Quote:
Originally Posted by NetBilling
As a sponsor and attendee of almost every show for the past 10 years, I think Free or discounted registration prices are where we need to be with all of the shows out there now. I love AVN, love Xbiz, and the CCbill shows too and well as Cybernet and Webmaster access but I do think if you want to get people to your shows you have to make it cost effective to be there. To be totally effective, you need to have low cost admission, low cost hotel rooms and not be at a location where food and drink are priced out too. Otherwise, you are only going to get the few of us that can really afford to bring ourselves and our staff, and this will leave out many webmasters and affiliates.
NOTE: All of these shows are great for us as a billing company. You guys need to focus on getting the affiliates there because as you know, the program owners are there to make affiliate deals and it all trickles down from there. Many programs do not come and attend or sponsor anymore because many of the affiliates are not attending.... get them there somehow.
IMO
Mitch
|
Hey Mitch -
In addition to everything I said before regarding why I'm skeptical of free badges... no matter how much D-Money disagree. ;)
Something for you to consider. At the end of the day, the people who are running these shows (like YNOT, AVN, etc) need to make sure the COST of running the shows is covered. It's not a simple matter to organize shows like these... there's a lot on the line, and you want everyone to have a good and profitable time, feel like the show was worth attending, etc. Nobody in their right mind is going to run a show at a big loss. It just makes no sense. And I think we all would agree that the people who run these shows SHOULD at least cover their own costs.
The only serious ways to do that is through sponsorships and registrations. So, if you make the registrations free, that means you have to shift the burden of cost over to the sponsors. And since most sponsors get hit up to sponsor a ton of shows each year, is that really appropriate? It's also getting harder for the sponsors, and if they drop out, NONE of us will have shows to attend.
I totally agree about keeping costs as low as possible. That's been the approach at Cybernet for years now. That's why we've been a regular event in June for many, many years, and will be back next June as well. We had hotel rooms for WELL under $200 in San Francisco. Low badge costs for advance registration.
AND.... we also made sure our sponsors weren't soaked, because they too need to see some ROI.