The BusyEvent Blog

What Part of Status Quo Don’t We Understand? #eventprofs #cema

During the first day of the Corporate Event Marketing Association’s Summit, there was a very intriguing discussion about “insurgents” and “incumbents” delivered in a talk by keynote speaker Scott Miller, author of “The Underdog Advantage”.

In it, he discusses how “It’s the toughest environment ever for incumbents and market leaders. Insurgents, revolutionaries and underdogs hold all the cards now.”

Which of course got me thinking . . . what is it about the status quo that we don’t understand?

As Event Bookmarking continues to gain acceptance in the market and as we talk to our clients about the use of our tools, we continue to be impressed with how much effort is required to help people accomplish the things they know they want and struggle with doing because of their tie to the past.

In the events industry, ‘the way it’s always been done’ is a powerful force.  Even though doing it the old way, produces sub-standard results, that level of comfort with “I know what I’ll get” is at the same time both comforting and frustrating.

And, here’s an example.  About a week ago, I went to the movies with my family and used many of the free and easy tools to make the experience enjoyable; we used the internet to determine the movie we wanted to see, SMS with our daughter’s to make the final decision, MovieTickets.com to purchase the tickets and the special tickets-pickup desk when we got to the theater.

Which is when I got the surprise that I’ve never really noticed before.

When we got to the theater I couldn’t help notice that there were about 50 people in the ‘ticket window line’ and NO ONE was using the ticket kiosks, not 25 feet away.  It got me thinking “why would someone choose to wait in line for 20 minutes, when a viable and proven alternative was 25 feet away?”

Other than techno-nervousness or perhaps the lack of a credit card, how much a role did ’status quo’ play in their decisions?  And, taken further, how much is ’status quo’ a challenge to the events industry:

• Why would an event planner choose to put their attendees through an arduous ‘badge line’ when airline-style kiosks or even better, Smartphone-based check-in is now available?
• Why would an event planner choose to put their exhibitors through a process that produces a ‘list of the list’ rather than truly qualified leads?
• Why would a speaker, with all the tools available to them, choose to give the same talk time-after-time rather than make use of the engaging Web 2.0 tools that are so prevalent you can’t escape them?
• Why would people choose the expensive or arduous path, when viable, cost effective and easier alternatives exist?

So, in a time of transition with the air so rich with opportunity are you falling prey to the status quo?  In essence, are you an incumbent or an insurgent?

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