E-venting.net: The blog on Interactive Advertising, Media and Marketing Events

At the Intersection of Social Media and Events is... a Widget

I'm more than just a geek. I'm actually two geeks - an Events geek and a Social Media geek. So when Freewebs asked me to produce a conference for them on Widget Marketing, I happily accepted, and WidgetCon was born.

You've seen widgets - they're those little mini-applications that are all over the social media web: slide shows, games, music playlists, YouTube players, etc. All these are widgets. You probably have some on your own blog.

WidgetCon is about how advertisers can use widgets as a new type of media. Which is interesting and all, and I'm doing the programming for it. But what's more interesting (at least to this audience I trow) is the widget we created for the conference:

Introducing the world's first Conference Registration Widget:

Here's what it does:

• WidgetCon is by invitation only. If you’re invited, the WidgetCon widget will confirm your RSVP based on your email address. It's linked to a database on the backend with invitees' info, so it recognizes you.
• But that’s not all – you can also use the widget to custom design your conference badge for WidgetCon. You can even upload a picture which will display on the website (but not on the actual badge - we opted to keep it only online because of resolution quality concerns)
  
• “Attendees” on the widget displays a slide show of all the RSVP’ed attendees and their custom badges. It's a list of who you'll be able to network with, and a photo album of badges combined.
• And if you have colleagues who are not yet invited, they can request an invitation using the widget. Their info and badge design go into the database until their request is reviewed. Clicking a box on the database backend accepts their invite and adds their badge to the "Attendees" slide show.
• It also pushes out updated content. We chose to include tabs with the Agenda and Speaker list, but could easily have included one with a RSS feed to the show blog, so all updates were pushed in real-time to the widget. And yes, if we elect to stream live video from the conference, we can do that through the widget as well.
• Finally, like all widgets, you can easily post it to any blog, profile page or website.

We put the WidgetCon Widget into a WidgetCon website, but it's also distributed all over the web. And that's its magic, really - distributed content. Wherever it shows up online - on this blog, on speakers' blogs, on ad agencies' corporate intranets, whatever - the entire conference has a presence there, not just an ad banner and a link. It tells a pretty complete picture of what the event looks like, invites interactivity, and encourages participation. And because the event is on Widget Marketing, it's naturally an ideal proof-of-concept of the show topic.

But it's also something I can see show producers getting behind no matter what their focus is.

So try it - monkey around with it, turn it over in your head, even put it on your own sites if you want by simply clicking on the "Get This!" button. Would love to hear your thoughts.

Cause Related Initiatives

So it's officially 'Holiday Season' again, the time of year when the call to do-some-good-in-the world is a little louder and more frequent than usual. But this year to me feels a little different - like more people are listening, and accepting the invitation. Maybe it's just me and a case of Yellow VW Beetle Syndrome (once you notice one, you suddenly see them everywhere), but it seems like a bigger movement than ever this season.

I could list a dozen examples, but will refer specifically to what Shop.org is doing with Cyber Monday. They coined the term a couple of years ago to designate the online equivalent of 'Black Friday' - the day after Thanksgiving that officially kicks off holiday shopping, and on which retailers move from the red to the black for the year. Cyber Monday is the following Monday - Today - and is the day that traditionally posts huge online shopping numbers. Largely a PR initiative, Cyber Monday was created to call some attention to the rise in e-commerce and certainly to position it among shoppers as a stress-free alternative to mall madness.

But what's interesting this year is that Shop.org has coupled the initiative with a cause. CyberMonday.com is an online mall created by Shop.org which features deals by over 400 retailers. Shop.org receives a commission for everything sold through the mall, and the commissions all drop straight into the Ray M. Greenly Scholarship Fund. Ray worked at Shop.org until a battle with cancer ultimately claimed his life. The scholarship was set up in his memory, and funds students embarking on Interactive Marketing and E-Commerce careers.

