Conference Playbook TOP STRATEGIES FOR GETTING THE MOST OUT OF CONFERENCES
CONFERENCE Ever
Table of Contents Introduction
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Shift Your Mindset
03
Create Your Success Strategy
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Conference Day
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Post-Event Follow-Up
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Worksheet 21 Craft Your Success Strategy
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Introduction
Make it stop! You try to look away but you can’t. It calls out like an alarm, a constant reminder of missed opportunities, a collection of budding relationships cut short. No, I’m not talking about a slideshow of your former sweethearts. This regret is that dusty stack of business cards from your last business conference. You know how it goes. You discover an outstanding event, and you get pumped up. You know you’ll gain inspiration and knowledge. You’ll develop powerful connections with influential people. Maybe even find a new client or two. So you buy a ticket, book a flight, and reserve a hotel room. “It’s a business investment,” you tell yourself as you think of all the new relationships you’ll build. And the event is terrific! It’s energizing. You meet new people. You gain skills and tactics to grow your business. By the end, your pockets bulge with a bounty of business cards. You plan to follow up with all your new contacts the moment you get back home.
Conference Playbook: Top Strategies for Getting the Most Out of Conferences
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Introduction
You say some quick goodbyes and head for the airport. When you finally cross the threshold to your office, you automatically hit the “back to reality” button. Invoices are piled up, clients need attention, and a major project is nearing its deadline. And so the business cards collect in the corner of your desk drawer. You’ll get to them when you have some spare time. (Which really means never, right?)
Does this story sound a little too familiar? Are you ready to leverage conferences as a significant business growth and marketing tactic? Then this playbook is for you. Read on to gain top strategies for maximizing the potential of conferences. These tips will make you money and save you time. Sound good? Then let’s get started! Conference Playbook: Top Strategies for Getting the Most Out of Conferences
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Shift Your Mindset
Shift Your Mindset “If you change the way you look at things, the things you look at change.” - Dr. Wayne Dyer
How would you like to build out your entire year’s client pipeline in a single conference? It’s possible with a bit of strategy. Most attendees focus solely on what they can learn from an event and miss the business-building treasure trove that’s hiding in the corner. Shift your mindset from “What can I learn?” to “Whom will I MEET?” and watch your business grow. You’ll never let a pile of business cards gather dust again.
Begin with 3 simple questions 1. What’s your purpose for attending? 2. What result do you want to achieve? 3. How can you add value for others?
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Shift Your Mindset
1. What’s your purpose for attending? Before you attend an event, decide exactly why you’re going. Do you desire to learn as much as you can and apply those new skills to your business? Or are you looking to meet people and build relationships? Perhaps a combination of both? There’s no right or wrong answer, but you’ll want to decide before you get there. Then you can create a strategy that easily produces that result. (We’ll show you how to develop it shortly.)
2. What result do you want to achieve? You’ve got your purpose for attending. Now devise a concrete goal to ensure you stay focused. Want to make forty new contacts and turn five of them into new clients? Is there a specific person you hope to meet, maybe an influencer in your field? Or are you looking for a new resource or referral? Get specific about exactly what you want to get out of the event. That way you can celebrate success at the end of the day.
3. How can you add value for others? Attending an event or conference shouldn’t be all about you. Determine how you can give value to the people you meet. Is there a tool or resource you’ve found or created that you can share? In the next section we’ll work on crafting your strategy for success. Deciding how to add value is a critical element of that strategy—so don’t skip it!
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Shift Your Mindset
Adding value extra credit Giovanni Marsico, Founder of the Archangel Academy event (www.ArchangelAcademy2016. com), says that networking at events is all about being of service. “I always focus on how I can help serve the people I’ll run into at an event,” Giovanni says. He suggests producing more value than you receive. Here are his four tips for becoming valuable to event attendees:
1
Be a connector. Before the event, find out who you know that will be attending. Ask them who they need to meet. Then help connect them to that resource. Take it one step further. Ask them who else is going to the event that you can also serve.
2
Be an information curator. Document your top takeaways from the event. Then share them with your community and folks you meet at the event. By sharing the most valuable nuggets of wisdom, you save your community their most precious commodity—time. As a bonus, turn this curated content into a lead magnet to offer to your new contacts (More on lead magnets to follow).
3
Be a strategic implementer. Take what you’ve learned and actually apply it! But skip the fire-hose approach (trying to incorporate every single thing you learned at the event). Be strategic. Pick two or three things you learned. Choose the ones with the
4
Be a follow-up master. Want to show your appreciation? Follow up right away! Even if it costs an entire day sending emails or making phone calls, be the one person who follows up with your newfound contacts. Giovanni recommends
biggest impact for you, your business, or your
doing so the day after an event. Here’s why:
community. Implement them. Forget the rest.
