. Consider it as your conference source code. MORE
As a conference organizer, how purpose-driven are you? Successful conference organizers are purpose-driven! They design conference experiences that become meaning-making opportunities for their participants. Purpose-Driven Conference Organizers’ Mindset. MORE
As conference organizers, we frequently ignore the evidence all around us of what’s working and what’s not. Often our conference planning teams and volunteer advisors follow our lead as we give more precedent to what feels right. MORE
Are 50%-80% of your conference attendees in your programming at any given time? One thing is certain, if your conference attendees are not fully engaged in the experience you provide, there is little, if any, chance that they will leave your event with any real ROI. MORE
To paraphrase Hoffer, you can never get enough of conference fads, gimmicks and trends. Unless your a conference participant and we often have had enough!). They also want access to your conference budget. You can never get enough of what you really don’t need says Eric Hoffer. MORE
Everything we take for granted about conferences, and planning them, faces disruption. Participants from all generations and cultures increasingly expect conferences to mirror their work and personal lives. Savvy conference organizers meet these disruptions head-on. MORE
In physics, the second law of thermodynamics says all things—bodies, businesses, conferences, energy, organizations, relationships—move toward chaos and disorder. As your conference matures, it experiences entropy. As a conference professional, you know this to be true. MORE
Do your conference learning opportunities—from the general session to networking to breakouts to deep dive workshops—empower registrants to participate in their own learning journey? Or do your conference education sessions motivate participants to see the finish line? MORE
As conference organizers, why can’t we also have a fun, fulfilling, and collaborative experience planning and designing the conference? Here are six ways to focus on designing your team’s experience during your next conference planning process. MORE
Many conferences are stuck in the rut of legacy routines, age-old rituals and cloned programming. Conference organizers and its advisors replicate the past maintaining the traditions and well-established procedures of yesteryear. Conference Reform Requires These Leadership Traits. MORE
As you embark on a new vision of conference renovation and reform, you may feel that you are crossing from a comfortable, familiar space to one that is unknown and unsettling. Conference Improvement As Your Threshold To New Growth. What’s your favorite room in your home? MORE
The first peer conference I convened and designed was held June 3 – 5, 1992 at Marlboro College, Vermont. So, as of today, the community of practice that eventually became edACCESS has enjoyed 27 years of peer conferences. Twenty-three people came to the inaugural conference. MORE
Established, successful conferences have leadership that are usually adept at incrementally improving their event each year. Conference organizers must focus on both their customers’ needs—their pain points and problems to solve—and their aspirations—their wants and professional goals. MORE
Who wants to attend a common, ordinary, ho-hum, everyday , I’m-just-like-all-the-others traditional conference? Your conference growth and revenue depends upon repeat paying attendees year after year. And your customer loyalty is built upon making your common conference uncommon. MORE
The North Star is the perfect metaphor for your annual conference purpose. When your conference purpose serves as a North Star, it guides all decisions, tasks, behaviors and strategy. Uncovering Your North Star Conviction To Find Conference True Target Market. MORE
Here’s my article “ Five Reasons to Change Conferences “ , published in the December 2018, NSA Speaker magazine. But our conference programs still focus on lectures, where a few experts broadcast their knowledge to passive listeners. MORE
It’s hard for conference organizers to stick to planning the essential elements of their events. As a conference professional, it is your mission each day to keep your focus on the essential elements of your event for your customers’ sake. What is the essence of your conference? MORE
Traditionally teams from organizations attend a conference with a divide-and-conquer game plan, as they split up and attend as many different sessions as they can. Yet conferences are lagging in meeting the needs of team learning. MORE
Now imagine someone asking your conference participants that question. Then they would launch into a passionate description of your event’s annual Party with a Purpose, its pre-conference feel-good community service projects and its ongoing student scholarship fundraisers. MORE
Most conference and meeting professionals want the coolest, hippest, latest ideas and trends for their events. We want to know what unique things other conferences are doing so we can borrow their ideas. We pursue fads, gimmicks and trends as the silver bullets of our conference woes. MORE
There is one debt every conference organizer must face and vanquish. It can cripple a conference. Anyone striving to build a 21st century sustainable conference needs to understand organizational debt, how it impacts their event and how to prevent it. MORE
The unique story of any conference should begin with the goal and then a detailed plan on how to reach this goal. If you understand your target audience, it’s not a challenge to build such a conference vision. What is a corporate conference planning checklist? After a conference. MORE
So is this the right strategy for your association and conference? A large percentage of student attendees won’t make all of your conference constituents happy. Smaller booth sizes and exhibitor churn tend to be attributes of conferences with high student attendance. MORE
If there’s something strange in your conference-hood. Our cognitive frameworks—our mental models and paradigms—shape our thinking, behavior, operations and success of our conferences. We falsely believe that future conferences are just an extension of the past. MORE
Impact on Healthcare Conferences? Here are four questions (and tips) for your conference committee to consider as they navigate this changing landscape: 1. Tip: have each conference committee member reach out to five to ten key attendees to understand their pressing priorities. MORE
Who owns the overall experience that customers have at your conference? Who oversees and manages the conference customers’ journey? Or perhaps no one is considering the holistic experience of your conference customer? Do you know what your conference target market customer wants? MORE
Conference Related Topics Velvet Chainsaw
JUNE 17, 2019
But when it gets to “go time,” does that culture manifest at your conferences and meetings? Her boss apparently thought she should spend all her time out “doing meeting planning” and not hanging out in a hotel conference room. Conference staff are not able to do everything!
