Posted Wednesday, February 20, 2008 by
Penni Allen
I enjoy being a Supplier member of The Society of Government Meeting Professionals (SGMP) and associating with meeting planners from federal, state, and local government as well as other providers of meeting services and facilities.
Through the Annual Education Conference and Tradeshow, monthly Chapter Meetings, and Special Events, planners and suppliers come together to review the latest trends in meetings management. It is very rewarding to help meeting planners improve the quality and cost effectiveness of their meetings.
On February 5, I participated in “Achieving Gold” the goal for this year’s National Capital (NATCAP) Chapter‘s 11th Annual Winter Meeting & Tradeshow. The event included a selection of sessions designed to keep planners and suppliers on top of current issues.
Sessions included “What is Sarbanes Oxley?” an explanation of the Sarbanes-Oxley Act of 2002 (SOX ) and how meeting professionals must comply with this law from an ethical standpoint. For instance, disclosing information that might provide one potential contractor an edge that others do not have; or bundling meeting services such as morning and afternoon breaks, internet fees, gratuities or perhaps even registration fees. The bottom line is accountability. Are we as meeting planners and service providers putting ourselves and our partners at risk of an ethical violation of SOX? Read more.
A very hot and chic session topic was the “Greening” of Government Meetings. This session demonstrated how the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) is leading the way by making environmental responsibility a common business practice. Did I mention the government has an acronym for anything and everything? EPA is changing their contract acquisition rules to give preference to meeting services and facilities that consume less and manage resources in environmentally positive ways. These topics were a perfect segue into the Trade Show. I enthusiastically talked with attendees about the immediate benefits of using Certain Registration to “Go Green”. Read more.
Mission accomplished. I Achieved Gold!
David Dzergoski and Jeff Wilson from Certain talk with an attendee about "Going Green."
While researching what Youtube clips exist out there on the meeting and event planning industry right now, I chanced upon this retro gem. From the looks of the hairstyles and clunky, old-school computer monitors, I am guessing this is from right around the early 1990's. Not too, too long ago, but definitely the pre-online registration days when things were still done manually with a huge paper trail, a simplistic desktop event management software program and shipments of slick marketing brochures.
Fast forward to the glorious digitized world of meeting and events planning in 2008 where business and communication are driven by the powerful engine of the internet. The hard way - manual processes, paper forms and printed collateral - have been replaced by convenient online registration websites that are hard at work for you 24/7.
These days, when you start planning a meeting, event, conference, convention or training program, you have to build a website first. And in this Web 2.0 era with so many great developments in sophisticated web design, social networking and back-end functionality, planners can't just publish rudimentary websites anymore. Your online registration website has to be creative, interactive, secure and.....in short, awesome.
"Web 2.0 is a knowledge-oriented environment where human interactions generate content that is published, managed and used through network applications in a service-oriented architecture."
This can be applied to create more appealing, effective, relevant and secure online registration websites.
TIP 1 - Custom design your websites
Even the least design savvy of people have grown accustomed to sleek, professional web design, so making your online registration websites have an engaging and sophisticated look & feel is just becoming a given. As a meeting and events planner, you are either creating a unique buzz around a specific special event or you are trying to conform to your client or organization's corporate branding standards. Good Web 2.0 online registration site design does not mean you need an art school or marketing degree, just access to an application that allows you to customize every element.
The number one guideline for Web 2.0 and beyond design is calculated simplicity. Make it readable, use clean typography. Use sophisticated color palates. Layout all the elements within a planned grid that makes them visible in the browser without scrolling down. Choose high aesthetic value, quality graphics.
If you aren't doing all this yourself, choose an online registration provider who offers event build services so you can engage a highly skilled web design professional with meetings and events industry experience to design the project to your specifications.
TIP 2 - Incorporate new media elements and relevant links
Well done Flash and video elements can deliver messages to potential registrants. A visionary address from the Board Chairman can put a face on an association and encourage old and new members to participate. A quick tour of a conference destination's amenities could entice more attendees to register. Increase program attendance by offering dynamic thumbnail previews or links to guest presenters' websites.
If you do not have the resources to create original pieces, look for ready-made media elements to incorporate from your host city's visitors bureau, hotel, conference venue or guest speakers.
TIP 3 - Optimize your websites for search engines
Optimizing websites to pop to the top of the list when people are searching on Google, Yahoo or other search engines is key, and even online registration websites can be search engine optimized. Determine what top keywords apply to the meetings, events, conferences or training programs you are marketing. Optimize every registration site by incorporating those keywords into the URL, web page titles, content and metatags. Because URL's are the very first part of any website that get crawled by Google, Yahoo and the other search engines, the ability to customize your online registration website URL is also incredibly huge, and not all software providers offer this capability.
TIP 4- Find ways to incorporate social networking and interactivity
In a sense, online registration is a social networking tool that is designed to bring people of similar interests together to meet face-to-face. But before that in-person meeting, you could offer ways for attendees to network with each other online before and after events. Create a Facebook page for the event, a Google group or a blog where attendees can have conversations with each other on specific topics. While these may exist independently of your online registration websites, offering them as "Meet Other Attendees" links within in your sites or in your email communications could be highly effective.
TIP 5 - Use hosted technology providers
One of the greatest things about how sophisticated meetings and events planning technology is today in the Web 2.0 era is that it is hosted. Unlike the days of paper and desktop applications, the availability of hosted Software as a Service (SaaS) solutions brings meetings and events planning professionals many more advantages. You gain the flexibility of on-demand technology that allows people to register 24/7 and you to track registrations up to the minute from anywhere. Because online registration websites capture so much personal data including credit cards information, hosted solutions offer a higher degree of security as well.
There is so much buzz around "going green" right now, from international government polices about global warming down to what toilet bowl cleaners you use in your bathroom. Even meeting, event and training planners are not exempt. "Green meetings" have recently been headlining the covers of your favorite industry mags like Corporate EVENT, Smart Meetings or MPI's Meeting Professional, with articles on everything from minimizing travel to advice on china service and locally grown catering. As Fortune 1000 corporations, professional associations, universities and government agencies begin implementing their own overall green strategies, planners are under special scrutiny to focus on the amount of resources that go into every meeting, special event, conferences, trade show or training program. The carbon imprint of travel arrangements, the linen policies of hotel venues, the impact of where flowers arrangements are grown, the extensiveness of recycling efforts - there are so many factors for planners when trying to plan green.
Luckily there is one easy green tactic planners have already had at their fingertips for a while now, online registration technology. The old school way to plan an event involved having tons of glossy collateral printed up and delivered by mail. Everyone then had to fill out their registration forms to mail or fax back. Online registration makes this entire process dynamically virtual via the internet, so significant amounts of paper are eliminated and emissions from mail delivery can be minimized.
Certain recently put out some tips on making such a paperless technology part of your green strategy with their white paper called "The Easiest Way to Go Green Right Now".
>>Gianni Michael Lyle, Marketing Communications, Certain
