The Meeting Planners podcast source for what’s new and exciting in meetings and events industry!
Mike McAllen of Grass Shack Events & Media
Tom Hillmer of Creative Group Inc.
Jon Trask of Alliant Event Services
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:03 Intros
1:12 MPI Bruce MacMillan extensive statement about the state of Meetings – Big thing is to encourage the media- business contacts- keep the misinformation down. Up on MPI website.
3:24 Event Solutions Magazine has a great 20 questions article about catering tips and reminders. Some ideas like pictures and lighting of displays, issues of working with catering, clients, charges, and objectives.
7:22 This is our 25th MeetingsPodcast roundtable show.
7:50 Event Solutions Magazine (October issue) had critique of the Republican and Democratic conventions.
11:38 New TSA rule to give full names to get plane tickets. Also a woman said she was injured by the TSA. Old employees of the TSA are walking away with the IDs and uniforms. Bombs dropped on Vegas.
15:07 Mike talks about online video ways to give your event or meeting content a longer life past an event or meetings. People search for information and can find your audience and connect of people. Also a great way for your content to be shared and marketed in a new media way. Follow old rules and regulations to make sure you are on track. Dont miss this opportunity.Youtube.com and Tubemogul.com
20:37 New widget on our meetingspodcast site shows where our readers are coming from.
21:48 Mikes friend Andy Quayles of Tubu.net (hosts the Meeting Podcast Blog) from his blog Techburg – Posted about the Malibu Inn Hotel you can get a downloadable updated guest services from your itouch and ipods. Get a massage, wakeup call, see menus etc…
24:40 Paper is being used less and less in the event world. Making sure your content is targeted. Selling and operational phase are different. But every meeting planner carries a binder with all the show info in.
30:46 Generational differences in business. You have to hit your demographics for your clients. They do not fit in a box these days. Wide range of life experience but a commonality. Generation is a big consideration for groups.
35:25 Toms Four Seasons Santa Barbara Biltmore garden review.
36:06 Jon wants to use Tripit.com for Tom so we can keep track of him.
37:36 Tom off to Cabo San Lucus in Mexico, Jon is in the Los Angeles California, and Mike is off to Napa California.
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Email us at meetings podcast@gmail.com
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Music by the www.TheDelgadoBrothers.com
Audio mixing by www.RipTideGraphics.com
Brought to you by Grass Shack Events & Media
Copyright 2008 MeetingsPodcast
Transcripts
Female: You are listening to the Meetings Podcast with Mike McAllen, Jon Trask and Tom Hillmer. The Meeting Planner podcast source for what’s new and exciting in the meetings and events industry. The information and opinions expressed in this podcast are of Mr. McAllen, Mr. Trask and Mr. Hillmer and are theirs alone and do not reflect the opinions of their past, present or future employers.
Please send in your question and comments to MeetingsPodcast@gmail.com and make sure to visit our website for pictures, video and show notes at www.MeetingsPodcast.com
Mike McAllen: All right, welcome back again to Meetings Podcast. My name is Mike Mc Allen with Grass Shack Events and Media. My co-host is Jon Trask CMP Account Executive from Alliant Event Services. Hi, Jon.
Jon Trask: Hello, hello.
Mike McAllen: And Tom Hillmer, Senior Vice-President and Account Executive from Created Group Inc. Hi, Tom.
Tom Hillmer: Hi, guys.
Mike McAllen: And before we get started I like to thank our sponsors, Hilton Hotels Events where our group accommodations are made easy, Blue Sky Factory, our e-mail provider of choice and Brand Creative, helping you creatively brand your company and so well let’s get started.
Jon Trask: All right, will just drive right in to things. Actually, I think the first thing that I really wanted to address is, you know, we’ve had all the controversy in the news particularly about those AIG meetings and we have talked about it a couple of times and we even have a couple of blogs pick our conversations and comment on it and all of that.
Well, MPI has finally gotten involved literally this week and Bruce MacMillan who’s the president released a fairly extensive statement which I think is well thought out and well written and it’s up on the MPI website today and I’m not going to try and read it because it’s 700 paragraph and I’m just not going to blast through the whole thing for folks but I would advice that they go look at because one of the things he’s encouraging all of us in the meeting planning industry to do is to look at the situation and kind of go out and try and make sure the record is straight and it, you know.
