Free is the new black

Photo by kalandrakas

The horrible economic trends as well as the impressive movement of user generated events is challenging the traditional scheme of paid events.

If you charge for your events you may soon be in real trouble. If you charge a lot for your events you are probably already facing tough challenges.

The Economy

Pretty straight forward. There are not enough money to be spent on events as before. Companies buying tickets for your conferences are now hesitating on such expenditure. There is simply not the disposable income there used to be. As simple as that.

The Technology

Online meetings are now preferred to conferences. Linkedin/Xing is now preferred to your 3000£/$/€ networking event.

User Generated Events

Meetups, BarCamps, unconferences and the like are now offering free alternatives to your paid events. Getting together a location and asking people to pay for their drinks is now accepted. Nobody wants to mix any more with sponsors, stalls, banners and so forth. Meetups are run by users and most of them are not sponsored. The conventional infrastructure around events is shaking.

Scarcity

You cannot rely any more on scarcity.

I don’t have to wait for big exhibitions to come along in order to network with top professionals. It’s all coming to my city and for free, possibly on a monthly basis.

Now, how do you deal with that? How do you compete with free, zero, nada, niet, niente?

Innovate

You will soon realize that if you manage events conventionally, the demand will drop sensibly.

Few tips.

If you use social media and social networks, if you know what twitter is, if you integrate sponsors gently and wisely, you will definitely find new ways to engage and make a profit.

If you think this is not going to happen and you feel safe where you are, start reading another blog!

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How to avoid no shows at free events?

Photo by: Jon Curnow

The results of a discussion on how to ensure that people who RSVP‘d yes at your free event do actually turn up.

The intrinsic value of free events

I love free events. What I love even more is free events with free drinks. It seems like I am not the only one. It is getting ridiculously awkward to actually pay to get in.

If you did your homework chances are that you can cover expenses and make a profit just relying on sponsors.

Last week I attended a Trade Show, a Meetup, a Twestival and a Barcamp.

In all of those I got free food and drinks, gadgets and I did the best networking ever.

The next time someone shows up and tells you you need to pay 1000£/$/€ to attend a conference or a networking event, bear in mind you are actually paying for the steering wheel of organizer’s SUV.

One problem

Now, from the organizer perspective, getting sponsors may be relatively easy if you have a good target audience. But making sure the audience actually attends the day of the event, that’s a whole different ballgame.

I noticed at one of the above events that 40+ attendees did not show up. That’s a pity because they excluded at least the same number of people, who eventually got together for a parallel event.

My problem

I’ll be soon organizing a free event. Don’t be curious. It will be on the barcamp concept, which we love so much, but I cannot disclose more than that.

The problem is we got space for 60 people and much bigger forecast demand. We want to make sure that those who RSVP Yes actually turn up.

On a first come basis

It doesn’t work, as simple as that. That’s what was used at the above event and the results were upsetting.

A twitter conversation

I decided to ask my supercool twitter pals about it and here’s the conversation
Read More

Harvest Twestival, definitely impressed

Harvest Twestival was held on the 25th of September for the joy of 220 Twitter people. Here is a short review of the event.

Planning

You could definitely tell that the event was mostly planned via Twitter. I remember logging in on the official website 10 days before the event and there was only two sponsors there. As the event came closer and the community started to be interested, at least 6 more sponsors jumped on board. Impressive.

People

My question before the event was how do you actually make sure that there is a good mix of people attending the event? Will there be 14yrs old kids mixed with Social Media experts in their 50s?

This was the single aspect that impressed me the most. The mix was perfect, I could run into good business contacts, as well as in friends or funny people. The twitter community did definitely defined itself at the event as very energetic, full of great ideas and very sociable. Remarkable.

Location & Logistics

Location was the Doon, a trendy Trafalgar square club. @amandita managed everything smoothly. Free drinks were poured efficiently (maybe too efficiently in my case) and the premises served the purpose. Although some peeps were complaining about the music being to loud, there were areas in the back dedicated to talking with no noise whatsoever.

I think that the logistics really reflected the twitter environment. The “everyone section” where noise is obviously there, but also the “you and your friends” area where things are calmer and deeper talks take place. I suggest this formula for those willing to organize one. Successful.

Treats

Another plus was definitely the raffle (with money donated to charity) and really relevant prizes. Moo was on board and that is very cool if you like to be social. Yummy.

What I did not like

Nothing much, but obviously integrating twitter on a screen with live twits was a must and possibly we’ll see that at next editions. Details count.

Vote:8

P.S. If you don’t use twitter and do not have a clue of what I am talking about, start using it right now, improve your business and internet relationships and feel free to follow me.

Other reviews of the event (thanks Pudding relation for the list):

Pudding Relations
TechCrunch UK
Current TV
Diffusion PR
Huddle
Londonist
Sizemore
Benjamin Ellis
Social PRobiotic
One Size Fits One
Jazamatazz
Richard
This Is Now
Fake Plastic Noodles
The A to E
Toodlepip
Girl About Web

The credit crunch of events

Photo by: Kyle May

The current crisis hitting the financial markets has impacted events. The trend of user generated events is going to shock our market even more.

I already talked about making your event web 2.0 compliant. This is just a part of what needs to be done. There are definitely other trends you need to look at if you are already missing out or if the scenario ahead does not look good. It’s not a case that a popular BarCamp took the challenge and shared their opinion on how they empower the user.

Please answer the following:

Do you work with events, in the same way a product manager approaches a brand portfolio?

Do you feel lost without your event production team?

Is your ROI ridiculously high compared to the resources you use?

Do you run events with scientific committees?

Do you charge astronomic fees to create scarcity, when possibly most of the content discussed is already out there?

If you answered yes to 1 or more, what’s ahead does not look good.
Read More

Keep your tension steady

This post suggests how to manage positive tension in longer events. It is based on Everett Rogers’ Diffusion of Innovation.

If you ever attended a marketing class, course, degree you probably heard of Everett Rogers and his book “Diffusion of Innovations”. He synthesized very well the level of adoption of new products and categorized the adopters in groups. You can see the graph resulting below:

Source: Wikipedia

It is pretty straightforward and gives you great insights about who you will probably deal with at your next event.

Applying Rogers’ Bell Curve to Events Read More