Know-How Exchange : Advertising/PR

so you're looking for suggestions to get your customers high.... up in the clouds.

Your existing prize suggestions sounds great, I'd love to win one of those.

What about reaching for the moon - could get a star !
Ask Bronson about sponsorship opportunities for either his solar glider or the moon ship projects.

Maybe a spongy jump from the highest possibly bridge
- Diving from the cloud to the ground and back again
(if you're doing a backup service)

What about a fully 3D immersion (like EON Reality) to walk on the clouds

Mikael
B2B Marketing

I wouldn't disrupt running my business to attend for a very small chance of winning something - especially if the prize is not something I'm interested in. Company policy (dollar value of gifts) may also affect their ability to accept a large prize, so it may be a less effective incentive.

You have enough ideas of prizes.

Consider not "winning" something - such that only one person walks away with something. Attendance is the key - not the gratuitous prize.

Consider these three things to encourage maximum attendance:
1. Promote the value of your solution, your unique value proposition
2. Everyone who attends receives something of value - a tablet computer, a choice of a $300 gift from a gift catalog, etc.. Also, add a discount on services if purchased within 30 days.
3. Provide the big but lesser prize - but make it their choice. from maybe 5 options.

The value and variability should be more attractive, and more effective for sales, than one prize. The total cost could be about the same with proper planning.

Bob

Bob has a point. If you're aiming for C-level attendees, they're not going to give you their time unless you give them something they really want.

Here are some suggestions about what that might be:

1. To know enough about the cloud so the Tech division can't pull the wool over the CEO's eyes. (Teach CEOs how to ask the right questions, understand the answers, and establish some criteria by which leaders can make sound decisions.) Promise that by the end of the day, they'll know enough to help their company choose the right cloud strategy for their future, even if they don't choose your company. And, deliver that understanding. You'll build trust, which is essential in your business at the C-level.

2. To deliver value to shareholders. For many C-level executives, this is Job One. Show them how moving into the cloud, or getting deeper into cloud-based technology, can increase the financial efficiency of the company. Tell them how that can be expressed in year-end statements to shareholders. Can the cloud improve a company's financial or competitive state enough to raise its share value? If the answer is yes, make that your headline ("Driving share value into the clouds").

3. To save substantially on the corporate tech budget. CEOs constantly bemoan the tech budget as a profit-killer. If you can show C-level executives what a typical corporation can save, enterprise-wide, on software, security, storage, communications, servers, and the teams that support these, then they'll pay attention ("Restore quarterly profits by moving to the cloud").

Solve problems for the top guys, and you'll get the top guys in the room. Focus on gimmicks, and you'll get other guys, pretending to be top guys, in the room.

Also, in this economy, where many companies have laid people off and recovery is slow, many executives do not want to be seen winning or taking a luxurious perk. It's bad PR. They want to be seen looking out for shareholders. What you might do instead of things like private jet timeshare, is focus on something that says "responsible."

For example, have a drawing that puts a $5,000 cloud credit (good for services from your company) into their Corporate Social Responsibility fund. Let their CSR team choose a community charity or school that could benefit from cloud training and services from your company; then your guys train the charity and provide the services. The corporation gets credit for doing good; you have relatively small hard costs; and you get your toe into the winning corporations by working with their CSR team. Everybody wins. Think about offering one or more of these, or something like it, in each of your six locations.

Hope these thoughts are helpful.