You’re talking to you’re reporters and business contracts and people like that so that there’s not so much miss information that’s floating around and that there’s an opportunity to kind of make our case for what we do for livelihood and, you know, he points out very justifiably in that, you know, we have 24,000 members in MPI worldwide and a lot of this because decisions effect not just the MPI members but thousands of people that branch out from that at the properties where people work and for the different companies where work and so this has a huge impact on our industry if we have people running around uninformed sort of calling for people heads, let say to eliminate things and, you know, he kind the says, “Eliminate the senior executive spa getaway” if you’re going to eliminate something but you know if you’re cutting out educational conferences and trade shows and performance incentive programs, you’re hurting a lot of people up and down the chain throughout our industry. So, I just wanted to mention that, that is up on the MPI website and it’s worth going and taking a look at maybe.
Mike McAllen: Very cool.
Tom Hillmer: Great.
Jon Trask: On the less serious note, I just – I had found some interesting stuff in Event Solutions latest magazine and they’ve got some good tips in there which would be worth checking out for folks on working with caters and particularly caters who are coming from an off site to come in to some place and one of the things they have is a list of 20 questions and I won’t, I probably won’t go through all 20 of them but there’s some very good tips and reminders in here and a lot of them are very obvious things but it’s just nice to see them all combine and put in to one place like for example our stuff [00:04:03] included in the cost, you know, are there are additional cost for overtime and labor and setup and, you know, do you take credit cards and what deposits are required and references and a lot of the due diligence things you should be asking anyway but I thought it was nice to have that list sort of combined into one place and there’s a few things that I wouldn’t necessarily thought if not being on the catering side of things enough planning that side normally, like asking for pictures of how the buffets will be decorated.
So, if they’re telling you their going to have a certain look, I mean I do that on my side of things, I’ve tried and provide pictures of previous shows and you know this is an idea of what I’ve got or drawings or things but I hadn’t really – myself thought of it in the food area where, yes, you want to see how the tables are going to look, maybe some previous events so you get a sense of – even how they’re lighting it and so there’s a nice list of 20 questions and there’s also some of the biggest issues that people run into while working with people.
And again I don’t want to try and read all the questions and answer out of this, it just maybe be a resource for you to go look at it but the major point are contacting an in client directly or pursuing a side deal. So, if you’re a meeting planner having the client you’re working it somehow contracting the cater directly, working around you, last minute your on site changes and the charges that those entail, not having timely follow-up and one thing that did jump out and I’ve talk to other folks in the business about that, in one of the answers somebody says, “You need to look at, are you giving the caterer enough time to prepare a recent answer and to really bring your information together” because I’ve notice that in our side of the business some of the lead times on events are shrinking and shrinking and shrinking and we’re finding out things two weeks out that we use to find out two months out and so making sure you’re building time and a schedule when you’re dealing with the caterer is good because like any vendor you’re probably going to get a better solutions and more creative solutions and more thought out solutions, the more time you give them to prepare that for you.
Not understanding the overall event objectives, needing some creative ideas brought in, not seeing how the other event elements interrelate in the meeting, so the cater are not paying attention to the fact that he want the table a bit nicely and if he’s not a lighting vendor, he should talk in advance to how that AV vendor is going to make things look good and the last one is packaging up before the event is over and just come in to some clear agreements with your vendor on that because nobody likes the kitchen riddling around while you’re still have people speaking or something like that on and off event. So, I just thought that was a nice number of things to look at and that all comes from an Event Solutions Magazine, October issue.
Mike McAllen: Very cool, that’s probably could be a post, repost that on the website.
Jon Trask: Yes, at least a link, I’m sure we can …
Mike McAllen: Yes.
Jon Trask: … we link to it or something so.
Mike McAllen: Posting link, how about that?
Jon Trask: So, yes look for that and you know by the way I wanted to note, I believe this is our 25th show.
Mike McAllen: Oh, it is, yes.
Jon Trask: So, you know there should be some commemoration made, I’m not sure what it is but I at least wanted to acknowledge that we’ve survive 25 of this.
Tom Hillmer: Happy Anniversary to us.
Mike McAllen: Everyone go out and have a drink now.
Jon Trask: There your go, there you go, so everyone have a drink not on us just have a drink in our right. The other thing that I had, well there are couple more things actually, one of them was in that same Event Solutions they did a little bit of a critic of the republican and democratic conventions and I thought, I thought it was sort of interesting to see they had brought in a number of different technical directors and producers and ask them to comment on both of the looks and kind of what they did at the show and then they also had a short Q&A with the executive producer of both conventions and so they talked about the strategies behind their set design and kind of how they were doing things and it’s very interesting to see the contrast and see the thinking behind all of it.
