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Fred Showker shares the secrets of the pros for making your group's meeting, presentation or seminar a huge success
Preface: In the late '80s to mid '90s I traveled to roughly 20 cities a year giving seminars and workshops in the design and publishing fields. I had presented at every Macworld Expo except one, up until IDG took over. Being sponsored by top-rated, professional seminar brokers like In-House Graphics, Dynamic Graphics and MultiCom taught me some very valuable lessons on successful presentations management.
Having successful presentations and meetings relies heavily on making the host successful and giving attendees a lot of value. The success for me was getting invited back! For seven years I was invited back to Chicago, Boston and San Francisco at least once a year. And repeat attendees were always a welcome sight, indicating a successful presentation the previous visit.
So, the following are some of the more important techniques (aside from the presentation itself,) that you can put to work for your user group's meetings and presentations.
When your group presents a member or guest speaker presentation it can be one of the most effective ways to increase your group's exposure and community image. Besides marketing and promoting the group, other organizations are always looking for speakers. When they discover just how successful your presentations have been, they may just get in touch for a presentation in their organiztion. The following will help you maximize your opportunities.
Send out press releases to local papers announcing the title of the upcoming speaker and presentation. You can get great free publicity by sending the topic and some highlights of the talk to the newspaper, radio and TV stations. Pick out some key points that would attract as many reader's as possible.
Produce a flyer with a picture and brief profile to distribute to members. This can be a simple business card or postcard sized piece. Publicize the event on your website and in your newsletter or any mailings you are doing. Make sure this publicity gets into the hands of your members who don't ordinarily attend meetings. If you have a list of prospects, consider inviting them to attend as well.
Make the speaker and officers available before the official meeting begins to greet and meet the audience. Any opportunity to build a rapport with the attendees will pay off later.
I learned this technique through speaker training at the DMA. It is practiced by professional speakers and is known to increases audience attention and retention. I would always arrive early to greet the audience while they were checking in -- doing my best to actually shake hands with as many as I could. "Pressing flesh" it's called. Bonding with the audience ahead of time almost guarantees their undivided attention.
In small crowds it's easy. If the numbers are up over 100 to 300 you can only hit a few -- but that doesn't matter -- being seen mixing with the audience is enough.
Always distribute handouts and the group's business card. Make the handout something of value that will be retained. If it's a speaker from outside of the group, offer to include their contact info as well. (If the speaker is a pro, a hand-out will be available in advance! I shipped handouts, promo sheets and question cards directly to all hosts the week before the event. They would be on the attendees' seats prior to arrival. I also brought more along.)
Include a bullet list of tips or secrets that will be presented, and perhaps thumbnails of some of the key slides. Include marketing and contact information for the group, and perhaps the speaker -- don't forget a plug for an upcoming event. Try to make the handout something that is especially valuable to the recipient. You may be surprised how long these sheets may float around -- continuing to promote the group.
One activity I've always conducted at my seminars and workshops for DGEF, MultiCom, and even Macworld, is to distribute 3 x 5 "Question" cards to all attendees as they enter. My cards are pre-printed, urging the attendee to submit their most important question for the seminar. A volunteer collects the cards during the talk and I address these questions at the end of the talk.
This keeps the questions anonymous and takes care of the timid or bashful attendees who normally would not speak up. It also guarantees that everyone will hear the question because the speaker will be reading them from the cards! You not only avoid heckler questions, but you can scan the cards to select the most frequently asked questions, or those that have a high entertainment value. The audience always loves this technique. (I've had brokers contract me to speak based on this reputation alone.)
The real hidden benefit here is that you go away with a stack of questions which give you the pulse of the audience. Use these to help build future workshops or presentations -- or even content for the newsletter! This is opportunity in its purest form.
Another way to get audience participation is to give out an evaluation form. Giving them a way to provide you with opinions and feedback makes them feel important. You may want to offer a door prize as incentive for handing in the evaluation. (If you've ever been to an Adobe presentation, you'll remember they give no goodies without that completed form!) The door prize can be modest, a book or tape that would follow the presentation topic and be of interest to the attendees. Collect all of the evaluations before the evening is over to select a winner of the prize.
This form should request names and contact information. Don't forget to ask "What kinds of presentations would you most like to see?"
Be sure to provide a place on the form where participants can list other groups that might need speakers and the program chairperson or other contact person. Perhaps ask for other organizations to which they belong. Groups are always looking for speakers and when someone has heard this presentation it becomes a great referral.
Arrange to have your speaker and group officers stay after your talk to mingle with the audience. There's nothing like that personal touch to make the event a memorable one.
Be sure to offer some form of follow-up and continued contact. This can be as simple as a web page form, email address or phone number. Offer additional support and to answer any questions that might come up.
If you are presenting for another organization or group out side of your UG, (Whether paid or not,) ask for some other form of compensation. A free ad in the group's newsletter might be a fair exchange, a link on their web site, or perhaps a complementary membership. In most cases they'll be more than happy to oblige, and your group gets yet another opportunity to market and promote.
I picked up one of my best advertising clients, once upon a time, from the mention in the organization's newsletter. Never underestimate the powers of people networking!
If you were the speaker, don't forget to send a thank you note to the person who invited you. In these days of the internet and email, thank-you notes still deliver a huge impact on the recipient -- particularly when attractive and hand-written. You can be sure it will be kept.
These are just a few of the lessons I learned while a member of the National Speakers Assocition, and my years as a contract presenter for various presentation brokers. From 1988 until around 1996 I conducted four different workshops for Dynamic Graphics and MultiCom (brokers) on topics related to graphic design, newsletter design and web design. All of the above techniques add a great deal to the attendee's experience. The evaluation forms were indispensable for fine-tuning the seminars, and the personal contact before and after the formal presentation made it a personal experience for everyone involved.
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