Looking at the “breaking news” today that some poor kid received an invoice for not attending a friends birthday party. (full story here) I know from experience of organising friends stag do’s for example, that you book things on a shared cost per person coming and if one suddenly can’t make it, you can’t suddenly pass that cost on to all of your other friends who may be sticking to a budget. Inevitably you take the hit. I think, that if they agreed to go and knew it would cost X amount of money then they should pay (get payment up front maybe?!). But sending your friends an invoice? That’s a whole other discussion…I mean wow!
What can organisers learn from this? They’re constantly looking at new ways of increasing conversion. Some are starting to charge for seminars or event entries (trade shows are typically free to attend in the UK). It’s one thing if you have a £000+ event charge, delegates are likely to go anyway. But what if you’re charging a nominal entry fee say £20 or seminar bookings at £25 a go? Is that enough to warrant someone committing to attending, if you’re not just looking at increasing your bottom line?
You’d hope that your delegates would be able to afford the small entry fee to gain knowledge from the sessions you’re hosting and of course the exhibitors they’ll see as well. As we keep hearing, content is king. It was previously king of the web (and still is), but it’s also king of your show floor.
But, what about changing that idea… What about saying you’ll refund them if they attend? Would that work? You’ll only know if you try it (and can report on it!!). So without suddenly having revenues come in and out of your bottom line, why not test it?
You A/B split test everything else (or certainly should be), so why not A/B trial this with your visitor reg campaign? It’s pretty easy to do and who knows… you might increase that sought after conversion rate.