Shop.org is a former client of mine, so when Scott Siverman (Shop.org Executive Director) asked me to mention the initiative here, naturally I wanted to comply. Apologies if it's off-topic a bit, but I'll try to tie it back here:

1. If you've got some holiday shopping to do, start at www.cybermonday.com.
2. Consider a cause-related initiative to your next event. Not because you can legitimately ask bloggers to write about it, but because you could actually do some good in the process.

Squeezing Ever More Productivity from your Speaking Gig

Congratulations. You were invited, accepted or otherwise negotiated for a speaking role at an upcoming conference. Obviously, you're going to do some preparation to make sure you know the topic and are prepared to make the most of your stage time. But to take full advantage of the opportunity speakers need to realize that what the audience in their sessions hear them say is just a fraction of the value they can gain from an event. Here's how to take a wide-angle view of your next gig in order to squeeze as much value as possible out of it:

• Your role as a speaker begins the day you learn of the gig, and ends when the conference producer dies. Your audience are the people peering at you on stage, but your principal consituency is the person who put you on stage in the first place. As soon as you've landed a gig, do whatever you can to help promote the event for the producer, including blogging about it, issuing press releases, inviting your clients personally, etc. Want to make a huge impression? Negotiate a co-op ad buy with the conference producer to run banners about your session on the conference website or elsewhere online. Why? Because good speakers possess two very distinct attributes: they do a great job on stage, and they make the conference producer's job a little easier. Add value at every step - instead of requiring maintenance - and you're a shoe-in for the producer's next event as well. And the one after that, and after that.
• Prepare an exclusive announcement. Maybe your session will have 50 people in it, maybe 500. Either way, it's a bigger audience than who reads your press releases, which you probably deliberate over for days and limit only to the biggest news. And since many attendees (and fellow speakers) blog about the events they're at, each pair of ears is attached to its own amplifier, just like the press. Only they've wilfully selected to come and hear you, and in doing so are hoping you'll reward them with some fresh, new, unique, exclusive announcement, piece of data, case study, or witty epigram. Let them down at your own peril.
• Treat your fellow panelists like your best customers. Even if you're a CEO and you're seated on the panel next to an Assistant Manager. Remember that anyone in the audience evaluating you as a potential partner is doing so based in part on what your company offers, and also in part on what kind of partner you personally will be. There's room for controversy and some adversity on stage, but never at the expense of graciousness. I've seen too often a speaker attack his fellow panelists and clearly win each micro debate both on merits and on volume, only to end up alienating himself in the process. And I've got the audience feedback forms to prove it. (This advice comes from me in my trade marketing consultant hat, not my conference producer hat: a villian makes for a great session. But don't expect to play the villian if you're my client.)
• Be in the audience, as well as on stage. 2 reasons for this: (1) There are likely dozens of really interesting speakers from remarkable companies at the same event. It's highly probable that you will learn something and find someone you want to do business with. (2) It's important to remember what it's like to be in the audience when you're on stage yourself. Identify what makes a session valuable to you (data points, strong opinions, epigrammatic wit, organic and authentic conversation) and what bores you (pitches, self-promotion, universal consensus, session time wasted on intros and background). Keep all of it in mind when it's your turn.
• Send a Thank You note to the producer. Don't you dare call this self-evident. It's not. I programmed a show a few months ago with no fewer than 170 speakers, each of whom I was in personal contact with leading up to the event. The show was a blockbuster success, with 2500+ attendees and full rooms in every session. And I did get some thank-you notes afterwards: 2 of them. Out of 170 speakers. Remember, the person who puts you on stage is doing you a favor, not the other way around.
• Your word is your bond. Understandably, conflicts come up and speakers must drop out. But drop out with less than 2 weeks before the show and no matter how passionately you adhere to all the points above, you just made the List. Oh, and remember that you are not your company. If you do drop out, you should absolutely offer up a replacement from your company or elsewhere - but don't simply assume that your speaking role is transferable to someone else. You think more of yourself than that, don't you?

