Conference Content Makes a Comeback

When I was hired by Frost & Sullivan in 1999, I was the only full time conference programming person in the events division. I was based in the old 90 West Street office which was populated primarily by salespeople - sponsorship sales, delegate sales (aka "seat sales") and account executives who sold Frost's research products.

There was alot of dot.com excitement in the air, particularly when the sponsorship group confirmed key title sponsors for an event that was to be called "Internet Marketing Strategies Conference and Exhibition." A rapidly growing list of sponsors and exhibitors, most of whom I had never heard of, were salivating at the opportunity to be a part of this program. More sponsorship sales managers were hired to return phone and email inquiries from interested vendors who were ready to write $25,000 checks with the understanding that they would have a speaking opportunity. As the program content expert, I was invited to participate on conference calls with my sales guys and a representative from interested potential sponsors (usually a marketing person). If I confirmed a speaking slot for the vendor, they wrote the check. I confirmed lots of speaking slots and the conference division collected checks totalling hundreds of thousands of dollars.

In the meantime, I was working late to finalize the agendas and speaker rosters for two conferences that were to occur before "Internet Marketing Strategies." When I had the time to work on IMS, I did some market research to create an agenda around the speakers we had confirmed. Ultimately that conference made lots of money (for all of us involved), but the delegate evaluations were less than glowing. Overcrowded panels. I got complaints from the delegate sales guys who said that their clients wanted fewer vendors on the program. Still, my schedule was filling up with sponsor conference calls to discuss speaking opportunities on upcoming programs. More sponsor sales people were hired.

Then the dot.com boom went bust and the conference industry suffered accordingly. Sponsor sales people disappeared as quickly as they appeared. But the Frost conference division leveraged this market downturn to focus on program content as a competitive differentiator.

We introduced a new highly interactive "executive summit" format. Vendors were no longer confirmed for general session speaking opportunties. Instead we created intereactive breakout sessions which were to be led by a select group of sponsoring vendors. I worked on the breakout topics with the sponsor, and we developed and enforced a strict set of guidelines to insure that these breakout sessions fostered highly interactive and informed discussions among the delegates.

I encouraged breakout sponsors to think very carefully about who from their organization to tap as "facilitator" (not "moderator" as labels are important and have nuanced meaning with respect to roles and delegate expectations). With many tech/software companies, their reflex was to nominate a senior level sales/business development executive--which worked only if that executive was also comfortable wearing consultant's shoes. One of the first questions I would ask potential breakout sponsors was "Can you tell me a little about the ongoing consultative relationship you have with your clients?"

The sales team sought to seed each breakout session with "thoughtleaders," i.e. practitioners who held positions of influence in Fortune 500 corporations. These thought-leaders were encouraged to stimulate informed discussion at the breakout of their choice. There were event marketing benefits as well. Thoughtleaders were featured in the conference brochure which served to reinforce the interactive nature of the breakouts and the conference in general.

Frost & Sullivan sponsorship revenue plateaued and dipped in alignment with the conference industry trend, but there was an upward spike in delegate approval ratings which was due to the quality of the program content (which featured case studies in addition to interactive sessions.) Sponsors were happy because they were interacting directly with prospects who were most interested in what they had to say. Stated more directly, the Frost executive summits enabled informed discussion on timely topics by speakers, sponsors and highly engaged practitioners in a specific vertical market or business discipline. In my view, it was during this period that Frost & Sullivan became known for producing great events on a consistent basis.

This focus on quality program content is a winning formula that will withstand the ups and downs of sponsorship investment. The decline and disappearance of many trade shows is --in part--a cautionary sign about an over-reliance on sponsorship revenue. Conference producers and associations that can consistently get the right people talking about the right issues are best positioned to optimize revenue (sponsorship and seat sales) in any economic climate.