Companies are using technology in ways that are innovative and beneficial for catering to the online world.  Trade shows and conventions must begin to search for ways to make technology work for them and allow them to also get into the online world.  One of the ways to accomplish this is to look for companies that are thinking ahead of the curve and making it possible to change the way business is conducted.  One such company that is out ahead and innovative is Trade Show News Television.

I had a chance to sit down and speak to the CEO of Trade Show News Television, Mr. Bob Lipp.  Bob has a very good understanding of creating exposure for your company, as he comes from an advertising agency background.  Bob opened his first ad agency long ago before anything digital was ever imagined.

“It seems like a former lifetime,” said Bob, when asked to remember the way it was. “Today, everything is digital, and with streaming video capabilities expanding on the web, more businesses, business magazine publishers, and trade show managers, are looking to video to deliver the message.”

This is a unique opportunity for trade shows and conventions and others in the industry.  Event planners and convention planners must take a look at the service provided by Lipp and his company. 

“More than ever, business customers and prospects access their information online through streaming video,” stated Lipp. “Our concept gives trade show exhibitors a unique sales tool that continues to support sales long after the trade show has ended.”

As a person that is hooked up in the use of new media for advertising, marketing and PR, I must say that I am very impressed with the company and their message.  I’m contacted daily by companies looking for ways to get into the new media space using sites like You Tube, FaceBook and Myspace.  They see the power behind the use of those new forms of media and are trying to find ways to get into the space.  The possibilities for the use of this company’s services are limitless.  I can see that exhibitors, and show managers can use this service to enhance the reach they have and to allow them to show many other people that otherwise are not able to get the experience of their trade show or convention.  It allows people the opportunity to get a feel for the excitement. 

Look into this company and their affordable services.  Trade Show News Television offers three streaming video packages: focus, reach and custom, each based on the need for content, distribution and additional marketing support.  Some of their samples are an excellent look into what they provide as well as the video above. 

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I’m suddenly faced with making a number of travel arrangements as a result of speaking gigs, consulting trips, and attending events, and it made me think about travel conventions.  What are the top travel conventions or trade shows?  I decided to hop over to Google and find out.  Turns out there is a travel convention and it has actually named itself “The Travel Convention” as if to say there are no other conventions out there but theirs.  I like the boldness of that statement.  Who makes the bold statement?  Why of course none other than THE Travel Association.

The Travel Association is a UK based association:

Formed in 1950 by 22 leading travel companies, ABTA - The Travel Association - now represents over 5,500 travel agencies and 900 tour operations, throughout the British Isles. Our Members range from small, specialist tour operators and independent travel agencies through to publicly-listed companies and household names; from call centres to internet booking services to high street shops. All of them carry the ABTA logo, which means choice, value, and high levels of service.

The Travel Convention is set to be held on October 6-8, 2008 and is taking place at Gran Canaria.

Of note is Mark Tanzer, Executive Director of ABTA’s behind the scenes blog.  Although this is more like an online newsletter than a blog, I see that they are trying to move into the social media marketing arena of using a blog to communicate.  Tanzer states:

“The Maspalomas Conference Centre provides us with another stunning business setting which is perfect for the UK’s premier travel event of the year,” said Mark Tanzer, ABTA’s Chief Executive.

The Maspalomas Conference Center is described in its site as a very beautiful facility and I think its in a beautiful part of the world.  I would be interested in attending just for the scenery and the fun on the beach.

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All over Mexico and North America, people are celebrating Cinco De Mayo or the celebration of the victory at the Battle of Puebla.  Many believe it to be the celebration of Mexico’s independence but although not, it is a highly celebrated day in Mexican history.  I thought that in honor of the holiday, and staying with the idea of talking about convention centers outside the U.S., I would  head down to Cancun and check out the convention center there.

The Cancun Center is located in the heart of the hotel district of Cancun and has 152,852 square feet of exhibition space.    The Yucatan Peninsula is a gorgeous setting for a convention or trade show.  The Cancun Convention and Visitors Bureau describes the faciltiy:

An extraordinary setting with a panoramic view of the Caribbean Sea combines with state-of-the-art technology and personal attention from a team of professionals.
The result is a full range of support services, from audiovisual and security to booth decor and food and beverage.
Everything you need to guarantee an event’s success is yours at Cancun Center.

I checked out their facility with their virtual tour and it looks like a wonderful place to have a convention or trade show. 