No. 1, you’re top of mind with the people you met at the event. And No. 2, then you won’t forget to do it! Keep reading for some additional tips and tricks to make following up with contacts simple by automating the process.
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Create Your Success Strategy
Create Your Success Strategy “Success is 20 percent skills and 80 percent strategy. You might know how to read, but more importantly, what’s your plan to read?” - Jim Rohn
Let’s refresh. You now know your purpose for attending your event, you’ve set goals, and you know how to give back to the people you’ll meet. Now it’s time to organize and strategize.
Your Three-step Strategy for Businessbuilding at Events 1. Pre-event networking prep 2. Drive traffic to a lead magnet or free resource 3. Automate your follow-up
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Create Your Success Strategy
1. Pre-event networking prep No, we’re not just talking about practicing your elevator pitch and packing extra business cards. Step up your game and stand out at every event with these helpful tips: Review the attendee list for possible connections Prior to the event, take a look at who will be attending. A list of attendees may be available. If not, search for a Facebook group or conference app that connects participants. Sign in and start mingling! Check out the other attendees’ websites, and/or social media profiles. Determine if you can help each other. What kind of value can you offer to them? How you can be of service? Make contact before you go Once you’ve familiarized yourself with some of the people going to the event, reach out and connect! Have you found appealing contacts? Then invite them to meet up for lunch or coffee. See if they’d like to check out the
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Create Your Success Strategy
event expo with you. Don’t limit your conference time to attending breakout learning sessions. Maximize your breaks. Plan your evenings. And, dare we say, consider skipping content segments to spend time with a new connection. Create your own conference agenda Now that you’re prioritizing making those new contacts, it’s time to draft your personal conference agenda. Before you arrive, check the event schedule and decide which breakout sessions are a “can’t miss” and which are worth sacrificing to an in-person meeting. Are organized mixers on the calendar? Those are always worth attending. Put them on your list too. Invite your clients/partners If there are people in your sphere of influence who would benefit from this event, invite them. Everyone appreciates a shared resource. Plus, it’s always nice to have a familiar face to break up all the new introductions. Connect with speakers and influencers Don’t be afraid to talk to special guests, speakers, and experts at conferences. Do you admire their work? Can you share how it’s impacted your life and your business? Influencers love to receive that praise. Reach out to them on social media prior to the event. Let them know you’re excited to see their keynote. And they’ll likely remember you when you introduce yourself at the conference.
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Create Your Success Strategy
Organize group meetups Get a group together. It’s a great way to make a lot of connections quickly. Bonus: as the organizer, you’ll be seen as an influencer. By simply organizing a happy hour meeting place and time, you’re making yourself the center of influence. Take it a step further; act like a host and introduce people to one another based on their needs and interests. The group will see you as the go-to person for resources, referrals, and connections. You’ll instantly build trust and credibility. Meetup.com is a great tool for facilitating a get-together like this. Simply hop on their website and create an event. Make it easy for people to find by using keywords that conference attendees are likely to search. Interested parties can RSVP right on Meetup, and you’ll know in advance who’s coming. Share the Meetup link on social media with the event’s hashtag, or in the event’s app if one has been provided. Prepare and practice your elevator pitch OK, we still had to include this one. Are you ready to talk about yourself? Try this formula for your introduction: “I help (your ideal client) with (the result you provide) by (the magical way you do it).” Want to make it even more compelling? Keep it concise and incorporate intrigue if possible. For example, you could say, “I help online entrepreneurs double their revenue in 90 days by using my signature ABC System.” Something like this will pique the listener’s interest and compel them to say, “Wow! How do you do that?”
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Create Your Success Strategy
Extra Credit: Talk less and listen more! (maybe in a callout box?) Surprisingly, you’ll have greater success connecting with others the less you say about yourself. Prep a list of universal questions to help you get to know your new friends. Then lead the conversation by asking and listening. People love to share about themselves. If you’re a great listener, they’ll automatically love you too. Giovanni recommends asking questions that generate interest. He suggests, “Forget the old ‘what do you do?’ conversation. Recently, I heard someone ask, ‘So, Nancy, are you cool?’ and you wouldn’t believe the conversation that followed!”
2. Drive traffic to a lead magnet or free resource You’ve done your research. You know who will attend the event. Now it’s time to add value. Create a lead magnet or free resource for the people you meet.
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Create Your Success Strategy
Not familiar with lead magnets? They’re a terrific opportunity to add value. All you have to do is create a resource and then share it as part of your follow-up process. You’ll get their contact information, and they’ll get a useful tool. Make it a format that’s easy to deliver by email. The trick is coming up with an offering that your new contacts and/or potential prospects desire.
