Labor Day signifies the end of summer…we move on to football, cooler weather and then before we know it, the holiday season. CustomNEWS had a very productive summer – our travels took us from coast to coast, including Oregon, Illinois and New York. Here’s a look at some of our projects between Memorial Day and Labor Day, which totaled:
30 Show Daily Onsite Print Issues
12 Daily Email Highlights Newsletters
2 Onsite Video Production Projects
2 Digital Preview Issues
3 Digital Highlights Issues
1 Print Highlights Issue
Showcase Content & News: Unsure about what value a show daily offers? Are you doing enough to showcase the content and news from your conference to a wide audience that goes beyond your attendees? Over the past three months, our editorial teams covered keynotes, parallel plenaries and concurrent sessions. We asked attendees about their conference experiences. Our photographers captured the buzz and videographers created dynamic content. And don’t forget, all of this content belongs to you to use throughout the year in post-conference wraps up, share via websites, email and social media, and use to market future events.
- Our reporters can also provide two versions of a session recap, if you’d like to have a longer article for a future publication.
Exhibit Hall Floor Plans: Has your organization eliminated the onsite print program? The mobile app will provide attendees with schedule information and session descriptions, which can be updated in real time. But when it comes to navigating the exhibit hall, attendees still seek a floor plan in print format they can use to navigate the exhibit hall. When I showed a few attendees the full-size floor plan in one of our publications, I couldn’t hand out the copies fast enough.
Involve your Members: We don’t use a cookie-cutter model when it comes to generating show daily content. One of our summer’s project involves a committee of members who serve as show daily authors. This is a sought-after position that is seen as mutually beneficial. Our publication has strong scientific content that attendees will want to read, as it is written by them for them, and the authors receive recognition and accolades from their colleagues. For another project, we use a hybrid approach, with both CustomNEWS-provided reporters and members contributing content. (Did you see our post about haiku contests, an idea that came from the show daily authors?)
Share Highlights with Everyone: Print publications reach your onsite attendees, but don’t stop there. Use social media and daily email newsletters to share daily highlights with members who aren’t attending and those following your hashtags. Showing them what they missed may push them to attend next year’s conference. With the growth of digital advertising, exhibitors will welcome new opportunities to reach a wide audience.
Promote Your Official Show Daily: Three of our projects this summer had competition from unofficial publications that were not associated with the conference, but solicited advertising from exhibitors. If you thought unauthorized vendors was only a problem for housing companies, that’s no longer the case. When you’re competing with a “renegade” show daily (as I like to call them), you must promote your position as official – we recommend having your show daily distribution team where shirts that signify their affiliation with your organization, and promote that throughout the conference. Example: “Be sure to pick up today’s copy of your official show daily from our distributors wearing red shirts positioned throughout the convention center.”
- Once your conference concludes, reaching out to advertisers in the unofficial publication should be a top priority. Find out why they supported the other publication, and not yours. It may be worth offering a special discount to entice them to advertise in the show daily.
- Seeking a high-impact sponsorship? The t-shirts worn by your show daily team can also become a sponsorship opportunity: include the company’s logo and booth # on the back.
Want a FREE Show Daily? Two of our summer projects were royalty-based. There was no cost for the publication, in return for the right to sell advertising to exhibitors and other approved sponsors. Our agreements included reporters and photographers, as we want to also provide the resources required to produce a top-notch show daily. Royalty scales will vary based on meeting size and net advertising revenue. Having an advertising team focused on show daily advertising sales will often yield better results than lumping it together with other advertising and sponsorship opportunities. After all, show dailies are very unique publications – your sales team needs to know about all the advantages that they offer.