This past weekend The Professional Convention Management Association (PCMA) Education Foundation held its first international Partnership Summit at the Cancun Center.  It was a chance to really showcase the convention center to industry leaders.  Arturo Escaip, President of the CCVB said just this:

“We couldn’t be more pleased to be hosting the Foundation’s Annual Partnership Summit,” said Arturo Escaip, President and CEO of the Cancun Convention and Visitors Bureau. “This is an unprecedented opportunity to ‘show-off’ all that Cancun has to offer to this group of highly-respected meetings industry executives. Additionally, the focus group and town hall meetings will provide us with some candid insight into the needs of meetings professionals, while also giving us a unique opportunity to demonstrate the many advantages of planning a meeting in Cancun.”

A great opportunity for the Cancun Center and I hope they took advantage of the chance to shine.  If you are an event or convention planner check out what Cancun has to offer.

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On April 21 the Massachusetts Convention Center Authority (MCCA) in conjunction with consulting and systems integration company Optaros announced that they will be partnering to launch a new event management system (EMS).  After the release went public I had a chance to hook up with a couple of the people involved in the project and was able to ask them further questions and find out more about their project and what it entails.  I want to first thank Steve Snyder the CIO/CTO of the MCCA and Marc Osofsky, Vice President of Marketing at Optaros as they allowed me to take some of their time to find out more about their project.

I first phoned Marc Osofsky (pictured left) of Optaros to find out about his company and what they specialize in and how they were approaching the project with the MCCA.  Optaros is a consulting firm of about 200+ employees and they handle the needs of over 70 companies across the U.S. and in Europe.  Optaros was hired by MCCA to come up with a different approach to their event management system.  The MCCA looked at what was available and found that off the shelf applications could handle only about 60% of their needs, and they were limited to only 2 companies that provide the top used systems in the convention and trade show industry.  These options were not only not what MCCA needed it was also a very costly endeavor.    Optaros sat down with MCCA and found out exactly what they wanted the event management system accomplish and through those efforts came up with the perfect solution.  Using open source, and inexpensive applications already available, they were able to build the perfect EMS for the folks at MCCA.  Osofsky was very pleased with the project and applauded the vision of MCCA.

“Like many specialized industries, the event management industry is ignored by large enterprise software players and niche providers that are not keeping up with customer requirements for enhancements,” said Marc Osofsky, vice president of marketing at Optaros.  “Innovative players such as the MCCA are designing and rapidly assembling solutions using open source components.”

The visionary at MCCA was their executive director James E. Rooney.  At his direction, Steve Snyder (pictured right) ran with the project.  I had a chance to sit down and have a phone conversation with Steve Snyder to find out more about their new system and hear the story behind why they decided to build their own EMS using the services of Optaros.  After the first few minutes of our conversation, I could tell Snyder was well versed in the use of technology and found that he was very passionate about the program. 

They first came up with the idea about two years ago when they had a chance to look at how it was that they did business.  In fact, that was the question that Snyder asked, “How do we do business?”   He came up with the answer in a 36 step process of what they do and how they do it.  Their current system could not handle that process, and when he looked at other companies that were providing other event management systems their off the shelf products could only handle just over half of their needs.  Having companies like Oracle, SAP or other large software companies build them the system was cost prohibitive and companies such as Concentrix couldn’t provide the data Snyder required.  He knew there had to be a better way.  Optaros proved to be that better way. 

Snyder was impressed that the people at Optaros sent people out to the MCCA and literally watched over the backs of employees as they worked to see how they could make their lives easier.  The release sent has a nutshell look at the EMS:

The EMS will enable MCCA staff to quickly and easily determine facility availability and book new events.  Users will interact using a common interface for all modules, streamlining service order fulfillment and improving service delivery performance.  The virtually centralized event management system will foster enterprise-wide collaboration and enhance internal communication across the entire organization, strengthening internal controls and minimizing the risk of procedural errors.  Additionally, the EMS will manage workflow, customer contacts and business intelligence, among other business components.

Executive Director Jim Rooney goes on to reveal:

“We’re building this innovative new system with our customers in mind - we’re confident that they’ll benefit from an ease of doing business, better access to information and an improved service experience all around.”

