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Meetings
industry marketers can be so much like politicians we love to detest... These
are the marketers who shamelessly pander for business, like politicians pander
for votes. Giving what they think the audience wants to hear,
regardless of vision or ideology.
Witness
the following slogans taken from one recent meetings publications. These are all from a hotel, a venue or a CVB:
- Inspiration Meets Here
- Ideas are Only as Good as Their Inspiration
- Share Ideas, Stay Connected Be Inspired
- Blue Sky Thinking at its Finest
- Our Corporate Training Facility Will Inspire You
A
whole lot of blah blah blah, all about inspiration, but really nothing that
differentiates each venue, or city... Is
it any wonder many meeting planners, both full-time and occasional, treat meetings
industry suppliers like commodities? So
many sound the same! (for more reading on the Commoditization of the Meetings
Industry check out the following blogs on Lead Spam 1 & 2).
But
what would vision in marketing a facility or destination look like? Good
question. I don't purport to have all
the answers, but here are a couple examples of at least more visionary
marketing than what we've been subjected to in the past:
Pebble Beach Resorts,
Pebble Beach, CA: Recently I received an email from this Resort
(where I had stayed a few years back) and they were offering me a complimentary
download of their first White Paper titled "Why Savvy Business Leaders Use
Golf to Grow Their Business".
All
I had to do was confirm my information and give them permission to stay
connected. It promised to provide me
with timely information so I could become a "Pebble Beach
Insider". It made me feel special
and the White Paper offered great tips to planners and corporate executives on
“selling” a golf-based event at a high-end resort like Pebble Beach.
According to their VP of Sales, Tim Ryan, the promotion did extremely well, and brought them several RFPs just with one email deployment. I thought their approach was very innovative, and completely aligned with the principles of inbound marketing that we’ve been preaching about (see also the following blog posts: The Difference Between Meeting Planners and Suppliers, Think Magnets,Not Darts, Six Tips toSuccessful Content Creation for #EventProfs).
National Conference Center (NCC), Leesburg, VA:
I have been following this IACC-certified facility for quite some time
now. They have a great blog that blends
insights about the meetings industry, with profiles of clients and event posts
on line staff. Recently when Sarah
Vining, their Marketing Manager, left to accept a position at the 4-H Council,
they blogged about her departure, giving her a nice farewell tribute, and
reporting on one of her last projects.
But
they don’t just blog about stuff, they also create useful resources for
planners, with white papers about diverse topics such as Enhancing Meetings
Through Food, Understanding Generational Differences, and Technology's Secret
Potential to Empower Participants. Check
them out at: http://www.conferencecenter.com/resources.cfm.
Both
of the above organizations seem to have clearly understood what Simon Sinek
author of Start with Why has called the
Golden Circle. If you're not familiar with Sinek's work, you ought to check out
his TED Conference video. But essentially Sinek
argues the following: people don’t buy WHAT you do (hotel rooms, conference
center facilities), they buy WHY you do it.
He says that all the top-performing, most inspirational leaders and
brands think, act and communicate completely differently from the rest of the
pack. They tell WHY they are in business, then how, then what, not the other
way around.
In
the work that both Pebble Beach Resorts and the National Conference Center have
done, I believe they have clearly articulated their why to their audience and
consequently have risen to a level above their peers in their marketing
efforts. With its white paper Pebble
Beach told me their WHY is to help business generate more business. It’s not about their ultra-luxurious rooms or
meeting space, it’s not even about golf.
Their WHY is about creating an environment where people make better
connections, strike partnerships and close
deals.
Similarly
the NCC’s WHY is about creating better relationships but their execution is so
different and personal that a planner would never confuse the two
entities. I can’t say quite as much
about many of the organizations in the North American meetings industry…
The
moral of this story is this: Business-to-business buyers and consumers alike
are tired of the noise in the marketplace. They seek alignment with organizations
and brands that stand for something beyond just what they deliver and how they
deliver it. How will your hotel, convention center, or destination rise to this
challenge?
