As event marketing professionals, you’ve got to keep things fresh with new ideas or else you’ll fall behind. It’s your role to stay up-to-date with the industry standards! That’s why we’ve put together a list of 2009 conferences and exhibitions for trade show and event marketers. With all of the other things you need to plan ahead for, make sure to mark your calendar and save room in your budget. Before registering, you may want to consider the top 5 reasons why you should make an effort to attend:

1. Stay informed on the latest and greatest - Learn from your peers and the top leaders in the event marketing industry.

2. Make sure to network - Build your inside connections while attending conference seminars, mixers, and parties (sure, you’ll learn some interesting stuff while sitting in those sessions, but personally engaging in conversation with conference attendees is a huge benefit).

3. Pitch speaking opportunities - Your business can gain excellent visibility as a guest speaker (plus, you’ll be well-respected as a thought-leader), so encourage your executives to get on the speaker list.

4. Get noticed in the Expo Hall - Exhibit your products and evangelize what you do!

5. Drum up new business & maintain client relationships

*Special Note: Make one-on-one contacts with industry media - Conference organizers often provide a pre-registered press list upon request. This presents a great opportunity to meet reporters in person rather than pursuing them blindly with an email or phone call!

Here are some of the upcoming events listed in chronological order:

The Special Event 2009 will be held from January 28 - 30, 2009 at the San Diego Convention Center. This event is for any professional who produces events (weddings, parties, corporate events, and celebrations). There will be over 300+ vendors on the showroom floor. We attended last year’s conference in Atlanta, GA and were surprised by the huge extravaganza of entertainers, caterers, decorators…acrobats, balloons, and color galore!

2009 Event Solutions and Catersource Conference & Tradeshow will be held at the Las Vegas Hilton and Convention Center from February 22 - 26, 2009. This event will host more than 7,000 attendees and 1,000 tradeshow booths, this is the biggest show in the events and catering industry. Educational workshops/seminars with a wide variety of key learning sessions are available. You can now register here.

Exhibitor 2009 will be held from March 23-25, 2009 at Mandalay Bay Convention Center in Las Vegas. The event, which is hailed as being a “world conference and exhibition for trade show and corporate event marketers,” is produced by Exhibitor Media Group. 6,000 attendees and 300 exhibitors are expected to be there.

ISES Eventworld 2009 will be held from August 6 - 8, 2009 at the San Francisco Marriott Hotel in San Francisco, CA. 500+ attendees and more info will be provided as the date gets closer.

If you’re aware of any additional event marketing conferences that aren’t listed, please feel free to leave a “comment” and we’ll be sure to include it!

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Online Market World is the leading summit for online sellers, merchants, and marketers and innovative minds who want to understand how to better leverage the internet to market products.  For those of you selling online, from products to tickets, the show is an opportunity to hear how to capitalize on the ongoing list of online markets including Amazon, Google, MSN, Facebook, and Shopping.com with multi-channel sales and service strategies.

Taking place at Moscone Center West October 1-3, Online Market World brings together industry notables including:

• Marsha Collier
• Tony Hsieh
• John Squire
• Matt Franklin

Keynote speaker Kathy Ireland, now CEO & Chief Designers of Kathy Ireland Worldwide, will share her thoughts on growing a brand in these times of media change.  We’re also excited to learn the secrets of effective blogging with Karen O’Brien, a “tightwad’s” opportunity to usability test (a key component of designing your site) with Jack Aaronson, and, led by Digital Axle’s Bruce Carlisle, how to navigate the online advertising maze!

Register now to attend this exceptional event or find other great resources and benefits at onlinemarketworld.com

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Hey L.A. Event Planners!

Zvents is exhibiting on June 5th at the L.A. Event Style Expo, and we’d love to meet you there! Get a free pass to the show (a $60 value!) when you register and use the promotional code PPLA. This special one-day event takes place at the Los Angeles Convention Center.

Stop by the Zvents Booth (#530) and Mention this Blog Post and get a Free T-Shirt!

Show admission includes these special events:

10:15 - 11 a.m.
Keynote Presentation by Lynda Resnick
The marketing mind behind brands like POM Wonderful and FIJI Water, Lynda Resnick knows how to integrate events into successful branding campaigns. Matching the right events with the right customers is key to her success. During this keynote presentation, discover the strategies she employed at high-profile events such as the Academy, Golden Globe, and Emmy awards to ultimately make her brands household names. She’ll offer keen insights into today’s competitive marketplace and share tips for the ultimate event business success.