On the republican side they mentioned that they wanted a very simple design because in the view of the economy and everything else to have this elaborate set and to really look like you’re spending millions of dollars seemed and appropriate.
On the background they wanted something that was visual because everybody remembers that the republican commission the one in Saint Paul was a very large video back draft and so they wanted to keep people attention but to detract from the people speaking and they kind the paired down their technology appearance because they just – they didn’t want it to be smoking laser but not – the focus needed to be on the person on stage and the message they are presenting. So, it was interesting to read the thinking process behind the executive producer on the couple of these things.
On the democratic side, he goes into the strategy behind their set design which actually took some, some criticism as they were still loading it in and he comments on that because he said you know, “How many people get their show reviewed during loading?”
Mike McAllen: Right.
Jon Trask: Which I thought was a very fair point because people are talking about the set before the convention had even started and basically his idea was they were trying to convey strength and a foundation and solid building, so they look toward federal building in Washington with a message behind it, the idea of being strengthen stability and in their case they saw technology did came in and even though they were shooting 16 by 9 they made they screen portrait, so they made them 9 by 16 because they figured most of the speeches would be in the close up anyway and they wanted to kind the – have a better look and they thought that, that would just better looking screen and so some of this points are worth going to back and taking a little look through because it’s interesting stuff. It’s very timely since we are in the midst of the election right now.
Mike McAllen: And didn’t they with the democratic they’d used those – big screen or kind went up and loop around, am I remembering it right? They have …
Jon Trask: I think that may have been the republicans. The republican convention had a huge screen center stage, the democratic convention had – because I have a picture of it here in the magazine, the democratic were flanking screens with a sort of column set behind the speaker and I’m not they have had some other pieces to it, that’s just the view that I’ve got here, what I remember.
Mike McAllen: Huh, interesting, yes, I remember reading about how they had, maybe they had two. Do they have it two different places? …
Jon Trask: Yes, they did have it in two places so it may have been in the second place because once they till the acceptance speech that was actually held it in outdoor stadium that was held at the (Nebraska’s 00:11:15) Investment Field.
Mike McAllen: Right, right.
Jon Trask: And so when they move it over to there that may have been where they had the difference set, I’m not clearly remembering of, as my dad once said, “I’ve slept since then” so everything got you know, knocked out a memory. But the other little thing that I had, there were some TSA staff and again you know part of our goal here, have always talking about airlines or travel and flaying at some point.
Mike McAllen: Green.
Jon Trask: Yes, well – so said green so we’re covered, even if we don’t need to come back too it, we’ve at least mention the word green so …
Mike McAllen: Exactly.
Mike McAllen: That’s going to cover us. Now, there’s a new TSA rule that I had actually hadn’t heard of and I’m not sure that it’s a huge deal to me, I usually fill up my name in complete name on a flight form but airline passengers have only been required to give their first initial and last name to get a plane ticket and that’s been causing a lot of false matching on the watch list, so starting in July of next year full names are mandatory. So, if you book a flight without giving all the required information you won’t be able to print a boarding pass until you go to the desk and confirm the missing information with an agent.
Mike McAllen: Wow.
Jon Trask: And so the TSA is involved in that because that’s how I guess for example when they pulled Senator Kennedy aside it was because he had E-Kennedy in that hit the watch list for some reason and so they’re just doing this to try and cut down on that, you have to provide full name and birth date before you can fly.
Mike McAllen: Wow.
Jon Trask: And then the TSA’s got a couple of other little negative things that have happen too, one of them is there’s a woman who is claiming and Washington that they actually made her take off her foot brace that she was wearing for a sprain ankle and she now has a fracture as a result of having to take her brace off and run it through the machine.
Mike McAllen: Oh my god. Well they make a run through the other little …
Jon Trask: They actually according to the story and this is on a blog Gadling which is a travel blog, kind of an interesting place that I link off to – of AOL to get too but they always comment on the airline industry and on the TSA and all a lot travel things, so it can be a fun place to go look. Another TSA thing they pointed out here in the last week is that apparently they’re not keeping good track of people who leave the TCA ID’s or uniforms, so they’ve a got a huge number of missing I’d badges and uniforms from people who were like former employees who just walk away with them and never return them and those can actually be use into the sterile of an airport.
Mike McAllen: Oh my god.
Jon Trask: So, with all of the checking they’re doing of the travelers on one side it seems like they’re maybe some holes being left on the other side if they’re not careful.
Mike McAllen: Wow.
Jon Trask: And this is the same blog where I found out that an S16 apparently bombs Vegas Strip the other day by accident.
