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7 Great Conference Strategies

Try these seven tactics to move your conference sessions from good to great

By Heather Kirkwood

What separates great conferences from mediocre ones isn’t always the technological gimmicks, fancy hotel or generous speaker budget. Instead, what makes any conference — from the executive roundtable for 30 to the multi-track mega 

conference for thousands — more useful and memorable for attendees is the extra attention to the staples of conference planning. Here are seven simple ways to make the biggest impact at your next conference. 

Choose the best conference planner 

Savvy attendees are no longer content with watching industry gurus give a PowerPoint presentation followed by a question-and-answer session. Today’s conference-goer has access to chat rooms, e-mail lists, video conferencing, online courses and applications that allow collaboration between co-workers worlds apart — all of which compete with the traditional conference session as ways to learn, interact with new people and take information back to co-workers. Couple these pressures with high travel costs and the critical corporate budget eye, and attendees want more than lectures and awkward coffee breaks.

What makes your conference better than all these options? Do you have access to the financial and intellectual resources, and do you have the time to keep up? Or is your attention really on selling exhibit space, negotiating vendor contracts and handling show logistics? 

If your educational sessions will inevitably play second fiddle to the show, consider either hiring someone to oversee the conference or outsourcing responsibility for identifying hot topics, recruiting and coaching speakers, and keeping attendees engaged. If your show isn’t already linked to a magazine, partnering with an industry publication is one way to ensure that the conference organizer truly knows your attendees and their needs. If there are several publications available, ask each to submit partnership proposals. 


Don’t plan by committee, consult by committee

While gathering the best minds in the industry isn’t a bad idea, says Colman Finkel, President of The Colman Center and the author of Powerhouse Conferences: Eliminating Audience Boredom, some organizers rely too much on committees. “The problem is that typically one or two people have dominant personalities and influence the other committee members,” says Finkel. “That can result in a skewed view of your industry’s needs.” 

Instead, Finkel recommends combing industry publications and rival or related conference prospectuses. But most importantly, talk to the audience. If you can’t afford an in-depth survey, spend time working the phones. 

For example, if you’re planning a conference track addressing sales issues, call industry sales reps and ask them open-ended questions:
• What are the three biggest obstacles you encounter when selling? 
• What three objections are hardest to overcome? 
• Which industry trends are impacting your sales the most? 

Take what you learn, coupled with your research, and then use the committee to refine ideas. Try talking to committee members separately and then as a group to keep your ideas well-rounded. 

And if you want an inexpensive way to survey potential attendees, several show managers have used a Web-basedsystem to conduct polls. Learn more at www.zoomerang.com. 


Choose the right facility

Conference sessions, just like the show floor, are about drama — the sense of theater that transports attendees away from their routine and renews their professional minds. Analyze how the environment surrounding your sessions will contribute to the experience. 

Karen Chupka, Vice President of Events and Conferences for the Consumer Electronics Association, chooses a different venue for her upscale executive conferences than she would for a larger industry-wide event. “We think about the kind of brand we want to create for each event,” she says. “If we want to create something known for being exclusive, we’ll hold it in an exclusive location. It adds to the image and experience we want to create.” 

Even if exclusivity isn’t your goal, subtle things have a large impact on how attendees learn — such as room temperature, lighting, even seating types. See the sidebar on page 84 for tips on selecting a facility for your event.

Find, or train, good speakers

If you’ve got the luxury of hiring speakers, be demanding. If, however, like many show managers you must recruit non-professional speakers from your industry, help them present well. 

Speakers must teach, not just talk. Learning styles vary. Some people learn by seeing information, others learn from hearing it and still others have to “do” or physically interact with information to absorb it. Good presentations offer something for everyone, which means avoiding what teachers call “chalk and talk.”

Explain to your speakers that the average presenter can hold an audience’s attention for 20 to 30 minutes. A good speech, as well as visual aids, are necessary, but ask speakers to create an activity that lets attendees interact with the information they’re learning. Suggest case study discussions, problem-solving exercises or group efforts to create diagrams representing the information just given. 

Check with speakers before the event. Ask them to submit outlines far enough in advance to allowfor tweaking. Make sure the speaker’s approach matches what you’ve promised attendees. If you’ve asked presenters to plan activities, arrange a time to briefly discuss their plans to ensure they’re feasible and appropriate. 

Lastly, allow plenty of time for questions. Not everyone is comfortable asking questions in a large group, so let attendees pass note cards to the front or use a wireless microphone instead of walking to a floor mic. 


Prepare attendees

Most people wouldn’t pay thousands of dollars to take a college course, then never prepare for class. Why, then, do we expect attendees to simply show up and absorb information with no forethought or preparation? 

Instead, help them come prepared to really hear the speaker. Don’t get so cute with session titles and descriptions, or so carried away with marketing hype, that the brochure doesn’t reflect the content.

Help attendees start thinking about the conference topics in advance. At the recent Continuing Medical Education Leadership Conference, held at Duke University in Durham, NC, Dr. Joe Green, Associate Dean of Continuing Medical Education, asked attendees to write a short essay about why they wanted to attend his conference. What professional challenges did they hope to address? This meant attendees had to evaluate their own goals before they arrived. 

During the conference, attendees were encouraged to refer back to their essays. When sessions broke into groups, they were encouraged to share the challenge statements with one another and devise take-home strategies. The statements were shared with speakers beforehand to help them better prepare for the audience. Green plans to follow up with his attendees in several months to see if they’ve implemented what they learned and, if not, what obstacles they’ve encountered. 

At your next conference, ask for short goal and challenge statements on registration forms. Or, provide a short “worksheet” in registration packetsthat attendees could complete ahead of time and carry with them throughout the conference. 

Ask speakers to prepare more than handouts

Handouts that outline what was covered in the session are always a good idea, but attendees need something more. Kip Eads, Director of Programs for IAEM, suggests giving attendees materials they can use in their day-to-day work. “The day of the long, drawn-out handout is over,” she says. Two popular examples from past IAEM meetings: A “top five” question card listing the five most important questions that should be included in an RFP and a pocket-sized guide to negotiating. 

Network, network, network

Help attendees use time at the conference better by helping them network. Many higher-end conferences publish lists of attendees with bios and contact information. While this may not be feasible for larger conferences, try setting up a place on your Web site where attendees can post messages before, during and after the conference. Encourage them to arrange their own meetings during breaks, lunches or evening free time. For example, an attendee with a specific production line problem could post his challenge and invite other attendees to join him for a drink to trade ideas. Try providing electronic or old-fashioned bulletin boards onsite so attendees have a central place to post such messages. 

Heather Kirkwood is Senior Editor of EXPO magazine. She can be reached at hkirkwood@expoweb.com.