Convention Insider (Conventions.net)

With the ever increasing media distribution channels and now the many citizen journalists your show floor needs to adapt to meet the needs of today’s new media.  The new media I am speaking of is the attendees themselves. Many of them are now producing their own media, through blogs, podcasts, video and photos.  They are now the new media replacing perhaps the more traditional media that we as convention organizers have been keeping in our planning for our events.  We have sent news release after news release to the more traditional folks trying to get them to run a story on their news sites or to do a quick story about how their viewers, readers or listeners can find out how to attend.

Now we need to figure ways to make it easy for the attendees themselves to have a way to make media on the show floor. We are now seeing many step and repeat back drops for people to do impromptu interviews of experts or speakers and other attendees.  Are you making these types of interviews happen by providing a place for this new media to distribute their product?  If you are not making it simple for the attendee citizen journalist to have a place to make their new media you are missing a most important distribution channel for your event right on your show floor.

Photo via ShashiBellamkonda

This is a question every conference, trade show, meeting and convention planner needs to ask themselves when getting ready to make that pitch to a prospective sponsor.  Why do they want to give you money to be a part of your show?  If the answer is not obvious, perhaps you need to be prepared to make it more obvious.

Many companies out there are hurting right now in this economy so they are beginning to tighten the belts of the budgets in the marketing and sales area and your convention may be the first place they want to cut.  Are they making a mistake? Probably, if they have the opportunity to make a sale or two by being a sponsor of your event.  You need to provide them with the information about quality leads, about why their brand needs to be aligned with your event and the return on their sponsorship investment.  If you can provide a good reason why they should be sponsoring your event then it should be an easy enough sale.

When going to the sales call, map out why each particular sponsor should be a part of your event.  Make it easy for them to understand and make sure you provide all the information they need to sell it on their end.  If you can make it easy for them to sell, your sale will be much easier.  I have found a number of sponsors for events just because I have made it easy for them to get approval to spend the money.  If you make it an easy job for all, then we all want the easy job to be on our plate.

If you would like to be a sponsor here on our blog or on the Conventions.net site I can provide many reasons for you to want to be a part of our sites.  Contact me.

[photo via fifa4fans.de]

We have been working feverishly here to get the new blog design up and running and getting all of the widgets working and the bells and whistles working and i think we have finally reached the part where we can see the light at the end of the tunnel. Hopefully the light that we are seeing is not a freight train. We will soon be back to our normal operation here providing information commentary and all things conventions and trade shows.

I myself was very busy in January attending the CES convention in Las Vegas and speaking at a conference during that show and finally attending the Affiliate Summit West in the Rio at Las Vegas. I have some stories to tell and some other things to fill in but for now let’s just say I won’t bite off more than I can chew until we get the remaining parts to the puzzle.

As you can see we also have added a feature that will allow you to advertise here on our site and I can certainly help get you on the site, or you can refer to our media kit if you are interested in being a part of this site or the mother site over at Conventions.net. In today’s uncertain economic times we offer a very affordable way to get some exposure for your company or your event, trade show conference, meeting or convention. In the meantime, Happy New Year! I am assured that we can say that for 30 days following the actual new year coming to pass according to Miss Manners.