Tom Hillmer: Do you think that would have been on the news?
Jon Trask: You would have thought that would have made the news but no, apparently it wasn’t the strip, it was just, no it’s Air Force Base and it was just off the base it drop to 25 pound bomb, 17,000 feet unto a truck by accident.
Mike McAllen: Oh my god.
Jon Trask: There are still deciding how it happened but as – since this is a travel blog, they were talking about you know, talk about struggling with declining numbers now they – getting bomb, so just again gadling.com.
Mike McAllen: Wow. Very cool, green stuff, I had some stuff – today I got in a conversation this morning actually something about online video because we’re talking about our podcast and online video and they actually work a pharmaceutically company and they were talking about how, you know internet video in general which this is kind of upper (Poe) for what you’re talking about Tom with your new flip video phone.
A lot of companies now or not a lot of companies but some companies are doing Youtube channels and pharmaceutically companies now are starting to do that to get the word out because I know one of the big – one the [00:15:46] I have is, we do all this cool content for events and then it’s just dies after, you know, there’s no legs for the stuff which is you know it did a one big paw but some of the stuff that’s not internal can go out into the world and build bus or do marketing for these companies.
One that I found was Abbott Pharmaceuticals did a – they have a Youtube channel which is working quite well and a lot of companies are not doing this kind of stuff because they’re afraid of, you know, the regulators are watching of course for this pharmaceutical companies and they don’t use RR feeds like we are for our podcast for playing their news releases out there doing it, you know, the old way by e-mail which is basically, you know, it’s old now, it’s like mail, mail like regular mail.
Jon Trask: Right.
Mike McAllen: And also companies aren’t even allowing people to see Youtube at work which is kind of huge missed opportunity I think because in this day and age people are putting content up and you’re sharing it. Like if I – like we are right now, people putting things up on the internet and we’re picking it up and here we’re talking about it, so it’s a whole new way of marketing stuff. So, it got me thinking about you know, how companies can use this videos, do videos for – if you and I are looking for product to some sort of if let’s say, you know a drug or anything, you don’t go and look for a commercials on TV, you don’t go look through or looking that magazine ads, right you’re going to go to the internet, right?
Jon Trask: Right, at most, most so far at this point.
Mike McAllen: Right, so that’s the way of maybe, you know, somebody’s companies thinking about it in a different way of that you know, the new media is a cool way of doing this and it’s still the old rules will apply, you know, you see – you don’t have to be afraid of the regulators, you just stick to the, you know, doing a responsible way follow all the guidelines but start doing stuff that, you know, you’re doing stuff anyway for events or for TV, why not, you know, through it on the internet also.
So, you know, it’s a cool way to you know talk about your products and it’s a great way to hit to this audiences, I mean that was our idea behind this podcast as we know there’s people out there better looking for meeting information, so the three of us got together to say, “Let’s do a podcast” the same thing goes for any niche you’re in, so it’s great way to use like you could do, how to for your product or have a testimonial, you know, and you could do this, you could some really dry stuff and make it fun by just having a creative writer do it or shoot it and you can do it on the cheap because those are cheap now to do.
Jon Trask: Right.
Mike McAllen: One thing which I thought was kind the cool was a great way that you can find, you know, that this pharmaceutical companies can find to recruit people for their like clinical trials because to find that, it’s kind the word of mouth of that way basically, so you can define people and then they see actually people that are in this clinical trials like they could do, you know, people that have been in trials before, they could show hey, you know, it’s not that bad, I’ll go try it which helps the pharmaceutical companies also, they could do, you know, educate the consumers, tells the stories, inspiring stories, they got and other thing I was thinking like that, that thing you went on Tom recently were went out and painted that school — … kind of a thing.
Jon Trask: Down in New Orleans.
Mike McAllen: Why not show that, that the company is doing this school next too, so it kind of neat thing, I thought and it so easy to make a Youtube channel, you could throw the stuff up there, you can, you know, you can see who, how that people are downloading it, you can you know, it’s out there to be share, someone think it’s cool, they fire it on.
Also you can see like stats to where people are dropping off, so you know, you you’ll say you put something up there and you can see, “Oh my god, they drop off right one, Tom Hillmer comes on”, so you know. You know, you would change it up, you know, so it’s kind of cool thought, I just started thinking, “Yehey, this is really a cool way to get message out there” you know started by Youtube channel and start to put your stuff up there and there’s also a service called Tubemogul which you can put your video up there and you put it into Tubemogul and it shoots it out to all the other video directory that’s are on the net, well not all of them but, you know, the main ones which is – it so it’s just a onetime posting, boom it goes. So, that’s my online video talk.
