Twitter users trend older than you think

The New York Times has an article all marketers need to read:  “Who’s Driving Twitter’s Popularity?  Not Teens”.

Did you think that Twitter was primarily a tool for young people to stay in touch?

Actually, only 11% of the Twitter user base is 11 – 17.  Young people don’t need it.  They got hooked on MySpace and FaceBook before Twitter was invented and see no use for it.  They want to stay in touch with friends, not the masses of anonymity in the Twitterverse.

There are two interesting ideas in this.  The first is that it turns the accepted notion that technology trends always start in the young on its head.

The notion that children are essential to a new technology’s success has proved to be largely a myth.

Second, that we marketers need to be more analytical in our thinking about new media.  How many event producers are missing out on key technology trends because they think they are only for the young, and aren’t being used by their demographic?  The worst error in marketing is to project from ourselves.

Though Twitter’s founders originally conceived of the site as a way to stay in touch with acquaintances, it turns out that it is better for broadcasting ideas or questions and answers to the outside world or for marketing a product. It is also useful for marketing the person doing the tweeting, a need few teenagers are attuned to. “Many people use it for professional purposes — keeping connected with industry contacts and following news,” said Evan Williams, Twitter’s co-founder and chief executive. “Because it’s a one-to-many network and most of the content is public, it works for this better than a social network that’s optimized for friend communication.”

Forget what you thought about Twitter.  The fact is that its main purpose is to connect like-minded groups of people to discuss areas they have in common.  Hm.  Sounds a lot like an event.  But year-long.

 

MPI experiments with a virtual event

Congratulations to Meeting Professionals International for the leadership shown in extending their July World Education Congress (WEC) with a virtual event. Not only did it allow MPI to distribute access to some content and exhibitors to those who did not attend, or continued access to those who did, but, as an event organization, it provided information and an example to their membership.

The decisions they made in how they did this exemplify the issues we all face in facing this new opportunity. What to charge for? How much to charge? Will it cannibalize existing attendance? What to put online and what not to?

Similar questions marketers face with every new technology.

There are no perfect answers, and we should not wait for them. We’ll only figure out best practice by diving in,  making the best judgments we can, and comparing notes.

Some of MPI’s decisions:

• The full $625 access pass for the physical event includes the virtual event. (Good call.)
• The Virtual Access Pass was $299. (About half price.  Logical.)
• The General Assembly alone was $19. (Hm.  I’d be inclined to make this one free.)
• The virtual event is open for six months.  (I bet this is partly to allow a down time between ‘events’ to build interest for the following year.

I don’t have their attendance figures.  Generally the combo physical and online events this year have seen similar attendance figures to what they expected without a virtual event (down slightly from 2008), but a much higher total combined audience.

Did it cannibalize attendance?  No way to prove it one way or the other, but it certainly did not create a major dip in physical attendance that hurt the event.

Every survey says that people prefer the physical event: and some simply can’t make it whether you offer the alternative or not.

 

Interactive meeting tool

There is a real trend toward adding interactivity to conferences…from encouraging Q&A to whiteboarding, breaking out into table-sized discussion groups, or giving the attendees a specific problem to solve.

But for some meetings, the interactivity is not simply a learning tool. Or an opportunity to contribute to the industry.

Sometimes it is the whole point of a meeting.

Like when a company is rolling out a new strategy or vision, and needs immediate employee feedback–both to improve the vision and to ensure full buy-in.

The June issue of Convene includes the article Faster Feedback, highlighting the abilities CoVision’s meeting software.  The idea is that after the presentation, each table group discusses the ideas presented, while a table moderator captures the key points on a networked PC.  A “theme team” 3-4 people who are skilled at seeing trends in responses, synthesize the collected ideas into a usable summary that quickly goes back to the presenter.  After a break the full group is already discussing how to modify or act on the original ideas.

Interesting that CoVision takes the automation only as far as it logically goes, but no farther.  Some day you can imagine pattern-recognition software replacing the 3-4 people in the theme team.  But I  would worry about whether that was an advantage.

It can be daunting to manage the process of really getting feedback from a large group.  In this case, Q&A would not get you there…and how many companies have decided that a lack of Q&A when they rolled out a new strategy meant that everyone was on board…to disastrous results.

This reminds us…there is no excuse not to get the group feedback.  There are tools to help.

 

Attracting and engaging VIP attendees

The very most qualified attendees at our events are the ones invited by our sponsors: their customers and prospects.  Our sponsors have lists we don’t have access to, and a relationship that enhances response from them.

The trick has always been, “How do we entice, exhort, encourage, enlist our sponsors/exhibitors to invite their customers to our event?”

Certainly the first step is to create a comprehensive kit to make it easy for the exhibitor: banner ads of various sizes, email templates, “I’m exhibiting at” web and print ad tiles, postcards, etc.

I haven’t seen contests that reward this activity work (tell me if you have!).

The best I’ve done is provide my best offer to my sponsors/exhibitors, so that they are offering their customers something of value.  “Because I am inviting you, you get a better deal than anyone else.”  Make your client a hero.

But here is an even better idea, copied verbatim from Travis Stanton’s editorial in the June issue of Exhibitor Magazine:

TechTextil The highlight of this event for the industrial-textile industry was a VIP Buyer’s Lounge with refreshments, meeting spaces, etc. All of the show’s exhibitors are encouraged to nominate their top clients and prospects for this special status, and show management selects and alerts the VIPs of the amenities they are thereby entitled to at the show. What a great way to make big spenders feel extra special on site.

I would simply tweak TechTextil’s program into an attendee marketing promotion.  Simply include these benefits in the templates you give the exhibitors for their invitations.  Limit how many people each sponsor can bring into the program.  NOT because you want to be exclusive, though you might.  But because by appearing exclusive, you add value to the program, and more sponsors will participate.

 

Case Study: Twitter at a Conference

Time Magazine just published the best description I’ve seen for the power of using Twitter at a conference.  (Scroll down to the heading: The Open Conversation.)

At first, all these tweets came from inside the room and were created exclusively by conference participants tapping away on their laptops or BlackBerrys. But within half an hour or so, word began to seep out into the Twittersphere that an interesting conversation about the future of schools was happening at #hackedu.

Making the point that not only does the Twitter feed capture the thinking in the room, but also:

1. enhances the discussion by creating the second outlet that bubbles that into the verbal conversation

2. allows people outside the conference to join into the discussion, and have their thoughts blended into the conference itself

3. continues the discussion online among those who attended and those who didn’t long after the physical event is over

4. retains a written record of the discussion, including, essentially, running commentary, footnotes, and bibliography, with tinyurl links

What a powerful set of impacts, for the cost of one large plasma screen!

If the conference director or education lead does not feel inspired to extend the conversation online (really?!) then the attendee marketing side of the business needs to push this.  Because it is clear in this example that the online discussion made the physical meeting MORE of a must-attend, I can’t believe I missed it event!