3 p.m. to 3:45 p.m.
Behind the Scenes at the GRAMMY Awards: What it Takes to Make Mega Events
In this session, Erick Weiss will moderate a discussion with top event producers from a cross section of industries: Branden Chapman, VP with the National Academy of Recording Arts and Sciences, Len Iannelli, VP with Twentieth Century Fox Film Corporation, David Finch, CMP from Amgen and Judi Froehlich-Pascoe with Americas, BCD Meetings & Incentives and the eWomenNetwork. The discussion will focus on the commonalities and differences between the various industries and what it takes, behind the scenes, to produce world class mega events.

Panelists:
Erick Weiss, President - Honeysweet Productions
Branden Chapman, Vice President, Production & Process Management - The Recording Academy
Len Iannelli, VP of Special Events, Marketing - 20th Century Fox Film Corp.
David Wellington Finch, CMP, Sourcing & Compliance Manager, Meetings & Conventions - Amgen
Judi Froehlich- Pascoe, Director of Business Development, Americas BCD Meetings & Incentives Managing Director - LA eWomenNetwork

BizBash LA Event Style Awards 2008
4:30 – 5:30 p.m.
See the events that dazzled! Celebrate the year’s best events at the BizBash Event Style Awards 2008. Glimpse best practices and get new ideas when more than 15 event categories are honored for outstanding industry contributions.

Interested in the full conference program? Visit the BizBash site for more information about the day’s educational sessions, and use discount code PPCONF for a special rate!

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Ethan Stock, Zvents CEO and Founder, was recently captured at The Kelsey Group’s “Drilling Down On Local ‘08: Marketplaces” Conference. In his presentation, Ethan discusses Zvents’ business model and how time-based promotions are an essential online marketing tool for all local merchants to get consumers in through their doors.

With the overwhelming and startling growth of local advertising revenue, Ethan Stock explores how Zvents is leading the evolution of local search - showing its impact on the advertising industry and what trends to expect in the future.

Check out the video below!

Online Videos by Veoh.com

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Let’s face it, promoting events can be a lot of fun, but managing the event registration, ticketing, and attendee lists can be a real pain without the right tools. Today, more and more event participants expect to be able to register online for events, which means you may need an easy and inexpensive way to facilitate registrations, collect payment information, and manage your attendee list.

If you host small, infrequent events or large events (where there are few types of attendees), all you may need is an event registration tool that allows you to:

• Collect credit card and registration information
• Process credit card charges
• Set up a basic registration form that you can link to from your Web site
• View/export a list of people who registered for your event

Two services to check out are Eventbrite and Brown Paper Tickets.

Eventbrite

With Eventbrite, there are no set up or monthly fees, or ticket fees for free tickets or events. All major credit cards are accepted, and final payment processing is done through Google Checkout or Paypal. Some nice functionality Eventbrite provides is the ability to send email invitations, customize and brand your event registration page, offer discount codes and group discounts, track affiliate/partner ticket sales, and track RSVPs from invites.

Eventbrite also goes a step further and offers to publish your event in search engines, such as Google, Yahoo, and…Zvents!

Fees: 2.5% of the ticket price, with a minimum fee/ticket of $0.99 and maximum fee/ticket of $9.95.

Brown Paper Tickets

As the “fair-trade ticketing service”, Brown Paper Tickets is here to change the ticketing industry, as stated in their Bill of Rights. BPT offers similar functionality to Eventbrite, and also includes 24-hour phone orders, assigned seating, password-protected prices, comp ticket and media pool ticket distribution, festival-style ticketing, and the option to print paper tickets (for a nominal fee).

Unfortunately, Brown Paper Tickets does not publish their event information to any of the event sites or search engines (Hey BPT, we’d love to hear from you if you want to give your clients this option).

Fees: 2.5% of the ticket price, plus a fee per ticket of $0.99.

Event Registration Services For More Complicated Events
Planning a more complex event, such as a conference, trade show, or series of events? Idealware wrote a fantastic in-depth post about the features and benefits of several event registration and ticketing tools, including Acteva, 123SignUp, Cvent, and RegOnline.

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How’s this for the evolution of offline events to the internet? (I’m sure you can imagine why this caught our attention)

Founded in 1996, the Interactive Advertising Bureau represents over 300 leading interactive companies that actively engage in and support the sale of interactive advertising. What is interactive advertising you might ask? We’re talking about digital advertising, that which we’re dealing with online but more, that which you can leverage through emerging “interactive” technologies such as video games, DVRs (TiVo), search engines, and cell phones. When you promote an event with flash ad creative, that’s interactive advertising. Television commercials, print advertising, radio, billboards… all are passive forms of advertising; the audience absorbs the message and reacts or ignores. Interactive gives the audience a measure of control, influence, or interaction on the message you present to them; most would argue you are more likely to reach target audiences than with traditional advertising and you can certainly more effectively measure the performance of your marketing.

