Last weekend I attended a lovely convention for about 400 women. The speakers were top notch, the content was outstanding. The problem was, I only collected a couple of business cards the entire day. Granted this was the first attempt by this group to put together such a large event. However, the snafus were major and not uncommon in similar events.
It started out with no name tags. I thought . . . . Hmmm.
Vendors were situated throughout the banquet room. Nice to look at, but when each speaker finished and ran to up sell their wares, part of the crowd went with them making it impossible to focus on the next speaker.
Too many speakers. The event was scheduled to run 8:30am – 5pm with a VIP lunch. It ran until after 8pm.
The lunch was on the fly with the people who paid to eat getting in line and sitting down at random unset tables, while those who didn’t pay were forced to find a meal somewhere else. This left people eating alone at empty tables. Not conducive to networking.
There were no networking breaks except for 2, 10 minute intervals throughout the entire day (excluding lunch) Not even time to go to the bathroom, especially with 400 women all vying for a stall.
So was it worth it? Well, as I said, the speakers and content were outstanding, but after 20 speakers who could remember?
If I had followed each speaker to each up sell table, I probably would have spent $100,000 all in one day.
The event planners hearts were in it, but I could see much more tweaking for next year.
Are you looking for a place you can network, learn, earn, and not be up sold at the same time? Give Rebecca Olkowski, business connections expert a call at 818-515-7880
About Rebecca Olkowski
I'm a 30 + year voice over actor, blogger, WordPress Blog Consultant and a gal who loves to have fun. I'm on a mission to travel the world in style. Can you give me a lift?