Tom Hillmer: Very cool.
Jon Trask: It’s cool because you know, you’re talking about connecting with people and all of that and I was looking at one of the widgets that’s been added to our page with the live activity feed and I’m just fascinated by that widget, I’m sitting here right now, even as we’re talking looking at it because we’ve just had someone Riga Latvija looking at our site.
Mike McAllen: Yes, that was a really cool thing to find, yes to throw up there. I think that is a cool thing. So, you can see all these people are looking at this and if they see something they like they’re sharing it with somebody out.
Jon Trask: Yes, it’s a – just s different way of connecting with people and so I think companies are going to have too embrace that at some point.
Mike McAllen: Yes and really the pharmaceutical company they really should go after it because we did a great way to show off, you know, show off stuff you know, that people talking about their drugs or whatever they’re selling or you know, not just pharmaceuticals, I guess any company. Anyway, so that’s what I had for that, so it’s kind of a cool idea, you know, you want to talk about it more, you know, send us an e-mail or call if you want to find out, you know, we have all the information do that kind of stuff too, so.
Jon Trask: Right, well we should give out the number for calling in.
Mike McAllen: Yes.
Jon Trask: Which is 510-735-9690 because I’m right on the website.
Tom Hillmer: There you go way to be on …
Mike McAllen: So, another thing that I had too, I have a friend who actually host our blog and his name is Andy Qualyes and he has a company called Tubu.net and he does his little tech blog and I was kind of nerding today with my online video, so I found this too and it’s a hotel Malibu beach Inn in Los Angeles and they have a – they are now doing this new way of people doing digit lead there, their guest services book basically where you walk in, you can download this – they’ll let you download on your iPod touch or your iPhone.
So, you can check in with it, if you’re coming in before actually I think you downloaded it through our website and then you could also or you can book a massage, you can set a wake call, you can contact the, you know, transportation, you can do anything that you would do rather guest services book, you can see menu which you can order food, you can do anything but it’s all digital and if you don’t have an iPhone or an iPod touch, they’ll give on when you check in, so it’s kind of cool, cool idea.
Jon Trask: Very cool, kind the like some of the things we were talking about for meeting attendees on previous shows too, where you know, you can download schedules and all that, it just seems like we’re really getting a way from paper and getting into so much more of a kind of paper list system, I know when I change company a while back, I was going through my office and trying to decide you know, do I need this catalog, do I need this book because I realize that you know, I’ve got like extensive files let’s say of a equipment, audio equipment.
Well, of is probably out dated within a year and everything is available online like I mention going to Panasonic’s website yesterday when we were talking early just to look something up and – with all that information, so readily at hand, I just don’t need a bookshelf full of catalogs anymore, telling me what each piece of equipment we own or potentially own can do because it’s so accessible to me from other method right now.
Mike McAllen: Yes, yes very cool.
Mike McAllen: Do you find that Tom with hotels in such too that you know, because I know – I’m sure you guys have extensive files that you built up a pockets and everything from properties, do you keep those anymore?
Tom Hillmer: Yes, you know, it like we’ve been talking about this very recently in our own office trying to figure out to do you – how do you maintain a balance between an inventory of that stuff that you’re going to use and not have or just sit there collecting dust when most people just want to go the internet or you know go to a website to check out, you know, what we’re talking about.
So, are we using of much anymore? Not really, you know, occasionally there’s the need for it but that doesn’t mean hotel still on providing it to you, we’re here on site right now, in a site inspection and, you know, first thing we walk in and we were handled a whole convention kit, you know, the brochure and the whole deal. So, you know, I think there’s still something nice about having the touchy feel a brochure but then you got to carry it back and I got, you know, log it along and but we are lost and lots we’ve got no point, we’re in our own office, there is – we will keep, try to keep one of everything, you know, from a hotels and then if we need more, we either call the hotels to get more or you know, our proposals are going out now, so many of them are like electronic submission of this proposals, so they’re being sent out and you just provide links to things and …
Tom Hillmer: Yes.
Mike McAllen: You know the client happy to just hit the link and research it further on their own and see the live website on it, so you know, it’s really there’s a definite, you know, I’m not going to say we’ve gone from one extreme to the other but there’s definitely a shift I think in the usage of that stuff. It’s interesting we’re having the same conversation right now internally because I have been, I’m in charge with kind of leading up the effort right now for us to revamp our both marketing collateral campaign and you know, all of our corporate literature and you know, follow sales pieces and what not for account executive.