Velvet Chainsaw
JANUARY 21, 2019
In physics, the second law of thermodynamics says all things—bodies, businesses, conferences, energy, organizations, relationships—move toward chaos and disorder. As your conference matures, it experiences entropy. As a conference professional, you know this to be true.
Velvet Chainsaw
JULY 27, 2018
Who wants to attend a common, ordinary, ho-hum, everyday , I’m-just-like-all-the-others traditional conference? Your conference growth and revenue depends upon repeat paying attendees year after year. And your customer loyalty is built upon making your common conference uncommon.
Velvet Chainsaw
JANUARY 31, 2019
However, a conference at rest, tends to die. The enemy of most conferences is the way it’s always been. Cognitive and organizational inertia keeps an association on its current conference course even when facing disruptive or rapid external changes.
Conferences that Work
JUNE 3, 2019
The first peer conference I convened and designed was held June 3 – 5, 1992 at Marlboro College, Vermont. So, as of today, the community of practice that eventually became edACCESS has enjoyed 27 years of peer conferences. Twenty-three people came to the inaugural conference.
Velvet Chainsaw
MAY 22, 2019
Traditionally teams from organizations attend a conference with a divide-and-conquer game plan, as they split up and attend as many different sessions as they can. Yet conferences are lagging in meeting the needs of team learning.
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Velvet Chainsaw
NOVEMBER 8, 2018
Applying a story arc to the conference can activate participants’ brains. You can use the story arc concept to carefully craft the messages and issues you want your conference participants to explore, experience and learn. So exactly how do you use a story arc for your conference?
Velvet Chainsaw
SEPTEMBER 18, 2018
To paraphrase Hoffer, you can never get enough of conference fads, gimmicks and trends. Unless your a conference participant and we often have had enough!). They also want access to your conference budget. You can never get enough of what you really don’t need says Eric Hoffer.
Velvet Chainsaw
JULY 12, 2018
These mental models are deeply embedded in our conference planning and management practices. Savvy conference organizers realize that their mental models have much more influence over their outcomes than their decisions and actions. Surfacing our cognitive conference constructs.
Velvet Chainsaw
JUNE 21, 2018
The North Star is the perfect metaphor for your annual conference purpose. When your conference purpose serves as a North Star, it guides all decisions, tasks, behaviors and strategy. Uncovering Your North Star Conviction To Find Conference True Target Market.
Velvet Chainsaw
JANUARY 7, 2019
Many conferences are stuck in the rut of legacy routines, age-old rituals and cloned programming. Conference organizers and its advisors replicate the past maintaining the traditions and well-established procedures of yesteryear. Conference Reform Requires These Leadership Traits.
|
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Velvet Chainsaw
SEPTEMBER 17, 2018
Most conference and meeting professionals want the coolest, hippest, latest ideas and trends for their events. We want to know what unique things other conferences are doing so we can borrow their ideas. We pursue fads, gimmicks and trends as the silver bullets of our conference woes.
Velvet Chainsaw
OCTOBER 17, 2018
Your association, annual conference, and governance are all institutions. One of the sacred cows for associations and their annual conference is attributing notoriety to the office of the president, board chair or annual conference committee chair.
Velvet Chainsaw
JANUARY 25, 2018
Too often conference and meeting professionals assume that their role is best suited to planning and executing the conference. I get that from the education section or the conference technical teams.”. They own designing the conference customers experience journey.
Velvet Chainsaw
APRIL 26, 2018
One of the strongest intangible attributes of a healthy conference is how much sharing takes place. Conversely, conferences that have a higher deal-making quotient tend to hold their cards closer to their chests. The post Conferences Need More Sharing appeared first on Velvet Chainsaw.
Velvet Chainsaw
OCTOBER 12, 2018
At a recent conference consultation with a client, a millennial made me think that I wasn’t keeping up with the times. I voiced my strong opinion that conference organizers should embrace inbound marketing (pull) over traditional outbound marketing (push).
Velvet Chainsaw
JULY 13, 2018
If there’s something strange in your conference-hood. Our cognitive frameworks—our mental models and paradigms—shape our thinking, behavior, operations and success of our conferences. We falsely believe that future conferences are just an extension of the past.
Velvet Chainsaw
JUNE 4, 2018
As conference organizers, why can’t we also have a fun, fulfilling, and collaborative experience planning and designing the conference? Here are six ways to focus on designing your team’s experience during your next conference planning process.
Velvet Chainsaw
JANUARY 26, 2018
Once you’ve observed the conference through the lens of your target customer and gained insights from conference data, you can move to the next steps. These steps are critical for you and your conference planning teams to embrace, enlist and employ.
