Base event themes on attendee experience.
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Looking for theme ideas? You might take a cue from Honey Creek Resort in Moravia, IA, where attendees have enjoyed everything from Hawaiian luaus, Mexican dinners, Texas Hold ’Em tournaments, and even Wii competitions. If your event features a themed activity, do it all the way! For example, if you’re going the Hawaiian route, include leis at the welcome reception, fresh fruits during breaks, a Survivor-type teambuilding activity, and island-inspired background music.

Or try tying your event theme to the unique attributes of the resort destination itself. Frank often creates Humana’s themes in conjunction with geography. She explains, “Typically, our incentive program is themed to the location we are visiting.”
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Use the purpose to maximize the impact.
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Lana Frank, Project Manager with Humana
Ensure your environment is in sync with the goals of your event. Board meetings, sales meetings, and incentive programs often fit right into the resort atmosphere.

For Humana, Lana Frank plans gatherings from corporate meetings to five-day incentive events. Purposes range from associate recognition, acquisition projects, PGA sponsorship events, consumer-centric information meetings, leadership planning sessions, and a myriad of others that keep Frank’s team of nine planners busy throughout the year.
“Our meetings [and] events involve both internal and external attendees,” Frank says. “Goals as a whole ultimately target engagement and progressing our business strategy forward to continue growth and profitability. Through identifying your goals, you can then begin to work with the resort on establishing a theme to use throughout the event, beginning with the invitations, email blasts, and other promotions geared toward getting your guests involved and excited.”

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by Shadia Cook
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Make a meeting impression… at a Midwest resort!
Rolling hills of green, lush foliage, sparkling pools, softly lit spas, plush robes and warm, cozy slippers… sounds like a VIP experience during a premier event at one of the Midwest’s resort destinations, doesn’t it?

After years of cost-cutting and bare-bones budgets, some groups are looking ahead, planning for a better future, and working to inspire leaders and key players to help make it happen. Better yet, some of those inspiring experiences are coming back to Midwest resort destinations. So how do you make the most of your group’s time at a resort? Check out some of the special touches that have scored points with attendees and bolstered enthusiasm to reach goals.
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Resort Benefits 02/14/2012
 
Midwest Meetings
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Resorts offer all-inclusive meetings.
When listing the pros and cons of a meeting or event venue, it is important to evaluate all the possibilities, including holding meetings or events at a resort. Choosing an option that’s just economical may mean losing out on important value-added amenities that will draw more attendees in and keep them engaged throughout. For some, resorts may seem too expensive or inappropriate for meetings, but upon closer examination, the benefits gained through meeting at a resort simply outweigh the uncertainty.  

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By Linda Leier Thomason

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Cindy Plummer, Director of Foundation Events for Ohio State University
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Kimberly Ritter, Senior Account Manager with Nix Conference and Meeting Management
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How would you respond?
Many meeting professionals have experienced an attendee’s medical emergency at an event. How a planner deals with such a situation it as it happens and after it happens affects not only the attendee’s quality of life but also an organization’s image.

So ask yourself a few questions. What would happen if you fell ill at a meeting? What plans are in place if an attendee needs to be transported to a hospital? Worse yet, what if an attendee passes away at an event?If this is a topic you prefer not to address, you’ll likely be unprepared when it happens. As always, it’s up to the meeting planner to consider the contingencies when planning an event.
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By Mark Dallman
How to drive additional revenue and attract new sponsors.
Host a policy debate or discussion… with government officials or candidates. This always attracts private sector sponsors and you can create a post-event VIP reception limited to sponsors so they can get face time with the officials in a non-lobbying atmosphere. 
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Midwest Meetings took five with Dave Serino, Founder of the Social Media Tourism Symposium, at the Explore Minnesota Tourism Conference to discuss social media engagement, strategy, and more.
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Social Media Is A Tactic, NOT A Strategy 
When you’re creating marketing plans for your next event remember this: Social media is only one tool in your arsenal of marketing opportunities; its’ not the end-all-be-all.  Many people focus primarily on social media outlets while forgetting the overall strategy: Engage your audience and get people to attend your event.

Remember that social media is all about engagement and conversation – the social media interactions need to be taken offline to create measurable results – including people attending your events.  What can you do instead?  Focus on the overall marketing strategy (from emails to phone calls to direct mail) and utilize social media as a support system.

Social Media Is More Than A Megaphone 
When promoting an event many meeting planners take the “ME, ME, ME” approach.  They broadcast the event again and again with just a sales pitch and link to registration.  Yes, you need to promote the registration (of course…).   What else can you do?  
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Midwest Meetings spoke with Anna Thill, President of the Greater Mankato CVB, about lessons learned from planning the Mankato Marathon in 2011 and how the 2012 event will be even bigger and better.
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Justin Baer, CheckInEasy Founder
Q: First, a little background: how did you become involved in providing mobile app technology for events?
A: Our sister company, Charityhappenings.org, is the master calendar of nonprofit events happening around the country. We have so many great relationships with event planners around the country, and the topic of eliminating stapled Excel spreadsheets and ugly clipboards kept coming up. We set out to create a much more efficient way to run check-in, and built CheckInEasy.

Q: So, what is CheckInEasy?
A: An extremely easy-to-use guest list and event check-in iPad/iPhone app that was recently used by Google at their holiday party to check in 2,600 guests at the New York Public Library. We just launched but have already gotten some exciting traction with users such as Tory Burch, Emory University, Ferrari and Masarati of Cannes, Elle Fashion Week, Nestle Water, AVT Technology, and more.
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