9/11: Remembering Danny Lewin

On September 11, 2001 I had just begun running Events for Jupiter Media Metrix, after working with the company for a couple of years as an analyst. The first show scheduled that I was responsible for was on Web Technologies in San Francisco, on September 12, 2001.

Danny Lewin, Founder and CTO of Akamai Technologies, was the keynote for that conference. He was on board one of the planes from Boston that struck the World Trade Center.

I never met Danny but think of him a lot, especially in September. I'm thinking about him today.

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The Daniel Lewis Science Scholarship Fund now exists to provide scholarships to students pursuing degrees in science. Contributions in Danny's name can be made at:

Hale and Dorr Capital Management LLC
60 State Street
Boston, MA 02109
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Why You'll Lose if You Compete on Content

I came to a discouraging conclusion yesterday when talking to one of my clients about marketing their conferences. They want to stay on the high road and be known for having the best content in their industry. In fact, the main reason they hired me was to achieve for them exactly that - Rule by Content.

The trouble is, I can't give it to them. My principal job with show producers is to help them create the best possible content at their shows, and use this superior content as a meaningful point of differentiation against competitors. And I'm unable to do it.

I'm not one for shirking responsibilities, but I don't think my failure is entirely my fault. I think you can't win on content. Why? Because there is nothing unique about one show's content over another. Sure, sessions can have more interesting titles and precise panel composition, and program directors can use feedback forms vigilantly to weed out poor speakers and re-engage stars. But there's nothing you can labor and sweat over that your rival can't simply copy, and quickly. I've programmed shows with 4-tracks and 20+ sessions in two months. If I'm nimble and connected (which I am), I can skim the cream off any show out there and stir it into mine. And launch before the shows I'm poaching from.

I don't do this, of course. But the way conferences within an industry work with and against each other almost ensures that the content is about the same. You see, programmers select their speakers and content from a few different sources:

1. Speaker and Session Proposals
2. Sponsors who buy their way in
3. Past experience

But all of these sources draw from finite and duplicated pools of potential speakers. Any company sponsoring your show (2) is also sponsoring your competitors' shows, and buying their way as speakers into all of them. For many companies, it's cheaper and more reliable than a PR firm retainer. And your past experience (3) is comprised of who you've seen speak and speak well at your shows. Think they got to be good speakers only speaking at your shows? Even speaker proposals (1), which are often the best source for finding speakers and companies not heavily on the circuit can backfire. When they submit to your show, you can be sure that the exact same proposal (or a near copy) is going to rival programmers. Believing that you're the only one who sees the potential in this speaker or company or topic is to underestimate your competitors, which is foolish. If you invite them in, know that your rivals will too.

I'm almost using "speakers" to be synonomous with "content"' and that's not entirely fair. They're very different to the people who attend the shows and diligently sit through the sessions. But the vast majority of people who learn about your show through your marketing will equate content with speakers. If they've seen that list of speakers before, they're likely to believe it's the same old thing they've heard before. It's rare when you hear a conferee remark, "Oh, she's speaking in that session? I saw her at a show last month. She was great. I'll go see her again." Instead it's, "Nah, already know what she has to say. I'm gonna go into the lobby and make some calls."

I've thought for a long time on this next point, and it's almost too simplistic to be true, but I believe it:

The only meaningful point of differentation a conference can achieve is through networking. Everything else is the absence of a negative.

When I was a Marketing Manager at a Fortune 500 company about 10 years ago, I was proud to be able to tell my then-boss that I was working towards my MBA part-time. Satisfied but unimpressed he remarked, "an MBA is the absence of a negative." What he meant was that you didn't get points for having one, but you'd lose points if you didn't. It was a cost of doing business in marketing departments then.