You know, it’s a fund project to be working on and I’m enjoying it but you know, we’re really having some great conversation about, you know, how of these do we print and how many customers really are looking at the stuff and you know, right now were arm resting over the content and the copy and the story you want to tell in the brochure and the whole deal and, you know, and I’m thinking – are people really reading it, I don’t know, I mean it could be, you know, if they do you want to make sure you tell the appropriate story but you hate to go through all this and print 25,000 copies and I’m sit on the shelf and, you know, the majority of people aren’t even, you know, looking up the stuff but yes, I think it’s still unnecessary even evil, you know, those hard copy brochures so.
Jon Trask: Well, and you know, there’s a place in the world for hard copies, I know, you know, sometime I just have to put my hand on a piece of paper, I’ll get to a certain good point on the show and I’ll print it out because I need it to lay it on the desk in front of me and look at it in a different way than other stuff.
Mike McAllen: The other too, I will tell you is I think that there’s a different also between the selling phase and the operational phase and, you know, when you’re selling and whether we’re selling, you know, our company or we are at partner to our customer and we are selling hotels and positioning or recommending hotels – or whatever, that is typically a lot of that is electronic but then you move into the operations phase and – there is an meeting planner in the world that doesn’t have a three ring binder with stubs in it with everything that they want to utilize and referred throughout the entire planning of their program and that’s where then your floor plan and all of your meeting, you know, space accommodations and you know all of that stuff, that all start getting turn out of brochures or pull out of brochures and three ring punched and you know, three whole punched …
Tom Hillmer: It’s a good point.
Mike McAllen: Three ring binder so in fact it’s interesting because that’s what we, you know, again I came back to our own journey that we’re on right now and trying to revamp our whole corporate collateral but you know the piece that we have had out there for a few years, it’s was cool I mean we’re basically, we’re not – we’re looking coming out with the new – the next generation of it if you will.
I mean we’re not walking away from it completely but one of the things that, you know, we got all hang up five to six years ago and it’s got to be cool and unique and different and the size should be fun and you know let’s – and so it is, it is a small piece and you know, there’s some panky weird sort of attributes to it as far as, you know, putting inserts in it and all that kind of stuff.
At the end of the day, you know, what we realize it’s not user friendly. It’s not customer friendly, so if I’m sending, you know, if I’m sending my customer my brochure and that easily put in to a three ring binder ultimately if I’m being bided out against three or four other companies and they’re keeping their bidding processes in their binder or you know, or a manila file folder. If it’s difficult to store it that way than I’m sending the message subliminally that I’m difficult to do business with and I don’t want to be that way.
So, now we’ve gone back to a very basic what will ultimately be a really creative treatment, a really cool way to tell the story, a really need visual piece but it’s going to be an 8-1/2 by 11, very simple in terms if it will fit in the – in a file folder, it will fit in a three ring binder and – you know, and it will be more user friendly to the audience that would typically be, you know, in receipt of it, so I don’t know this is a big old tangent that I’ve got on here but you know it’s all kind of related all this collateral stuff, you know.
Jon Trask: Absolutely, I was just sitting here thinking as you’re saying al that, how much this relates to our meetings because in the same way when you’re putting people in a room, you have recently constraints and you can do off the page to a certainly distance but you don’t want to go so far that you loss the message or that you loss sight of the core message you’re trying to get across to this people and get loss in all of the fun stuff or all of the – it just different from being different.
Mike McAllen: Right, yes somehow I have too use them all together to make sure your fun stuff is pointing out those – that message, right it make sense, so very cool.
Tom Hillmer: Wow.
Mike McAllen: Very cool, very cool.
Jon Trask: That’s been the challenge with us working with some of the creative people that are helping us with this things, is that they’re wonderfully creative, they’re amazing talented but you know to try to keep them focus and looking at it from a prospective of who’s going to be using it, you know.
Tom Hillmer: That’s right.
Mike McAllen: Or you know ultimately there is a – there’s end user to this collateral pieces, it might needed to be, you know, we want stand out, we wanted to be something that sticks out on somebody’s desk if they’ve got a stock of them from other competitors but it’s still needs to be a format that’s going to be user friendly to them too, so – and how many times do you – how many do we get stuff, it just thought of way and I think, “God the money that spends on it” you know, so.
Tom Hillmer: Right.
