CeBIT: 10 tips how to save it
Ralf Haller
March 6th, 2009
Today I made a blitz trip to the CeBIT event. I did not manage to see all the halls, but still got a good overview. I went to the show last year after being absent for more than a decade, so I still know it from its heyday. Not surprisingly, this year the event has far fewer exhibitors (no Alcatel-Lucent, no Funkwerk, overall 25% fewer exhibitors). But the companies I met were mostly positive about the quality of the contacts and found it was worth coming. So there is still hope for this event, I thought, and want to give the organizers some free tips on how they can save it. Looks like the consultant firm they hired to do interviews does not get it.
- Split the event into a B2B and B2C event. The B2B halls will charge entrance fees (more than what they charge currently); the B2C halls are free to go to.
- Further segment the B2B show into clusters that are currently hot.
- Entertain the B2C crowd with music, interactive events, awards etc. etc.
- For the B2B crowd, provide top-notch speakers and events that present every time in the halls next to the booths, and not in some lonely VIP area - and for free!
- Use the web heavily, with landing pages for each hot area where qualified CeBIT moderators have blogs, collect company inputs such as white papers, videos, interview podcasts, etc., so a wealth of really informative product marketing materials that prepares you for the event, and also lets people stay connected afterwards.
- Invite real industry execs to open the show and not some clueless politicians. I saw in the California pavilion (that looked pretty sad overall) a Terminator figure and thought what BS is this? Still better than an Angela figure probably, but why in the world are they qualified to open an ICT event, other than that they can operate their own cell phone and otherwise misuse it for their very own personal PR?
- Move the event to May/June when the weather is warm and in general more pleasant. To walk between the halls at zero degrees Celsius in the rain simply does not boost my or anyone else’s mood.
- Hire true ICT experts to plan and prepare the event on the web and in reality. It is obvious that there are too many non-ICT experts on board.
- Provide interactive demos sponsored by the companies, such as live video conferences, and look for world-first types of demos that attract the people, both experts and consumers. E.g. IBC in Amsterdam did this well, I thought, last year with a 3-D video interview live event.
- Get rid of anything that is just a left over from the good old times where just about anybody exhibited and came to the event. E.g. they should bring all the national ones — German state, German university, Fraunhofer and other government-funded research institutes’ booths — into one hall, and run events that focus on innovation, startups, investments, government programs. Events could be company pitches, demos on stage, awards for best technologies/innovations, best business models, best government-run incubators, evening parties, etc., and broadcast this onto large screens across the hall so that many people can follow it and, of course, also show it live on the Internet.
Tags: CeBIT