I don't mean to discourage everyone who toils and tears over all aspects of show production - operations, programming, sponsorship sales, vendor liaison, and on and on. I've done it all and I know these functions are important. But only inasmuch as they don't give the audience a reason not to come back. Nobody will rave about your show if they're sped quickly and efficiently through registration, but if they have to wait 30 minutes to get their badge it will color their whole experience. And I've never seen a response on a feedback form inquiring into the attendees' favorite things about the conferece, "The chairs in the general session were super comfy!" But make someone who spent $1100 stand in the back because you over sold (or under set) and you may have lost them for good.

Sadly, I believe the same thing holds true with content. If it's the same pool of speakers on similar topics, how can it not?

But there is a perception that content at one show is better than another, and here's how that happens, and what you can do to put your content's best foot forward:

• Manage expectations. The greatest disappointment I've heard from conferees is not that the content isn't any good, but it's that it's not what they were expecting to hear. Make certain that the speakers discuss the topic exactly as it's presented to the audience. Your attendees are evaluating not what they hear in an absolute sense, but what they hear relative to what they expected to hear, even if it's less interesting to you. It's like when you bet on the ponies - if you bet a horse to Show (come in third place or better), you win more if that horse comes in third than you do if he wins. (I'm conservative - I always bet to show.)
• Remember my blog, E-venting.net. This is an absurdly narrow blog on a topic important only to a few hundred people in the whole world (most of whom seem to be in Canada, strangely). But you're one of them, and you're reading it. And the reason you are is because I'm producing the content I'm uniquely qualified to produce, and letting the audience for it (however small) find me. When you program your shows, be very conscious of as narrow an audience as you can. If you want 1000 people to come to your show, and try to find topics relevant to all 1000, you'll be so watered down that you'll get 200 if you're lucky, and send them all away unsatisfied. This means conscious segmentation, and swallowing the bitter pill which is the realization that you can't program a show for everyone in your industry. You can't. There is too much diversity of company type, company size, seniority or tenure, functional responsibility and domain expertise. No matter what industry you're in. What's that? You run a show now that brings in all those people? Harvest it, now. As your audience becomes increasingly demanding for specific content and interactions in all channels, there's no place to go but down from where you are.
• Start, but don't finish, conversations from the stage. I would have put this in the point above about the blog, if I had enough comments here to make a point. Many programmers think their objective is to create ALL the show's content. It's not. They should be focused more on catalyzing conversations than wrapping up points nicely at the end of a session. Good blogs do this, where a post of 200 words spurs conversations in the comments of several thousand words. I don't know what the right ratio is for conferences, but it sure isn't 50 minutes of panel discussion / 10 minutes of audience Q&A. Let your conferees take some responsibility for what they came to learn - they'll do a better job than you can, and cement their loyalty to the show in the process. Think of this: let's say you run a 45-minute session on 'Best Practices and Case Studies in Hoozenfaffer Ubbaglub,' a topic of particular interest to your attendees given the pending Hoozen legislation. And let's say that in your 45-minute session, each of your 3 presenters sucks. And by "sucks" I mean that they're good, but not rock stars (because that's "sucks" means to someone paying $1100 to be there and taking 2 days off from work). Session ends; grumbling audience files out, complaining of wasting 45 minutes. Now let's say that instead of going to the next session, there is a 45-minute structured peer networking session on the exact same topic, where everyone joins tables of fellow conferees and even the speakers to vet the session topics. Even if someone says, "Well that sucked. I didn't learn anything. Here's what I know about Hoozie-Ubb..." and someone else says, "I agree that it sucked. But I disagree with what you just said because..." Suddenly the content as catalyst has redeemed the time invested.

So you see why I think the networking is the most important part. But it shouldn't be separate from the content, as it usually is. It's not the 45-minute break in the exhibit hall, or the cocktail party in the club that's so loud and social that you feel like a jackass by even asking someone, "So how do you handle your Hoozie-Ubb situation?"

The other point I'd make about networking is that it's a quality game, not quantity. If 200 of my peers are at a conference, mixed in with 800 people who aren't, I suppose I can find someone like-minded, though it's no guarantee. But if I have lunch next to one person who has a really provocative point of view and inspires my work in some way, then the conference is worth it.