Jon Trask: I’ve got a vendor catalog right in front of me that just came from somebody that I meet in an MPI meeting and they’re actually a vendor to me in the sense of they provide drapery and stuff and I think that’s beautiful but I can’t imagine how much they spent putting this catalog together.
Tom Hillmer: I also site …
Jon Trask: It matter about …
Tom Hillmer: Yes sorry to interrupt you, I just – I also think that, you know, the other thing we’ve talk a lot about also and you know, we as a company have been very sensitize to this, we have talked about it a lot, we’ve educated our people on it as a relates to selling, as it relates to our customer as it relates to even our own employee base but you know, this is another whole topic for anther show somebody but the study of generational, you know, the generational impact in today workforce, I mean you never had anybody – I mean we’ve never had a period in time where there are so many co-mingle generations all interacting at the same time in the workforce, you know, together and what those people all and it’s amazing, you know, the older general if you will, what they’re needs are and what they want is very different than the 20 something’s and the 30 something.
So, you have to figure it out, I mean that’s true whether we’re trying to reward employees, whether we’re trying to inset sales reps to achieve it’s incentive travel program or whether we’re, you know, trying to build our brochure that, you know, my audience could be anywhere from 25 to, you know, to 65 years old today and what does everybody going to look at, you know, in a piece like that, that’s going to standout to them. So, that’s another whole interesting impact, I think in today’s world of you know you’re trying to be all things all people and yet all this different groups of people have very, very different sets of requirements and different sets of things that you know, attract them or interest them or you know, excite them or, you know, whatever so …
Mike McAllen: Yes, [00:31:40]
Tom Hillmer: Those (are guys 00:31:40) years ago.
Mike McAllen: Ops, sorry go ahead.
Tom Hillmer: Oh, that’s fine, go ahead Mike.
Mike McAllen: I was just going to say, I was just reading something that about hotels and they’re trying to plug in to the different people who you know, actually use the hotel just like you’re saying, you know, that they’ve break them into, break them into people, of course they’re sales people do that anyway but really, you know, have their just like you’re saying, not one would like it collateral or whatever their marketing message is, they’ll really go after each one and have a separate ones for each, I’m mean very similar but the pop on them, you really ride in and kneel on the head with that stuff I think …
Tom Hillmer: Right.
Mike McAllen: That’s that new way again of – again hitting the niche market, you know, who we actually talking too, so …
Tom Hillmer: Right.
Mike McAllen: Let’s kneel on it, you know, right between the eyes, so anyway, sorry.
Jon Trask: But you also have to remember that you can’t fit the segments in the box because – as you were saying early their so diverse and there so many different age groups they cut across and it’s a really wide varying demographic at this point, I went to a convention a couple of weeks ago related to the gaming industry and you know, they are people with gray beards like me there and then there are people who are like 17 and there’s this narrow segment of this type of gaming that appeals to all of these people, so it’s crossing across that. So, the people who plan this convention had to find the way to satisfy an audience that literally ranges from 6 to 60.
Mike McAllen: Yes.
Jon Trask: And you know there’s no easy solution in that because there’s such a range of life experience and you know, attitudes and ideas and the way that you look at the world is just incredibly but yet you have a commonality that you found and now they’re trying to play that commonality. So, it’s – we’re maybe getting a little esoteric here but it’s just kind of an interesting ideas that you know, we do have a very multi generational workforce that we’re trying to deal with this days and it’s probably more challenging that it might have been when it was, you know, not as a diverse maybe 20 years ago.
Tom Hillmer: Yes.
Mike McAllen: Yes and it’s good that all portions of the event like where, you know, we’re all come from different world the same event but we’re all handle it from different areas so it’s great to you know that everybody is starting to think about this things too, you know.
Jon Trask: Yes.
Mike McAllen: I mean it’s really important that we’re all …
Jon Trask: …a few years ago we had a gentle, I’m trying to remember his name so quick and I can’t but anyway his a generational expert and he came on, he came in to our company, actually doing a couple of different session with our account executive base as well as our entire employee base just talking about this is it’s relates to the workforce, you’re work environment as well as interacting with customers and, you know, but he had a great analogy, said you know, years ago it use to be the incentive groups, you know, they would love to just, they would love to just take the dinner boat cruise on, you know on San Francisco bay and going to see the bridge, you know, then after the next generation came along and they wanted to get out of the boat and they wanted to actually you know, get up and climb the bridge then the next generation came along and they want to get out of the boat, climb the bridge and bungee jump off of it, you know and it was just that’s interesting to hear, you know, when you think, “It’s true” I mean it’s just everybody, you know, and then you got a mixed audience and you’re trying to hit on all those cylinder at onetime as fast as you can, I mean the demographics of groups, there’s just a significant part of what we are all doing, you know, I might had that conversation with my customers many times or we’ll go and you know were look at a property or were look at an destination and you know, they love it but I’ll challenge in a little bit to go great, what about your group? Do you think your group would love it? You know.
