What keeps my members up at night?
The COO of a professional services association wanted to know, “What keeps my members up at night?”
She wanted to ensure that if members had the option of joining more than one association in their highly fragmented industry, her organization would be the default. She recognized that in order to achieve this goal, she’d need to have greater insight into members wants and needs than they ever had before.
We created over 40 trivia contests and other types of games for members to play at their annual conference. The contests and games were designed to solicit insight into member’s wants, needs, hopes, fears, and other types of psychographic data (personality, values, opinions, attitudes, interests, lifestyles, etc.).
When combined with demographic data the association already had on members, we were able to create more robust, dynamic profiles of members and better segment member groups.
The association was able to use these personas to create more personalized products and services. A number of these were outside the bounds of their traditional offerings but proved to be of great importance to members and opened up new revenue streams.
What does all this data mean?
The CEO of a large medical association was sifting through hundreds of pages of charts, tables and verbatim comments from attendee evaluations. “What does all this data mean?”, he asked.
He directed his staff to find a simpler solution to collect, analyze, and interpret data so they can make more informed decisions about their event and allocate their limited resources for efficiently and effectively.
We analyzed their existing data and were able to identify several key constituencies within their membership they were unaware of that were being overlooked. One group, in particular, represented the future leaders of the industry and were at risk of leaving for a competitor’s conference.
We conducted individual interviews and a focus group to better understand their wants, needs and expectations.
With this information, we were able to develop a separate conference track for these emerging leaders along with other support services and keep them in the fold. This approach served as the template for customizing the attendee experience of other key constituencies.
If the booth fits…
The CMO for a large Asian destination exhibiting at an international trade show realized their booth was failing to draw adequate foot traffic.
The booth had been designed by one of the best firms in the industry. Their booth staff were well trained. Yet no one seemed interested in what they had to offer. This did not appear to be an issue for other booths located in their immediate vicinity.
The VP of Sales needed to know what was broken and how he could fix it. Immediately.
Using a variety of tools and techniques, we conducted an audit of the exhibitors and the attendee’s booth experience. We determined the physical dimensions of the booth, that had numerous access points and seating areas, was appropriate for their native Asian population but proved ‘challenging’ for Western audiences.
We recommended they incorporate a variety of cultural experiences that would entice attendees to learn more about the destination.
The next day, attendees were so excited to discover all the unique experiences the destination had to offer, they didn’t want to leave the booth. They exceeded their expectations and standardized on this innovative, experiential approach at other trade shows where they exhibited.