I believe the show producer's objective is to facilitate that serendipitous meeting, not obviate the need for it.

Speaker Self Promotion = Symbiotic Conference Promotion

My friend Rob Leathern over at AnalystBlog.com is needling Plaxo for a press release that promotes their speaking role at an upcoming conference.

I agree with Rob that it's a crummy topic for a press release. It's certainly not anything any member of the press would be interested in, and seems to belie a gross misunderstanding of trade marketing vehicles - particularly for a Web 2.0 company like Plaxo. In fact, it's almost as if the CEO came out of his office and proudly declared, "I'm speaking at a conference!" to which his assistant snidely remarked, "I'll alert the media." And then did just that.

But...

As foolish as it makes Plaxo's PR department look, the conference producer - Supernova - is likely thrilled with their efforts. If each speaker at a conference promotes their role through their own channels - whether Press Releases or blogs or client / prospect newsletters - it can create a veritable groundswell of mindshare for the show itself, boosting Search Engine results, building relevance for the show's brand and assets, increasing the authority for everything related to the show. This translates into more attendees, happier sponsors, greater coverage of the event itself, and on and on.

So if you're speaking at a conference and you want to be invited to speak at additional conferences, by all means talk about it, blog about it, shout it from the rooftops in every way short of issuing a clumsy press release about it (Rob's right - the reputation liability isn't worth the payoff, which is tiny) - knowing that your primary audience is not your audience, but the show producers themselves.

I'll even go a step further and say that while promoting your involvement at a conference today makes you a more valuable speaker/partner, it's going to quickly become the cost of doing business in the conference biz, and failing to do so in the very near future could get a speaker blackballed.

UPDATE 6/28/06:
Tim Bourquin over at New Media and Tradeshow Startup just called my attention to his post from yesterday, where he rants a bit about what NOT to do if you're a prospective speaker. It's definitely worth a read. Subscribe to Tim's blog (like I just did) so you don't get this day-old second-hand perspective from me.

Dos And Don’ts For Your Next Annual Sales Meeting

A few weeks back I wrote an article for MediaPost entitled "Dos And Don’ts For Your Next Annual Sales Meeting." Have a look at the article on MediaPost for the full text, but here are the 8 tips:

DO's:

• Do kick off with a provocative keynote speaker who can speak to some of the biggest issues in the industry - especially, forward-looking issues.
• Do program the event to include lots of networking. Consumer-generated content exists offline as well; creating a context for dialogue, and letting your salespeople learn from each other, can be highly profitable.
• Do invite partners and vendors to attend, and even exhibit at the event. Giving your sales force firsthand en-masse access to rich media, research, measurement and other partners is expedient to both you and your partners, and gives everyone more depth in your offerings.
• Do budget appropriately for the event. A two-day conference at a major hotel can easily run $500/per person, and is rarely less than $250 per person. In addition to your staff travel expenses, your budget should allocate for everything from venue and food and beverage, to A/V, on-site signage and collateral, shipping, photography or videography, Internet connectivity, gratuities, even speaker honorariums. Sound like a lot? Calculate the cost of taking your sales force off the street for a day or two, and it's easily justified.

DONT's:

• Don't think of the event as having "mandatory attendance." Maybe it does, but if you program it that way, you'll fulfill the event's promise of being an "insipid time suck." Program a show you'd take a day or two out of your schedule to attend yourself.
• Don't limit speakers to your own executives, or even to the sell-side. Round out your agenda with every perspective that might contribute to a more productive and valuable event.
• Don't focus exclusively on sales force education or professional development. An annual sales conference is a powerful way to solidify internal culture while transferring knowledge throughout the organization.
• Don't invite clients. No matter how much work you put into the agenda and the environment, all attention is lost if there's media budget in the room. Make the day about your sales staff, and keep the dialogue with them wide-open.

