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Something is in the water, and I don’t think it is economic recovery. I think it’s fear. Is it just me or has the volume of sales calls just gone off the charts in the past two months? And these sales calls are different too. They are aggressive beyond anything I’ve ever seen. One fine gentleman saw fit to pretend he was a new client, nefariously wresting my cell phone number from a colleague so he could reach me while I was out of the office. His purpose was to sell me video monitoring equipment so I could spy on my employees in our office. I don’t really have a need for that, with my upstanding team, but regardless, I certainly was turned off completely by the disrespectful approach.

Along with this type of sales call, our offices have suddenly been besieged by door-to-door cold callers for everything from payroll services to insurance. The change in the climate is so remarkable, we have had to put up a “No Soliciting” sign on our door for the first time in thirteen years of business.

What does all this mean about the relationship between sales and marketing? Has marketing failed to develop the awareness and leads it is supposed to drive to sales? Have so many companies gone out of business that suppliers like these I have mentioned are desperately trying to save themselves by pressing their sales force to return to this random cold-calling approach to survive?

As a marketing agency, we are in no position to judge other business models, but we do practice what we preach, and those clients who pulled back on their expenditures during the rough times have resurfaced, and re-engaged us with the alleged resurgence of the economy. This is the case, we believe, because we have built enduring relationships with these clients, and built them based on delivering results.

However, it gives us pause to ask the question, “How has your company changed its sales model in response to the shift in the economy?”

The corollary, of course is, “Why have you changed, and has it worked?”

I think WOW is going to start its own little awards division for the meeting and event industry. Our team has been watching with great fascination the companies that exist out there with one sole purpose – to get you to enter their awards (for a fee between $50 -$500, of course). Usually you win. Then they are also happy to sell you the award for a few more dollars. In fact, if you are feeling especially generous, buy one for your client too! I tell you, there is money to be made here, for those of you who want to join us.

Of course, I admit, we know how to make the most of this game. Pay the dollars, win the award, then use all your PR and marketing prowess to tell the world what an award-winning agency you are. Of course, truthfully, we know and you know that results matter more than awards. It’s just hard to ignore the shiny, sparkly awards and ask the probing questions when an agency has all that award bling in its lobby.

Meanwhile, the best one yet landed in my inbox. The Small Business Commerce Association (SBCA) awarded WOW 2009 Best of Business Award, provided us our very own prize claim code, just so we could purchase our plaque. Well, they awarded it to us, and every other business they could find, including a few of our clients. The thin veneer of validity is getting thinner every day.

It really is true, anyone can be award-winning these days. It takes very little time, very little effort, and only a little investment. Just keep in mind, the real prize is delivering the results and building the relationships that endure over time.

It may be the greatest obstacle to managing a project budget that has ever existed – revisions.  Everyone knows there will be some. What is surprising, and frustrating, is that today many agencies are eliminating them from their project estimates altogether, presumably in order to win business. The result is out-of-scope, unmanageable additional billing to the client. The answer, however, is a whole new era in budget management that is a revision-driven organization’s dream come true.

Client Frustration
It is easy to spot someone who has experienced the revision creep effect first-hand.  The pricing looks great on the surface, and clients eager to grab the best creative for the lowest possible price don’t think to inquire about the inclusion of revisions until the additional billing for revisions starts rolling in. One client from a Fortune 500 company recently complained of another agency, “I feel like every time I pick up the phone on this project, I am spending money I don’t have allocated in the budget. I just don’t know how to manage this.”

The Agency Gamble
The secret is this: most agencies don’t know how to manage revisions either, and it is one of the main reasons agencies lose business, next to creative that misses the mark. Client frustration and inability to manage a budget is now at an all-time high as they pick the low-cost leader who left revisions out of the pricing model, hoping to make those up if, and when, they occur. Agencies are afraid of the effect on their bottom line if they don’t bill for the hours they work on a project, but even more afraid right now of not winning the project in the first place – so they gamble on the low price, hoping that any subsequent revision billings, if necessary, will be few and won’t irritate the client.

The New Era In Pricing
No one ever knows the scale or volume of revisions a project will entail. There are too many variables. A few forward thinking agencies, The WOW Factory among them, have developed a “Revision Insurance” plan for clients. The best part is – it doesn’t cost any additional money.

Years of project work have shown that most clients make no more than one or two rounds of revisions at any phase of a project. Each of those revisions take approximately one or two hours apiece for a designer, programmer, editor, or other creative or production team member to execute. An average hourly rate for these team members is $130/hour. Experience has also shown that clients that go beyond the second round of revisions are 80% more likely to reach five, six, seven or more rounds of revisions – and while they stand to gain the most in this arrangement, they are in the minority. Therefore, this “risk” that certain agencies, WOW among them, are taking, is really nominal, and designed for long-term business relationships founded on consultation and trust.

