A friend of mine wrote a weekly sports column once called “Things I’ll Never Understand if I Live to Be 100” with column entries like “Is Reggie Jackson REALLY worth a million dollars?” 

Okay, this was a while ago.

Today I’m just as baffled by some things that perhaps will become clear with time – like Reggie Jackson in October.

My conundrum – virtual tradeshows.

We’re in the meetings business.  The real, get-‘em-in-a-car-or-on-a-plane-bring-‘em-to-your-town-put-their-head-in-a-bed-and-their-rump-in-a-restaurant-seat business.  Which is why sending clients to a web-tradeshow has me jumping up and down.  Don’t we know by now that sitting behind a desk and double-clicking has far less economic impact than actually traveling to interact with people?  It’s not even close.

I’ve even looked at the avatars that wander through make-believe tradeshow corridors.  Where’s the fun?  I don’t get it.  No smells, no pervasive hum of business activity.  Instead, you’ve got mute and pause buttons so you can tone down the din or escape to the fridge whenever you want.  Total economic impact: about $.55 for a Coke.

If I’m missing something, tell me.  That’s the beauty of this, I guess – interactivity…sorta.
 

David Zunker, President

Finding a convention destination that is a short driving distance or has easy to use and affordable mass transit services can be key to making your meeting a success in the coming years.

Who wants to spend hours traveling in a car, plane or bus only to arrive at the convention destination and have to get in a taxi or bus to get around town during and after your event.

Towns like Saratoga Springs have safe sidewalks that get you to most meeting locations, restaurants and attractions.

Click here for a video tour of Saratoga.

Do you have pictures of your meeting attendees enjoying Saratoga?

Click here to send them to us and be featured on our blog.

What other benefits do you see from meeting in a walkable city? Please comment below.

Click here to submit your RFP and qualify to win an iPod.

Heather

Online chat or instant messaging can help you have quick conversations with members of your meeting planning team.

Marie

Meeting planners save time using free online documentation services like Google Docs.

Since we launched our new and improved website back in August, our popularity has increased amongst the search engines on the Internet! Yahoo, Google, Ask.com are just some examples of popular search engines. What search engines do you trust or use the most?

Does it drive you crazy when you call big businesses and everything is automated? It takes forever to get an actual “real person” to take your call after going through several prompts. The first one always being – to continue in English – press 1. Sometimes I wonder if they really want you to find them!

Times are tough. We are all aware of the nasty downslide the economy is in. It is more important than ever to be sure to get your name out there. A membership with the Saratoga Convention & Tourism Bureau is a great place to start. The more potential customers that see your name the more likely they will be to come see what the buzz is all about.  The Bureau’s main objective with our members is to help increase business. Our new and improved website is a great tool for getting exposure. The hits to our website are up thousands compared to this time last year. We are getting ready to produce The Ultimate Saratoga Map for 2009. The map is full of member information (Business name, address, phone and a brief 10 word description) and we have 20,000 copies printed! These maps are given to all attendees of trade shows, corporate meetings, and conventions as they register for their events. We are also willing to put any collateral material member businesses want to give us, such as menus, flyers, coupons, or business cards.

When I jumped into my new career opportunity as the Senior Sales Manager with the Saratoga Convention & Tourism Bureau in May of ’08 I had to learn a new language. That’s correct, the language of ACRONYMS.

As the SSM @ the SCTB I belong to MPI, PCMA, ESSAE and FICP. I learned to work closely with the CMP to obtain the RFP and post it as the ML for the DOS. I further learned that NYBA and APA can certainly refer to more than one organization. I used to get confused when I received a text from my daughter…not anymore…LOL X 2!