Jon Trask: Right.
Mike McAllen: Right, right. Very cool, very cool. [00:35:18]
Tom Hillmer: I can be the roving reporter here this week for two minutes that I would be at Four Seasons Santa Barbara, the Biltmore Seasons Santa Barbara. Oh, god my, this is a beautiful hotel. Has anybody has ever been here hasn’t seen it lately, it’s more beautiful that it’s very been, just absolutely gorgeous.
Mike McAllen: I’m so looking forward to you having that flip video.
Tom Hillmer: Yes, I know exactly.
Mike McAllen: You’re going to start here all over the place, it would be great.
Tom Hillmer: Well, then actually I’m talking to you, because talking to you guys, I’m walking to the garden here and just enjoying the landscapes thing and it’s all Spanish [00:35:46] architecture you know and built back in the 1920 and just absolutely beautiful.
Mike McAllen: Very cool.
Jon Trask: So, Sunday work isn’t to bad, is it?
Tom Hillmer: Exactly, Sunday are just doesn’t suck, does it.
Jon Trask: Well, you know we’ve, the Tripit site that I mention a few weeks ago, I was playing with it the other day and I’ve got a personally trip coming up that I was working on their and I’m kind the put my itinerary in it. I’m really, I’m really digging on it but one of the thing it has is a little widget, you can bring over – and I’m thinking we need to bring it over for each one us Mike because it has a widget that shows like where the person is traveling and where they have been and records how many miles they’ve done and I think we need that on Tom.
Mike McAllen: Yes, Tom would be the one …
Tom Hillmer: Oh my god.
Mike McAllen: …would be the one to have it on in that would be fantastic.
Jon Trask: Because I think Tom probably travels more than half the people I know combine.
Mike McAllen: I’ve a got a good idea with that too then we could have a contest on the podcast, people can call and see how many they could guess on how many Tom travels or where is Tom is or you know.
Jon Trask: Where in the world is Tom?
Mike McAllen: Where in the world is Tom?
Jon Trask: Yes.
Mike McAllen: Right.
Tom Hillmer: Exactly, I work that one.
Mike McAllen: That’s the perfect day for your videos Tom, your flip video that you’ll be doing. Where in the world in Tom?
Tom Hillmer: I’ll pull off my red and white strip stocking cap or whatever is [00:36:58], yes, we’re all going to do it, yes. I thought you might say (Matt Lauer 00:37:03) – oh, yes, where in the world is (Matt Lauer 00:37:05), you know, where is – tomorrow actually we leave here and flight off on Cabo San Lucas. I’ll be down there for the next couple of days.
Mike McAllen: Great, great, great.
Jon Trask: There you go.
Mike McAllen: And be – Jon are you go off anywhere?
Jon Trask: I’m going all the way to Fullerton for a wedding, that’s it.
Mike McAllen: Nice, nice. Yes, I’m headed to Napa for drinking wine, there you go.
Jon Trask: Really that’s why you go to Napa, isn’t it?
Mike McAllen: Yes, yes.
Jon Trask: I mean not a knock on Napa but you go there to drink wine.
Mike McAllen: Yes. All right well, I think its great show. I was going to share some more iPhone stuff but I think that’s a – I think we should go off now and share it another time but …
Jon Trask: You can start drinking wine earlier then.
Mike McAllen: I can, yes, that’s a good idea. So, I guess in closing let’s to remind everybody to use the comment line, 510 – Jon already said this but 510-735-9690 or e-mail us at meetingspodcast@gmail.com and thanks a lot guys, great show and great to talk to you both.
Jon Trask: Have a good week.
Mike McAllen: And probably the next week huh?
Jon Trask: It’s good.
Tom Hillmer: All right, next time.
Mike McAllen: Okay, bye-bye.
Jon Trask: Bye-bye.
Female: We appreciate and thank you for listening to the Meetings Podcast. You can find Mike McAllen at grassshackroad.com, Jon Trask at alliantevents.com and Tom Hillmer at creativegroupinc.com. The Meetings Podcast theme music comes from the Delgado Brothers which can be found at delgadobrothers.com. Special thanks to riptidegraphics.com for the audio editing of this podcast.
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