MBA1734 Why You Should Start a Small Conference

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Hey oh. Welcome to the $100 MBA Show. Because your business needs you at your best. That's why we deliver daily 10 minute business lessons for the real world. I'm your host, your coach, your teacher, Omar Zenholm. I'm also the co founder of Webinar Ninja, a self funded software company I started with my partner back in 2014. And in today's lesson you will learn why you should start a small conference. A conference? Omar, with COVID going on. Is this guy nuts? No, I am not nuts. I will explain in person. Conferences have an incredible impact on you as a person as well as a brand. By being the connector, by being the person that brings people together, you gain instant credibility. Become the person that that helps other people. People want to work with people like that. And as they say, your network is your net worth. So no matter what happens in your business, you can always rely on your network to help you out. But how do you start one? And why would you want to do one? Even during COVID Well, notice that the title of today's episode and lesson is why you should start a small conference. Let me explain in today's lesson why you should do it, how you can do it, and all the benefits you'll gain by having your own conference.

Let's get into it.

Let's get down to business.

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Let's first start with the elephant in the room Having a physical in person conference during COVID Let me begin by saying that planning a conference, whether it's big or small, takes time and I can't speak for every country in the world. Depending on where you live, you can use some time because it's going to take some time for things to slowly go back to normal or at least ease up with the restrictions. For many Western countries, they're about six to nine months away from herd immunity with vaccines. Just enough time for you to start planning a conference. Now when I say a small conference, I mean a small conference, even a retreat, so to speak. Why not have a small 20 person conference, a 10 person conference so that every attendee is a VIP ticket holder. Now there's a lot of benefits of having a small gathering, a small retreat, a small conference, one everybody gets to know each other very easily, it's a more comfortable environment for all the attendees and there's a lot less room for disaster. It's so much easier to plan something that's smaller, that doesn't require so much planning. The bigger conference, the more issues you're going to face, more challenges you're going to face. If you're running something for a dozen people, you need a small venue you can sell out in a week. If you're going to cater, you can get your local cafe to cater it. It just makes life a whole lot easier. I Another benefit is that if this is your first conference, the smaller the better. See this as a minimal viable type of situation where you want to just see all the moving parts of running any kind of conference. Let's start small. You might even want to consider doing this as a one day conference where you run out some space. In a co working space you may want to do a two day thing or even a full on retreat where a group of you and other like minded people in your industry go on a trip together. Now why would you want to do that? Well number one, small conferences are hard to compete with because many people are going big, they're going really large and if they can't do a large conference, they just don't do it at all. So it's very hard to compete with a tiny conference, something that people don't even see on their radar. But you can easily find 20 people that you know and invite them to your event. With small conferences, you can get really niche, you can get really specific. You can keep it tight. With small conferences, you can even keep it small enough to be within the COVID restrictions in your country. For example, in Australia, the maximum amount of people that can gather in one place for an event is 50 people. That's well over what we need for a small conference. So why put in the work and do this? I mentioned that by being the connector, you become the influencer, really, you become the person that people look to and want to do business with, but be beyond that. It's good for you to learn from other people. It's good for you to connect and get to know people on a deeper level. And if you're going to spend a day or two or three with them, that's going to happen next. People are hungry for connection. Covid has really started us of that. So even if it's a small conference for a day or two, people are going to be attracted to that. They're going to be hungry for that. It's going to be something easy to sell. And by attending this conference, the attendees are going to talk about you and your business and what you do to other people. This is indirect marketing in some way. Yes, it's a small group, but if you invite the right people, they'll have great influence and be able to spread it far and wide. Third, it's fun. Running a small conference is like running a small party. Get a chance to have some fun with some people that you really connect with. And yes, you're doing it under the umbrella of business, but we all love what we do and this is a way for us to express it and enjoy it with other people. Another reason is that from my experience, when you run an event, you learn a ton in the process. Creating and running an event teaches you a lot about logistics, planning, being in service, and really dealing with different types of people. Event planning is totally different than selling a product or service. And getting your feet wet with something small will give you a taste and say, hey, is this something that I want to maybe keep on doing, Go deeper in, expand in maybe something that I didn't really enjoy? It's not such a commitment. But regardless, you will learn a lot if your event is a hit, if it's successful, you can be sure that people will be talking about it and the Thing about small conferences is that it's exclusive. People want to be a part of it. People want to go next year. Don't be surprised after you run your first small conference that your inbox starts to get a little busy. In my opinion, if you're going to run a small conference, it's okay for you to charge a little bit more. People will enjoy the little bit of luxury, the niceties, the things that make them remember the event, whether it's a small gift, whether it's the meal they were served, whether it was the ambiance or the location you had the event. And now, with social media and people taking pictures every five seconds, your conference will be on everybody's Instagram feed in no time. But essentially, what I love about small conferences is that it allows you to network in a huge way with very little capital, with very little commitment, with very little planning, or I should say minimum planning. And it's such a huge commitment, you can try. If it works out, awesome. Keep on going. When you have a small group and you're only meeting for a day or two, it's not that hard. And the returns are huge. For the minimum amount of input and time and effort and finances you're going to have to put behind it.

We've all been there. You hold on to a coupon, but forget about it and suddenly it's Expired.

Expired in 2012.

Dang it.

Fortunately, by switching to Geico, you could save about $900 on car insurance without ever touching a coupon.

It feels good to save big. It feels good to geico.

To wrap today's lesson. If you love connecting with people, if you want to be the tastemaker in your industry, if you want to meet new people or people that can really take your business to the next level through partnerships, a small conference is a great way to get your foot in the door and really get that ball rolling. My advice, the first time around, invite the people to your small conference that you know would love to attend, people that you already know in your local community, your local business community that you have around you. If things go great, the next time you run that conference, whether it's in a few months or in the next year, word will get around and you'll be able to get other people that may not know you yet but want to go to your conference because of what they heard about it on social or what they heard about it from other people. So think about this, especially when you're making your guest list. Who do you want to really connect with? Who knows that person. A first step would be inviting that person, okay? Because they'll tell them about your conference after they've enjoyed it. My last piece of advice is force yourself to make sure that this is a minimal, viable experiment the first time around, around. Optimize for ease and convenience. Keep it small, keep it simple but enjoyable. Okay? And it's okay to get in front of that and say that the first time. Hey, this is just the first time we're doing this. This is mvp. If everybody loves it, we'll do it again next year. But bigger and a little bit better. Thanks so much for listening to the 100 LMBA show. If you love it here, make sure you subscribe so you never miss a beat. By hitting subscribe, you get our next episode automatically. It's that simple. Go ahead and do that. It's absolutely free. And you can do it on any podcast app that you listen to or use, like Apple Podcasts or Stitcher Radio or Spotify. Before I go, I want to leave you with this. That in person connection can never be replaced. This is just in our DNA as human beings. The memories we have, the impressions we make on other people when we're in person is so powerful. This is the power of a conference. And by doing a small one, you can taste that power. You can really enjoy that power. You can benefit from that DNA that's in all of us, even if it's just a handful of people. Thanks so much for listening and I'll check you in tomorrow's episode. I'll see you then. Take care.

We've all been there. You hold on to a coupon, but forget about it and suddenly it's Expired.

Expired in 2012.

Dang it.

Fortunately, by switching to Geico, you could save about 900 on car insurance without ever touching a coupon.

It feels good to save big. It feels good to Geico.