So what kind of lead magnet or free resource should you offer? Ask yourself, “What would be most useful to other participants at the conference?” There’s probably a piece of your business that aligns with the event content. Give it away as supplemental information to anyone in need. How about a report of helpful industry tips written in your own words? Or maybe you know a way to simplify a difficult task.
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Conference Day
Sharing it would make your new friends’ lives easier. If you’ve interviewed a thought leader, think about offering a video of all their insights There’s no need to rack your brain on this one. Just take great notes at the conference and offer a summary as a gift. Jump to the next section for more tips on how to make the process of delivering it really easy.
3. Automate your follow up According to a study conducted by Gartner Research, companies that automate their lead management experience a 10 percent or greater increase in revenue in six to nine months.
You’ve connected with all those new people. Why not make the follow-up easy? Personalized automated follow up, referred to often as sales and marketing automation, simplifies the process and ensures that follow up happens. Have you ever wished you had ten hands and two brains to help get everything done in your business? That’s what sales and marketing automation can do for you. And it’s especially helpful when it comes to simplifying your follow-up process with new contacts. With automation you can create customized follow-up emails. These are often referred to as campaigns, and can be sent to multiple people at the same time. We’re not talking about generic emails with a “Hey you!” salutation either. With good sales and marketing automation software, you can add
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elements to your follow-up email campaigns as unique as the people you meet. And all without having to manually compose and send each individual email. If you’re an Infusionsoft user, our apps and campaigns make automation a no-brainer. For plug and play options, try out the free Live Event Networking and Mobile Networking campaigns (– note: to learn about these campaigns you can view a video training here.) These campaigns enable you to tag a new contact as someone you met at this specific event. Then they run a sequence of emails that are geared specifically to them as follow-up. There’s even a spot to drop in your lead magnet. The emails will tell the recipient how much you enjoyed meeting them. The app will even drop in personal details, like how much you loved their polka dot tie, using a custom contact field in the setup process.
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What’s a “tag” anyway? Sales and marketing automation software can categorize contacts by types. Often called “tags,” a user can add category identifiers to each contact. Tags remind us of many things: where we met the person, which newsletters to send them, and even what pages on our website they’ve clicked. When building an email campaign, a tag can be selected to identify the right audience for that particular campaign. For example, you could tag everyone you meet at your next event with a tag referencing the name of the event. Then set your campaign up to email anyone with that tag assigned to them. Only the people from that event (who you’ve tagged as having attended) will get those follow-up emails.
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If you’re not an Infusionsoft user—or are not ready to jump into sales and marketing automation just yet—you can make following up manually easier. Sending individual emails is a daunting and time-consuming task. To simplify the job, create an email template you can use when you return from the event. The message can be generic. You’ll copy and paste, then add specifics for each contact. Incorporate in at least one personalized element so they know you care. (For example, referencing something you discussed at the event.) Just be careful! When you copy and paste it can be easy to accidently send an email with the wrong name or detail. Take the time to double check before you hit send.
Try Video! Danielle Watson, creator of The Purse Process (™) and the Suddenly Single podcast, and a serial networker who has booked dozens of radio, podcast, and TV interviews by attending events, recommends recording short videos to personalize your follow-up. Got an extra ten minutes and a hot lead? A video lets that contact see your sincerity. They’ll know how much you enjoyed meeting them.
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Conference Day! “The best way to predict the future is to create it.” - Abraham Lincoln
Here’s where the rubber meets the road. All that prep work is now behind you. It’s time to execute your strategy. When you get to the event, dive into making those connections, both in-person and virtually. If the event host has provided a hashtag or an app, get in on the discussions. You’d be surprised how many additional connections you’ll make. If there are organized mixers or networking events on the agenda, attend them! Remember your “how can I add the most value?” strategy. Queue up your unique conversational questions. And prepare to connect like crazy. How about arranging a meetup with a group of your new contacts? You could explore the conference expo together. If you do this, host a quick meeting before hitting the expo floor.
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Determine what resources each person needs. That way the whole group can help with the search as you explore the expo floor. Each time you meet a new person, whip out your smart phone and use a tool like Infusionsoft’s Snap app to add their contact information to your Infusionsoft account. With Snap, just take a photo of their business card and, voila, their information is added directly to your Infusionsoft account. Then give them back their business card to offer to the next person they meet. They’ll save cards, and you won’t have to add it to your dusty pile at home. (Win-win for you both!) If you’re not using Snap, try Camcard. The free version of this app works on both Apple and Android smartphones, and allows for up to 200 cards to be scanned and added right to your phone’s contact list. Or upgrade to the paid version for unlimited contact adds. Take the power of automation a step further. Add the conference tag you created earlier to their contact, and your automation sequence can start right away, even before you get home!