By the end of 2009 the Convention Industry Council (CIC) will be launching a new set of standards for green events. Not since 2004, when the first set of guidelines and best practices (PDF)  were developed by the CIC, has there been this much discussion about greening the meetings industry. A green meeting or event incorporates environmental considerations to minimize its negative impact on the environment – and the meetings industry is a dramatic offender in this area – second only to the construction industry.

Therefore it is no surprise that over 200 volunteers have been working for almost two years on the new CIC guidelines and standards, which are launching at a critical juncture. According to Event Marketer Magazine, “the market for Green Solutions is expected to nearly double in the next 12-18 months.”  In concert with this movement, the CIC has joined forces with the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), Accepted Practices Exchange (APEX) and The Green Meeting Industry Council (GMIC) to develop a minimum standard to qualify an event or supplier of that event as “green”.

What’s Covered in the New Guidelines
The goal of the new guidelines is to give meeting stakeholders and planners a framework for purchasing decisions. This framework is not built in absolutes, but in defines levels of acceptability, performance and a clear path to improvement if levels are unacceptable. The new guidelines cover nine areas common to both meetings and tradeshows:

• Accommodation
• Audio/Visual and Production
• Communication
• Destinations
• Exhibits
• Food & Beverage
• Meeting Venue
• On-Site Offices
• Transportation

For those interested in seeing the current specifications in progress (currently open for review and feedback) there is a forum available online at http://wp.apexsolution.org/.

Why Be Green?
According to the CIC, “planning and executing a green meeting isn’t just about being environmentally responsible, they can have economic benefits for the event organizer. In fact, many of the minimum recommended guidelines in the Green Meetings Report can actually save money. For example, collecting name badge holders for reuse at an event of 1300 attendees can save approximately $975 for the event organizer.” While this may seem minor, there are endless lists of ways to reduce waste AND investment in events – and they are scalable to the size of the event.

There is also no limit to the leverage a company can gain from a green event in the eyes of its employees, constituents and customers. For example, according to Meeting Strategies Worldwide, “If a five-day event serves 2200 people breaks, breakfasts, lunches and receptions using china instead of plastic disposables, it prevents 1,890 lbs. of plastic from going into a landfill. Another example is by not pre-filling water glasses at banquet tables during three days of served lunches for 2200 attendees; 520 gallons of water can be saved.”

Get Ahead of the Curve
While the meetings industry has recently jumped into the issues of sustainability practices, parent corporations have been struggling to find effective ways to comply for years. On October 8th The WOW Factory will host an interactive video webcast on green meetings, featuring Roxane Peyser, CEO/President, maurgood LLC. Roxane’s specialty is developing highly-effective corporate responsibility practices and sustainability strategies for companies and organizations. In addition to specializing in environmental sustainability, she has specific expertise in climate change and carbon reduction strategies. This one-hour session will explore how to turn meetings and tradeshows green — and how it is not an all-or-nothing proposition. Attendees will be encouraged to explore cost-savings from greening a meeting, and how to leverage green meetings and sustainable strategies into growing their brands.

A rebrand can reboot a company’s presence, distance it from baggage, or align its visual communications with an updated strategy. Sometimes, though, rebranding can backfire… or does it?

At the end of August, IKEA sloughed its font of choice for over five decades, Futura, in favor of Verdana – and the resulting panic among brand experts, designers, and typography lovers spread quickly across the Web. Verdana was designed for Microsoft to be used on screen and at small sizes. It does this well, but designers and type designers seem to simply hate Verdana. Frankly, I think this is mostly because it stands for typography in the hands of the masses, and it’s not as sleek as Futura (which is WOW’s font of choice).

Earlier this summer, the 16 year-old Sci Fi Channel rebranded to SyFy. Apparently, the reason for the change was the fact that “Sci Fi” was not something that the channel could own or copyright as it describes a genre that anyone else can use as a descriptor. So, with SyFy, the channel can establish a wordmark that can be rolled out to its subsidiaries and projects. However, Sci Fi fans were incensed at what was considered an affront to their loyalty.

Tropicana had its own debacle earlier this year, as well. After nearly a quarter century, the company updated the “straw in the orange” with a minimalist design. The reboot of this iconic brand, however, was likened to the disastrous relaunch that was New Coke. Tropicana executives responded to the uproar – and possibly the impact on sales – quickly, and the branding has already returned to the loved straw in the orange design.

