Embrace Target Marketing
Understanding each segment of your
audience allows you to target your
messages and marketing to attendees’
unique needs.
If you’re used to a one-size-fits-all
approach to marketing, ask yourself
these strategic questions as you transi-
tion to a target-marketing approach:
• What do I want each audience seg-
ment to know as a result of receiving
my message, or attending my event?
• How do I want each audience segment to feel after receiving my message, or attending my event?
• What do I want each audience segment to do after receiving my message, or attending my event?
Once you’ve identified what you want
each of your target audiences to know,
feel and do, you can more effectively
create messages that reach them.
According to Charlie Souhrada,
director of member services for the
North American Association of Food
Equipment Manufacturers, one-on-one
meetings or focus groups can provide
valuable insights in this area. “Select
a few representatives from each target
audience and visit them personally
before building a strategy,” he recom-
mends. “In the meeting, ask these
strategic questions and start building a
rapport.”
Event marketing — both message
and medium — should be individually
targeted to each of your membership
segments, focused on the unique bene-
fits that address each segment’s needs.
“Determine the communication meth-
ods to reach each audience segment
most effectively, such as e-mail market-
ing, dimensional mailers, face-to-face
marketing, etc.,” Souhrada says. “Some
audiences may be difficult to reach via
particular methods, so a unique strategy
should be built for each.”
Count on Content
Associations should return to the same
“know, feel, do” guidelines throughout the meeting planning process to
make sure that their content and event
structure — like their marketing — is
addressing diverse attendees’ needs.
Consider education tracks, for
instance. Although it’s not a new idea,
the importance of targeted learning
based on unique member needs cannot be minimized or overlooked. Also
consider venue. While some of your
audience segments may still prefer
face-to-face events, for example, others — such as young professionals —
may crave educational content that’s
delivered electronically, through virtual
events, trade shows or webinars. Similarly, some segments may prefer networking over education, or vice-versa.
If your audience is diverse, offer
diverse education tracks, venues and
programming so that members can
select the event choices they most
prefer. Consider diverse speakers and
sponsors, too; Souhrada recommends
recruiting thought leaders from each
of your target audience segments as
speakers and facilitators.
If the educational needs of one
audience segment contrast starkly with
those of another, consider offering a
separate event — or a pre-event day of
learning — for that group. Examples
include first-time attendees, new members or C-level members.
“The C-level audience often likes to
network with each other,” Well says.
“For one of our clients that attracts
some C-level members, we offer a spe-
cial one-day event for this audience seg-
ment only.”
Don’t forget to diversify the exhibit
hall, too, as diverse audiences will no
doubt have diverse product and vendor
interests. To meet these needs, try seg-
menting your trade show to make the
floor easier to navigate, grouping similar
vendors within sections that are orga-
nized by specialty. If an attendee has a
unique interest, his or her needs can be
met conveniently in a single location.
Incentivize Diversity
It’s no secret that incentives help
move members to action. When offer-
ing participation-related incentives,
therefore, consider how each of your
audience segments is motivated. If you
are looking to attract a greater diversity
of experience levels, offer group incen-
tives to organizations that bring many
attendees, or to those that bring junior-
or senior-level attendees — whichever
you need more of. Similarly, rebates or
discounts can be awarded to members,
allied organizations or vendor partners
who recruit new attendees.
Keep It Moving
What’s true of real estate is true of
association meetings: It all comes down
to “location, location, location!”
If your membership is geographically
diverse, you should take attendee travel
into consideration when you’re choosing
locations for your events, regularly rotat-
ing your meeting to different regions to
keep it as accessible as possible.
You also should consider co-location
to increase the appeal of your event to
members while also engaging the participants at another event. If an outside
event would be of interest to your members, why not approach that association
and discuss a partnership? Perhaps having the events back-to-back will benefit
both and increase overall attendance.
To sweeten the deal, Souhrada suggests
offering free meeting space to related
organizations.
No matter where it’s held — on its
own or alongside a complementary
meeting — one thing’s clear: Engaging
a diverse, ever-changing association
audience brings new challenges for your
event, but also new opportunities. As
you identify diverse needs and interests
among your members, therefore, be
ready to think originally and incorporate
creative new techniques to keep all your
participants engaged and coming back
for more.
Kevin Olsen is president and principal of One
Smooth Stone, an event and communications
agency based in Downers Grove, Ill. He may be
reached at (630) 427-4224 or
kolsen@onesmoothstone.com.