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Masters Social Media Networking Tip Snap a photo of yourself in front of a landmark at the event (like an expo booth or easily recognizable break area) and post on social media with the event’s hashtag. In your post, invite people to meet you at that location. Specify a time later that day. Then prepare for some group networking. (If the event hosts have provided an app for the event, you could post it there as well!)
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Post-Event Follow-Up “Follow up right away! Even if it takes all day.” - Giovanni Marsico
Follow up shortly after returning home. The longer you put it off, the less likely you’ll be to get to it at all. Block off time, maybe the entire day, following your homecoming to reach back to new contacts. Show them you loved meeting them. Make follow up easier! If you have contact information you didn’t capture with your phone app at the event, use it to capture photos of all those business cards now. Snap will add their info to your Infusionsoft account automatically and Camcard will add them to the cloud so you can access them from their web app on your laptop later. Don’t forget to tag them for any automation or lead magnet delivery you’ll provide. Decide which leads are “hot” and require more immediate action. Set meetings with those leads. Add notes to their contact information in your contact management app. For
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the odd contact that doesn’t turn into an immediate sale, create a long-term nurture process for ongoing follow up and relationship building. Just because they declined today doesn’t mean they won’t become a client tomorrow. According to a MarketingSherpa study, poor follow-up accounts for missed sales conversions on 79 percent of leads. That’s a lot! For the long-term follow up, think about resources each contact might find valuable. Then research and share items that can fill their needs. All right, you did it! You prepped and planned. You strategized and executed. You followed-up and nurtured relationships by adding value. We hope you made a few sales because of your new conference attending skills! Now all that’s left to do is to find a new knick-knack to take the place of the stack of dusty business cards that no longer darkens your desk. (Oh, and if you found this guide helpful, click here to share it now!)
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Worksheet Don’t end up with another stack of dusty business cards on your desk! Use this handy worksheet to prep for your next conference and leave with a stack of new clients instead.
Start With Your Mindset Answer the following questions to get clear on how this event will help you and your business: 1. What’s your purpose for attending? What will you get out of being at this event? And how will it impact your business or life?
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2. What result do you want to achieve? How many new clients could you connect with at this event? Is there a specific skill you’re hoping to learn? Set a goal and go after it!
3. How can you add value for others? Be a giver! What resources can you offer to the people you meet at this conference?
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Craft Your Success Strategy Pre-event networking prep - check each item off as you complete it Review the attendee list for possible connections Make contact before you go Create your own conference agenda Invite your clients/partners Connect with speakers and influencers Organize group meetups Prepare and practice your elevator pitch Extra Credit: List five unique questions you can ask new connections to generate engaging conversations: 1. 2. 3. 4. 5.
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Drive traffic to a lead magnet or free resource Decide what the content of your lead magnet will comprise Create the lead magnet Determine your delivery method Automate delivery so it’s ready to go when you arrive at the conference
Automate your follow up Setup your automation campaigns to manage your follow up Personalize your campaign emails, including creating a custom field for personal details you can add for each contact you meet If not using automation software, draft an email template to send out manually post-conference
At the event Use social media to connect, including the event hashtag or app provided by hosts, if any Download Infusionsoft’s Snap App—or a similar tool—to capture contact information from your new connections Organize a group gathering and invite your new contacts Post-Conference Follow Up Block off the day after you return home for follow up
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Use the Snap App—or a similar tool—to capture any remaining contact information from business cards collected, tag them to add them to your campaigns Add personalized information for each new contact to the custom field you created to populate automatically into your follow up campaigns If not using automation software, manually send out follow up emails Identify “hot” leads and set up meetings Record personalized videos to add to your hottest follow up emails Create a nurture process for leads that will not turn into clients right away
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About the Authors Amy and Tom Birks are every mission driven entrepreneur’s marketing dream team. Combining their copywriting and strategic coaching superpowers, they deliver exponential growth tactics and execution plans, alongside powerful wordsmithing. From calculated launch plans to customized email marketing campaigns, and everything in between, Team Birks provides the whole marketing enchilada.
Amy Birks People call Amy Birks “the Strategy Ninja.” Helping mission-driven entrepreneurs worldwide, Amy guides clients to grow their impact, reach, and revenue in a flash She powers up her human GPS to create customized strategies and fast-action execution plans. Clients love receiving a detailed. www.amybirks.com
Tom Birks As a copywriter for entrepreneurs, Tom Birks converts words into revenue. He specializes in creating unique voices for business owners; a voice that represents the best version of them and their gifts. From sales pages to email marketing, and everything in between, Tom transforms his clients’ words into compelling messages their ideal customers love.
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