Very few events are aimed at the sell-side, placing an enormous educational burden on the Annual Sales Meeting. Many of the heads of sales I've spoken with see this project as hazardous duty, or the cost of doing business in a sales organization. Instead, I think it's immensely valuable and a huge opportunity - with the same potential as any other industry event.

Writing Better Speaker Proposals (especially if you're a Vendor)

If you're a vendor or technology partner or someone else on the 'sell-side,' speaker proposals are a critical part of your events strategy. And if you're in interactive media, marketing or commerce, your Events Strategy should be a critical part of your overall trade communications program.

I read a lot of Speaker Proposals (and also write them for clients) - probably about 200 in the past 12 months alone. Based on what I find most compelling, here are a few tips to help you get your next speaker proposal accepted:

1. Format your Format: Take a look at the previous agendas for the show you're submitting for to determine what session format is most popular. Is it all panel discussions? Heavy with solo presentations? Vendor / Client case studies? If a show is predominantly roundtable discussions (like the OMMA events), a 45-minute speech by your CEO will simply never get accepted - no matter how topical or relevant you think it is. Play to the odds by submitting a format you know your target show works with. And increase your odds by submitting several formats if the agenda mixes it up.

2. Empathize with your Show Producer: Feel their pain. Figure out what's the hardest part of what they do and submit a proposal that makes their jobs easier. For most of the shows I'm involved in, the hard part is recruiting great speakers for a must-include topic. A submission that nails a topic squarely AND includes pre-confirmed speakers really streamlines a show producer's job.

3. Choose your Moderator like a Show Producer, not a Vendor. Vendors shouldn't be moderators; they should be panelists alongside their clients. This is likely counter-intuitive, as almost every vendor proposal I get includes the vendor as the moderator of a roundtable of clients. But vendors probably have a broader perspective on the topic than most of the panelists, and a better session will take advantage of that perspective. Instead, line up as a moderator someone the show producer would want to have as a moderator anyway - an industry analyst, consultant, journalist, or even a well-known agency exec or client with a particular affinity to the topic. Not only will this increase your chances of getting accepted (because the session will look less like a vendor-submitted session and includes a more well-rounded speaker lineup); it will also better position you during the  session. Not only is an industy expert leading a discussion on a topic highly relevant to your business - they've (seemingly) invited you to join the conversation.

4. Don't merely propose. Instead, Converse. Sure, you can guess what the show producer is looking for by examining past agendas, going to the show, reading blogs to see what sessions and speakers generated strong feedback. Or you can ask the show producer directly what they're looking for and how you can help. It may very well be that the interests your company represents won't be addressed at all at the show, in which case you've saved yourself some time but still made more headway with the show than you would have by submitting a session blindly.

5. Remember your Ulterior Motive: Goodwill. Your principal objective is to get your session accepted and secure a speaking spot for yourself or your colleague or client. But know this - of the 200 or so submissions I reviewed within the past year, fewer than 20 were accepted wholesale. 10%. Since those are your odds, you need a back-up strategy: build goodwill with the show producer. If you / your client is attending the show anyway, say so. (Especially if he/she is paying to attend.) Mention that you're promoting the show on the corporate blog and inviting clients and partners to meet up there. Offer to help secure a client as a speaker for a separate topic even if there's no role for you or your executive. All of this goes a long way towards building a relationship with the show producer, and helps in future efforts.

Have any other tips that have worked for you? Please share them in the comments.

Updated 6-8-06:

6. Propose only what you're Uniquely Qualified to Present On: It may be a great topic, and it may be perfect for the show. But if there are a dozen or more other companies who could present the same thing, there's no reason for a show producer to choose you. In fact, they'll probably just harvest your idea and fine someone more relevant to present. For your submission to stand out, it should be on a topic that's both relevant to this audience AND one which you're Uniquely Qualified to present. Often, this combination simply doesn't exist (a big reason why 90% of proposals are rejected).