Have you been included in or have conducted a company conference lately?
Business conferences aim to achieve important B2B outcomes, including:
- Gaining new leads and revenue
- Building excitement for a company’s products and services
- Teaching valuable information
- Facilitating networking opportunities between participants
In other words, this is where innovative ideas are thrown left and right. It is here where trends are discussed among industry experts.
This is your chance to stand out and show everyone that you’re on top of your game. Whether it’s for announcing achievements and new company goals or introducing new products, you have to ensure that what you say will not tarnish your reputation or change the way your audience sees your brand.
When your event flops, you’ll definitely lose potential customers and investors.
Before you succumb to these pitfalls and put your company’s reputation at risk, we give you four main reasons business conferences fail:
Lack of Personalization
Attendees of the company conference expect you to provide valuable information and connection throughout the duration of the conference. This is where being relevant is the most important because if you make your audience sit through hours of presentation only for them to find nothing of note, just imagine how time consuming, frustrating, and draining that is.
Before every company conference, make sure you have the following:
- Target demographic
- Solutions they are looking for
- Content they are interested in
- Factor that will accelerate the buying cycle for them
The more you know about your audience, the easier it will be for you to prepare presentations and other types of content for them.
You Don’t Follow Through after a Company Conference
You’ll meet with potential customers and investors during a company conference, it’s inevitable. But, as much as you want to impress them, and let’s say they are floored by your pitch, without a follow-up, it’ll stay that way, an impression and nothing more.
If you want to seal the deal, you can’t just sit around, days after the conference, hoping that they pick up the phone and rave about your stellar idea. You have to remember that your conference probably isn’t not the only one they’ve attended, so you have to be proactive and ensure that your company is always on their mind.
Slow Reaction to Changing Needs in the Industry
One of the reasons you’re holding this event is to introduce new trends.
If you’re not updated with the emerging needs of society and changes within the market, you’re putting your company’s credibility on the line. Knowing what goes on around you make polling and analyzing the market a lot more fulfilling—it’ll make more sense if you know why you’re doing it.
When you have intel on the market, niche events shouldn’t pose as a threat to you because you’ve got that area covered as well.
When you have intel on the market, niche events shouldn’t pose as a threat to you because you’ve got that area covered as well.
Your event must be in line with current trends within the industry. If not, then you can’t expect it to be successful, especially if the attendees are there because they know what’s happening and they want your insight on certain topics. You don’t want to be a deer caught in the headlights.
Unengaging Presentations
Your presentation could be ineffective for reasons such as:
- Cluttered slides
- Too much information, not enough visuals
- Lack of preparation
Think of it this way: if you don’t want to sit through presentations that have those qualities, then why would you do that to your potential customers and investors?
Presentations take time to make. It needs to read like a story, and once you have a well-crafted deck in your hands, you need to rehearse until you know your topic and the flow of your presentation like the back of your hand.
What you can do, if you don’t have time to prepare visual aids or if you lack the expertise to make one, is to hire a presentation design expert. Fortunately, that’s exactly what we do here at SlideGenius. Not only do you get professionally designed decks, but you also get to work with some of the nicest people in the industry. Apart from that, some of our services go beyond presentations—copywriting, website development, animation.
We work hand-in-hand with our clients, so you get what you want and more!
Ultimately, failure could all be prevented if you planned your conference well. Company conferences don’t just take a week to plan. Rushing and just going with the flow will only result in missed networking opportunities as well as wasted time and money.
Improve and Engage
Attendees of your event might have spent big bucks for the experience. This includes the access to new knowledge and potential business connections.
One of the most important things you should remember during these events is to interact with your audience. Yes, you organized it, but you should know who your audience is and what they want before you start making the necessary arrangements.
Make your conference fun—don’t stop at presentations. If you want to engage your audience, prepare activities where they could actively participate in.
Organize a raffle where the prizes are relevant to your brand or to your industry. Have the winners announced throughout the day.
Panel discussions. What’s better than one person talking about the newest trends in the industry? The answer is more thought-leaders. During panel discussions, various insights are shared, giving everyone a mind-opening experience.
Create a hashtag to promote the event. Have it plastered all over the function hall and have the speakers mention it once in a while. What better way than to have people on their phones, talking about how cool and compelling your event is.
Lastly, ask for your audience’s opinion via live poll. Make them feel like what they think matters, and it does! This only signifies that they’re listening to you. Plus, this gives the presenter an opportunity to pose interesting questions.
To learn more about our services and for more insight like this one, visit our website or contact us today!