Holiday Inn has been rolling out a rebrand quite slowly – announced in 2007, the update will continue through 2010. The rebranding will start with the logo, which has ditched the well-known script and rising star graphic in return for cleaner, simplified Webby look. The goal is to reposition Holiday Inn more directly against Hilton and other properties geared toward business travelers. It’s not just limited to the logo: new signage, exterior hotel lighting and landscaping, lobby areas which include a “unique brand scent and sound experience” and clutter-free front-desk, and updates to room amenities. Response has been lukewarm, and franchise owners have noted that the timing is unfortunate (as the travel industry continues to struggle).

So here we’ve got four examples of rebrands with less than stellar reception. But they’ve all got something in common: people talked about them, either via petitions from loyal fans, or scathing reviews by branding experts. The takeaway here is that while a rebrand may not successfully accomplish the reboot that brand managers seek, there is likelihood that the move can raise awareness, regardless of positive or negative reception.

This is only brushing the surface, with recent, high profile examples. I’d love to hear your rebrand backfire stories.

Like all execu-speak phrases, “co-creation” has suddenly emerged as the trendy hyphenated word of the moment – replacing the recent blockbuster “at the end of the day”. Executives in the know (or executive-wanna-be’s, who would like to appear in-the-know) use it as a great way to say “we’re going to build this thing together.”  However, the executives I hear using it could just as easily say “collaboration” or “brainstorm” or a host of other less trendy phrases.  I don’t think these otherwise extremely brilliant executives are fully aware of the implications this little powerhouse phrase contains.

Co-creation has its origins in improvisational theater, where actors randomly react in a scriptless environment, allowing each performance to be entirely unique and utterly un-reproducible. Is that what these executives are after when they want to co-create a project plan or strategy? Seriously? I don’t think so.

Of course, the rise of open source software, where users have full access to the source code and are empowered to make their own changes and improvements to it, has recently taken over the phrase “co-creation”. In this instance, co-creation means that anyone and everyone has full democratic autonomy to change and customize a tool to suit their uses, exclusive of how anyone else uses it.

Again, I ask – is that what these executives are truly after? If they are, then I tip my hat to them. They are the fearless leaders who will allow the common man to speak with equal  weight as the Director, the VP or even the CEO. Even so, in the end, an organization does not thrive on a complete lack of commonality or structure. Corporations need some form of structure and uniformity for their very existence.

So, while it sounds oh, so edgy and hip and even – dare we say it – glamorous – to bandy around the phrase “co-creation,” I would remind our executives out there that if you have someone like myself sitting in the audience, you have just pronounced open-season on anarchy within your office/division/organization and you must consider – is that really what you want? Or do you just want people to get creative and collaborate a little bit? If so – why don’t you just say that? Trust me, you will still be just as cool in our eyes. Maybe cooler.

The WOW Factory has begun hosting a series of webcasts focused on demystifying some of the newest and most visible (if not best understood) ways to deliver value to meetings and events. Seems we are not alone – although the focus these days seems to be more on cutting costs than delivering value. Not surprising since the meeting industry is undergoing a sea change along with the rest of our economy. This economy has shaken the status quo and assumptions that particular meetings are necessary and put others under the microscope. Planners – and the organizations for which they work – have been forced to scrutinize the strategic value of each event and each dollar spent; it comes down to “survival of the most effective.”

For example, one of WOW’s clients that chose not to have a meeting at all in 2009 is now planning to revive it next year. Another is readdressing all of its meetings and might eliminate some while keeping others.

A recession can be a real opportunity for growth and increases in efficiency. According to a new study, the economy is driving meeting planners to take a more strategic role in their business, demonstrating their organizational value by positioning why their meetings are critical. PCMA, American Express and Ypartnership fielded the U.S. Meeting Planner Intentions Survey during April and May 2009.

The study surveyed 516 professional meeting planners working for corporations or associations. It found that the economy is the main factor driving changes observed in meeting planning, booking and rebooking. Corporate meeting planners were more likely than association planners to indicate they expected a decrease in meetings due to meeting budgets being cut because of general economic conditions or image/publicity/public‐policy considerations.

Other findings include:

• 44 percent expect to plan fewer events in 2009/2010 than in 2008
• 47 percent expect to plan the same number of events
• Planners intend to make greater use of alternative meeting methods, including Webinars (54 percent), teleconferencing (48 percent) and videoconferencing (30 percent)
• 52 percent of meetings booked were for 100 attendees or less
• 12 percent of respondents planned off-site meetings for more than 1,000 attendees

Increased scrutiny of meetings paired with economic constraints has led planners to carefully consider not only whether or not to have a meeting, but also whether a face-to-face meeting is the best method for an event. The takeaway here is that the industry isn’t collapsing, it’s getting stronger and smarter… more effective.