Velvet Chainsaw
SEPTEMBER 15, 2016
It is much more effective to provide opportunities for conference participants to solve their own problems, then telling them how to solve it. Conference organizers automatically assume that if someone is attending their event, they expect the conference to help them solve their problems.
Velvet Chainsaw
JANUARY 10, 2019
It’s hard for conference organizers to stick to planning the essential elements of their events. As a conference professional, it is your mission each day to keep your focus on the essential elements of your event for your customers’ sake. What is the essence of your conference?
Velvet Chainsaw
JUNE 29, 2018
Conference organizers and their planning teams should understand, identify and quash organizational debt. Refactoring As A Metaphor For Conference Improvement. Thus we refactor to improve the conference experience for our customers. Consider it as your conference source code.
GEVME
JUNE 13, 2018
The unique story of any conference should begin with the goal and then a detailed plan on how to reach this goal. If you understand your target audience, it’s not a challenge to build such a conference vision. What is a corporate conference planning checklist? After a conference.
Conferences that Work
MAY 14, 2018
Here are nine mythodologies about conferences. At least half the sessions programmed at traditional conferences are not what attendees want. Mythodology: A “ conference curator ” can improve the quality of your conference content. Reality : Sadly, conference curators don’t exist. Mythodology: Conference programs should be stuffed full of sessions so there’s something of interest for everyone.
Velvet Chainsaw
JULY 24, 2018
As you embark on a new vision of conference renovation and reform, you may feel that you are crossing from a comfortable, familiar space to one that is unknown and unsettling. Conference Improvement As Your Threshold To New Growth. What’s your favorite room in your home?
Velvet Chainsaw
JUNE 13, 2018
Now imagine someone asking your conference participants that question. Then they would launch into a passionate description of your event’s annual Party with a Purpose, its pre-conference feel-good community service projects and its ongoing student scholarship fundraisers.
GEVME
MARCH 15, 2019
When you’re in the events industry, you should know the main event management conferences for 2019 so you can visit them to improve your knowledge and share your own experiences of working long hours while trying to pull off amazing corporate events for your clients.
Velvet Chainsaw
JANUARY 30, 2017
Everything we take for granted about conferences, and planning them, faces disruption. Participants from all generations and cultures increasingly expect conferences to mirror their work and personal lives. Savvy conference organizers meet these disruptions head-on.
Velvet Chainsaw
JULY 31, 2018
As conference organizers, we frequently ignore the evidence all around us of what’s working and what’s not. Often our conference planning teams and volunteer advisors follow our lead as we give more precedent to what feels right.
Velvet Chainsaw
JULY 31, 2017
As a conference organizer, how purpose-driven are you? Successful conference organizers are purpose-driven! They design conference experiences that become meaning-making opportunities for their participants. Purpose-Driven Conference Organizers’ Mindset.
Velvet Chainsaw
JANUARY 24, 2018
Who owns the overall experience that customers have at your conference? Who oversees and manages the conference customers’ journey? Or perhaps no one is considering the holistic experience of your conference customer? Do you know what your conference target market customer wants?
Velvet Chainsaw
MARCH 7, 2019
Putting the participant at the center of your conference programming by becoming more learner-centric, that is planning and offering education sessions that go beyond surface learning, is one of the biggest challenges facing conference organizers today.
Velvet Chainsaw
JANUARY 9, 2019
Do your conference learning opportunities—from the general session to networking to breakouts to deep dive workshops—empower registrants to participate in their own learning journey? Or do your conference education sessions motivate participants to see the finish line?
Velvet Chainsaw
JANUARY 11, 2019
So is this the right strategy for your association and conference? A large percentage of student attendees won’t make all of your conference constituents happy. Smaller booth sizes and exhibitor churn tend to be attributes of conferences with high student attendance.
Velvet Chainsaw
SEPTEMBER 16, 2016
Are 50%-80% of your conference attendees in your programming at any given time? One thing is certain, if your conference attendees are not fully engaged in the experience you provide, there is little, if any, chance that they will leave your event with any real ROI.
Velvet Chainsaw
JANUARY 18, 2018
Established, successful conferences have leadership that are usually adept at incrementally improving their event each year. Conference organizers must focus on both their customers’ needs—their pain points and problems to solve—and their aspirations—their wants and professional goals.
Velvet Chainsaw
MARCH 6, 2017
Your real conference competition is not that event held six months after yours. Today’s technology driven, hyper-connected, instant gratification, real-time world puts you as a conference organizer in a difficult position. Have you normalized conference mediocrity as acceptable?
Velvet Chainsaw
JUNE 28, 2018
There is one debt every conference organizer must face and vanquish. It can cripple a conference. Anyone striving to build a 21st century sustainable conference needs to understand organizational debt, how it impacts their event and how to prevent it.
Velvet Chainsaw
JANUARY 26, 2017
Impact on Healthcare Conferences? Here are four questions (and tips) for your conference committee to consider as they navigate this changing landscape: 1. Tip: have each conference committee member reach out to five to ten key attendees to understand their pressing priorities.
Velvet Chainsaw
JULY 18, 2018
Yet deciding to abandon a conference programming element can clear the way for new successful traditions to take hold. It is creating a habit of regularly questioning every conference planning practice and programming component that we currently use.
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