According to the IAB, IAB members are responsible for selling over 86% of online advertising in the U.S. The IAB supports the continued growth of interactive advertising as well as interactive’s share, and of its member’s share, of total marketing spends.

The IAB’s VP of Events helps build their conference, event and exhibition business (sounds a little like us!) in through with the IAB presents recommended standards and practices along with effectiveness research and education about the advertising industry and interactive advertising. You’ll have the opportunity to work with interactive advertising industry leaders, programming exciting and cutting edge topics regarding Web 2.0, gaming and mobile.

If interested, get in touch with IAB’s David Doty at (david at iab dot net). The successful candidate will participate at the highest levels of management, manage events P&L, and direct industry events such as MIXX Conference Expo and Awards dinner, Leadership Forums and Luncheons, Innovators Roundtable Dinners, and the IAB Annual Meeting, the industry event focused on the future of the interactive ecosystem.

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Are you an events professional interested in furthering your professional development, networking with industry peers, and keeping up with the hottest trends in professional events? If your answer to any or all of the above is YES, then attending one or more of the following conferences is a must in 2008. Shows are listed in chronological order.

1. The Special Event Conference 2008: Atlanta, January 15-18

Touting itself as “…the Premier Annual Tradeshow and Conference for Event Professionals in the United States”, it is hailed as the fastest-growing trade show and conference for event professionals. This year they expect to have over 8,300 attendees and over 300 exhibitors.

Known for its educational sessions, this year’s conference features over 150 hours of content divided into eight educational tracks. Topics include Event Management, Design, Sales & Marketing, Food Services, Weddings, among others.

If you’re attending this conference, make sure you stop by booth #1718 and meet the Zvents folks!

2. MPI Professional Education Conference: Houston, February 2-5

With over 23,000 members in 68 countries, Meeting Professionals International (MPI) is one of the largest and most respected global meeting and events industry communities. Their mission is to “help our members be their best by building human connections to knowledge, ideas, relationships, and marketplaces.”

Learn about the Certified Meeting Professional (CMP) designation, and attend any of the dozens of specialized Knowledge Sessions. Keynote speakers include Mary Boone, Kay Caldwell, Jeff De Cagna and Richard Laermer. Over 2,500 attendees are expected to attend.

3. Event Solutions Idea Factory: Las Vegas, February 24-28

Produced by Event Solutions magazine, the Idea Factory promises “4 days, 100 classes, 4,000 attendees – 1 million ideas to take home”.

Maybe it’s because this show takes place in Vegas, but I have to say it looks fun! With a creative bent, Idea Factory focuses on trend-setting ideas to help you create cutting-edge events. Significant attention will be devoted to food and beverage services too, as the popular catersource Conference has merged with Idea Factory.

This show is designed for event professionals from corporations, associations, non-profits and independent event producers. Featured speakers include the Hearty Boys, Robyn Waters, and Oprah’s preferred event planner – Colin Cowie.

4. 2008 Experiential Marketing Summit: Chicago, April 21-23
In its sixth year, details are yet to be announced for EMS (formerly the Event Marketer Summit). Produced by Event Marketer magazine, over 1,000 event marketers are expected to attend.

5. MPI World Education Conference: Las Vegas August 9-12
Featuring education sessions for all levels of event planners, this MPI conference has a more international focus than their Professional Education Conference.

Session and keynote details have not been announced, but based on the 2007 event, expect more than 100 sessions divided amongst the following tracks: Novice Meeting Professionals, Senior Meeting Professionals, Small Business Owners, Sales & Marketing, and Strategic Meeting Management. Approximately 3,500 people are expected to attend.

6. ISES Eventworld 2008 – St. Petersburg, FL 8/21-23

Produced by the International Special Events Society, Eventworld 2008 features education sessions, leading industry experts, and networking opportunities. ISES also sponsors the Certified Special Events Professional (CSEP) designation and the ISES Esprit Awards.

The International Special Events Society is comprised of over 4,000 professionals in over 35 countries representing special event producers (from festivals to trade shows), caterers, decorators, florists, destination management companies, rental companies, special effects experts, tent suppliers, audio-visual technicians, party and convention coordinators, balloon artists, educators, journalists, hotel sales managers, specialty entertainers, convention center managers, and many more.

Did we miss something?

If you know of other trade shows, conferences, or programs that benefit event professionals, let us know. We’ll do a follow-up post on other relevant events.

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