Marketing conventions to build attendance has never been as important as it is now. Just ask your nearest event stakeholder. Fortunately, CVBs are coming up with solutions.

When a survey of 120 association meeting planners by the International Congress & Convention Association appeared in September, many were not surprised that the report indicated that 46 percent of respondents were getting less financial support for their largest events in areas such as sponsorship and exhibition revenue. Declining attendance was also a concern.

As the global economic malaise continues to impact convention attendance, planners and other stakeholders are looking for whatever serious help they can muster to encourage registration and make revenue resources go further.

Old media—such as splashy full-color destination brochures, visitor guides and direct mail cards—are still enticing attendees. And most everyone these days is into e-mail blasts and new media messaging with Twitter, Facebook and Flickr to build the numbers. Customization is also employed, especially with tailor-made microsites on destination marketing websites, designed to address specific meeting client needs.

What’s really notable in this recessionary era, however, is the creativity event managers are using to achieve acceptable or even excellent attendance levels. Planners are finding some of their most helpful partners—especially for citywide events—to be CVBs. Bureaus are working harder than ever to not only snare the bookings, but also to assist clients through the event marketing process and beyond.

Star Power
Top executives and sports and entertainment celebrities can be convincing salespeople, and the bureaus of both New Orleans and Houston have made video productions for citywide clients this year utilizing this kind of star power.

Catherine Wagner, marketing associate with the American Society of Anesthesiologists in Park Ridge, Ill., says her 2009 New Orleans annual meeting of nearly 16,000 attendees got a big boost from a CVB-sponsored video project.

"We collaborated with the bureau to write a script and shoot the video in the city, something we had never done before," Wagner says. "We called in the local doctor committee chair and the convention chair to talk about the education we were offering, what would be going on in the exhibit hall and what would be going on in the city. Then we sent out an e-mail blast with a link off the main meeting site."

Wagner says representatives of the New Orleans bureau came and spoke to the association’s staff in Park Ridge. They also did presentations about the city to key organization committees and last year’s annual meeting attendees.

"New Orleans goes above and beyond to get out their message and to move people beyond any lingering concerns about the effects of the Katrina hurricane on the city," Wagner says. "We definitely believe the video made a big difference with attendance, but we doubt we’ll get the same option in the West Coast city where we’ll be in 2010."

One citywide meetings customer reaped attendance benefits from the Houston CVB’s expansion of its successful MyHouston celebrity and local citizens marketing campaign that has used luminaries such as George Foreman, Beyonce and President and Mrs. George H.W. Bush to extol the city’s attributes.

"We had a meeting of elementary school principals coming to town, so we integrated some of their key people with the celebrities in talking about our city’s appeal," says Lindsey Brown, spokesperson for the Greater Houston CVB. "An e-mail blast called attention to the link off the convention microsite."

 Marketing Summits
In Atlanta and Orlando, bureaus are melding the marketing, creative and event management powers of customers, bureau staffs and outside consultants for the benefit of citywide clients.

"Customers typically ask for one point person at a bureau," says Bob Schuler, vice president of sales for the Atlanta CVB, "but when folks with like backgrounds and expertise talk with each other in a conference room, you get one big brain storming session. We are doing these client orientation meetings to flesh out logistics and marketing matters like attendance-building."

One of Atlanta’s biggest customers is the International Poultry Show, which comes to town with about 20,000 attendees annually. In 2009, a new idea bore great attendance fruit when the bureau marshaled its restaurant community to do "Featherfest," a week they said was "going to the birds."

"Each restaurant created a specific chicken or egg dish in honor of the citywide meeting," Schuler says. "We worked with the industry’s trade press to promote the idea, and the client put it into all their promotional materials and website. Because many pro sports teams have a bird as a mascot—like the Atlanta Hawks basketball—we got team mascots to hand out flyers on the trade show floor so attendees could vote for their favorite dish. The client was very energized by this partnership and we’re doing it again in 2010."

Exhibitors are also a focus for Atlanta CVB marketing. A citywide client’s top 10 or so exhibitors get invited on a familiarization trip to the city several months prior to the event so they can scope out venues for their customer events.

"Our goal is to bring them in, showcase our top locations and get them excited about the city," Schuler says. "If they expect to bring in 100 people to their event, we want them to increase that to 150. Trade media are coming in ahead of time, too, on fams. This helps create pre-show press and excitement about the city.

"We’re also sending our convention services and public relations people to a customer’s event the year prior to their Atlanta year," Schuler continues. "And we are visiting tentative customers who might be making booking decisions for four to five years out."

Gary Sain, Orlando/Orange County CVB president and CEO, says his bureau’s new "brand summits" bring marketing expertise to brainstorming sessions about event theme, content, demographics and other customer objectives.

"We bring in our own PR agency for those customers who want this as well as the brand marketing expertise of our own staff," Sain says. "We are finding customers want not just our facilities and attractions; they also want marketing partners who can help them meet their numbers.

"We recently used this approach with one of the biggest brand names in the food industry," Sain continues. "Our brand summit helped the client create a high sense of urgency about attending the event—the sort of ‘everyone will be there’ approach—and they were very pleased at the results."

Orlando is also firing on other meetings fronts for mutual benefit. In its Roadmap 2010 project, it is combining citywide sales teams from the CVB and the Orange County Convention Center in one location for greater impact and efficiencies. According to Sain, this approach is an industry groundbreaker, because pulling teams like this together in one location is rare.

Direct and e-mail campaigns are in the Fort Worth CVB’s repertoire. To build attendance among a group of educators, the bureau recently created a "Field Trip to Fort Worth" project that included branded school supplies mailed in custom lunchboxes.

"Coming up this year will be more tech tools to help build attendance for citywide events," says John Cychol, the CVB’s vice president of sales.