MCCA is changing the way they do business to better fit the needs of Show Management, Exhibitors and Attendees.  They are truly leading the way in this innovative thinking and they are leading the charge to doing events, trade shows and conventions differently using technology.  At the end of my conversation with Steve Snyder it became very apparent that they are innovators in the convention space when he revealed that all of the MCCA properties including Boston Convention & Exhibition Center (BCEC), which was recognized by the 2007 Spotlight Awards as the “Convention Center of the Year”, the John B. Hynes Veterans Memorial Convention Center, and The MassMutual Center, have or will have free Internet access through the use of WIFI technology.  Now that is innovative.  I hope other convention sites will take note of this and follow suit.

If you are a event management company or manage a convention center, I urge you to take a minute and contact the folks at MCCA and ask them about their system and how you might be able to learn how they are changing the way convention management is done.  They are truly out front leading the charge.

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My wife has been bugging me to get her garden ready for planting.  Here in Colorado it is safe to plant your Garden on Mother’s Day and we promised we would do this as a family.  My job has been to get the soil tilled and ready for planting the various vegetables.  I woke today thinking I had a couple of hours that was not filled with conference calls that I could get to the local nursery to purchase my materials to prep the plot of dirt in the back yard.  The only problem with that intention was that as I opened the door I had a blast of cold and found that it was snowing.  It snowed most of the day.  Love that Colorado weather.  I missed that opportunity.  I was looking around the web for some information about soil preparation and found myself looking for a landscaping convention.

The Landscape Show is a large show that is scheduled this year in Florida at the Orange County Convention Center on September 25-27, 2008.  The show is very large with 250,000 square feet and 600 exhibiting companies.  Apparently they are capitalizing on the green movement itself:

Looking to make an environmental difference in your part of the world? Plants and trees are the original cleaning agents of the earth – offering oxygen while absorbing carbon dioxide; absorbing pollutants, odors and noise; providing homes for wildlife and creating important beauty for quality of life and sense of community. The Landscape Show offers a diverse pallet of plants, products and services that can make a positive impact on your environment.

I think I will try again tomorrow unless we have any blizzard warnings.  Someone forgot to send the memo of global warming to the gardening gods.  In the meantime do the planet a favor and plant something.

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This year the Democratic National Convention is scheduled to take place at the Pepsi Center here in Denver.  The title of the post will be explained but we have to visit the sports page of the newspaper.  The Pepsi Center plays host to the Denver Nuggets and the Colorado Avalanche, our basketball and hockey teams.

This year both of those teams have made the playoffs.  As of this writing however, the Denver Nuggets have been swept in 4 games and the Colorado Avalanche are down 3 games to none and looking like they will be swept and eliminated from the Stanley Cup playoffs.  This is the reason the Pepsi Center will be unused.

Some facts about the facility that will be the location of this year’s DNC.  The Pepsi Center in Denver was built in about 21 months and cost $180M in private funding.  The building sits on 45 acres and is 675,000 square feet.  During the Democratic National Convention the Pepsi Center will handle approximately 21,000 people or more.  The problem I see now is that with the Nuggets eliminated from the playoffs and the Colorado Avalanche on their way out of the Stanley Cup Playoffs, the building will be quiet and vacant for a while.  Yes, if that does sound like sour grapes, it’s because I am very disappointed!

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I have been spending a lot of time lately speaking to and interviewing some of the leaders in our industry of conventions and trade shows and I will be doing a series of posts to reveal the results of those interviews and discussions.  One of the things that seems to occur to me after speaking to these industry leaders is that there seems to be a shift in what is the norm in trade shows and conventions and how they are being handled.  I have heard tell of new technologies being used, new players in the old world of how things were done and show managers that are seeking new ways to plan events and shows.  One thing is certain, there will be some benefit to the show exhibitors and attendees based on the changes I have seen in little areas.  Stay tuned for more information as I get all my notes together and get my posts completed.

If you would like to be featured as a thought leader in the industry or if you are doing things in the convention or trade show industry that you feel is revolutionizing the way we do business, please feel free to drop us a line or use the contact section to let us know about you.  I’ll be contacting many others to find ways to reveal what is happening in the world we live in.

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I have been talking about all kinds of different places for trade shows and conventions here at Convention Insider, and most, if not all, have been about convention centers right here in the United States.  There are plenty of other locations around the world that are also great places for conventions or trade shows and other events. 

One of the places I have on my places I would like to visit before I die is Sydney, Australia.  I figured I would start there as a place to visit for a convention center or trade show location.  Of course, since we are headed down under the proper spelling here is “centre”. The convention center is the largest of its kind on the continent and holds more than 600 events throughout the year.  Their brochure goes on to describe the location:

As Australia’s largest and premier venue for conferences, exhibitions and special events, the Sydney Convention and Exhibition Centre has played host to some of the world’s top companies and international associations.

Superbly located on the waterfront in Sydney’s most popular visitor precinct, Darling Harbour, the venue is renowned for its flexibility, which enables it to manage events of any size and complexity.

This convention center hosts apparently a very large event in the Australian International Motor Show which has about 300,000 attendees and another large event event called the Sydney International Boat Show.  This makes sense because they are right on the Darling Harbour, or as we say here in the US, “harbor”.

[Photo via adactio]

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Growing up as a young boy on the western slope of Colorado we didn’t have much for television.  In fact I think we had a local farm report at 6:00 in the morning and part of the Dick Van Dyke show at about 6:00 in the evening.  It must have been related to the satellite that made it’s way around the planet every twelve hours.  Since I didn’t get the same chance to watch TV as other kids my age, I got into comic books.  I loved sitting and looking at the stories, and later when I was old enough to read actually reading the stories.

I have been waiting for a comic book convention to come to town that I can attend, but it does not look like that will happen anytime soon but I could travel out to San Diego, California for Comic-Con International.  The event is set to take place July 24-27, 2008 at the San Diego Convention Center.  This is the 39th year for the event and if it has the same success it had in 2007, the event will see 125,000 attendees.  The event was sold out last year and they fully expect to see that happen again in 2008.  They do not sell passes for the event on site so you must register online.

One of the things that caught my attention with this event was their use of a blog to help attendees with their questions and problems with getting a place to stay while in San Diego.  The blog relates:

In 2007, Comic-Con International had 125,000 attendees. We realize the challenges related to an event of this size. One of the most challenging aspects of attending Comic-Con is trying to reserve a hotel room. Each year, we open hotel reservations only to have them initially sell out in a matter of hours. And while rooms almost always are added or become available due to cancellations, the simple fact of the matter is there are not enough hotel rooms in San Diego for everyone who wants to attend Comic-Con.

This seems to be a real problem, and I really wonder why they continue to have the event in San Diego when apparently the event has outgrown the host city.  A blog is a big help to communicate to your attendees, but you would think they would address the problems of the lack of hotel accommodations with a different location or some other solution.  Good luck if you have not booked your room for this convention.

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I have been a bit under the weather this week and as a result I have had a chance to lay in bed and watch daytime TV.  Not that everyday drama laden stuff you get from the soaps, but the drama laden everyday stuff you get from watching boys get paid lots of money to play a sport they love.  Of course, I am talking about the NFL and the upcoming NFL draft.  I can remember as a boy running to the paper to see a list of who the Broncos (I admit I am a hometown sports fan) drafted in the NFL draft.  That was back when I followed what was happening in college with all of my favorite players as well.  Perhaps I’m dating myself but I remembered wanting to grow up to play like one of my favorites, John Cappelletti (Google it).

The NFL Draft now has taken on a whole new meaning for kids (yes I include myself in that category to this day) as they watch their favorites from college make it to the next level and they get to see who is the latest addition to their favorite professional team in real time.  We get to see all the cool stuff like war rooms, owners on the phone, players at home or in studio, highlights and all the other stuff that makes this a media frenzy, all live and in person from our own armchairs.  This spectacle needs to be held somewhere and in fact its not much different than putting on a large trade show or convention.

This year’s event is being broadcast live from New York City from the Radio City Music Hall.  What I think is super cool however is that the Radio City Music Hall has its own blog called The Monitor.  You should definitely check it out for New York City latest in what is happening.  The blog also covers other event locations like Madison Square Gardens.

The RCMH is hosting the event for the third year now and if you are lucky, its free:

NFL Draft Fan Central will be open to all fans on Saturday, April 26 from 10:00 a.m. to 7:00 p.m. on 51st Street between 6th and 7th Avenues. NFL Draft Fan Central is a free event and will feature interactive football activities, Giants and Jets player autograph signings and live coverage of the 2008 NFL Draft on the NFL Network big screen.

Held in New York City since 1965, the NFL Draft will be televised nationally by NFL Network and ESPN. This is the third consecutive year that the Draft will be held at Radio City Music Hall.

You can bet that this is not the same as a trade show or convention we talk about here much of the time, but many of the same types of vendors and suppliers we feature here will be providing services there.  How can RCMH afford such extravagance?  Are you kidding?  The Dolphins just spent $30M on a kid out of college that has not showed up for a day of work yet.  I’ll let you decide who gets the check.

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