Annual Conferences Events

Annual conferences events have gained importance in the recent past especially due to association with economic impact to the places they are held. Majority of past research have therefore focused on the economic benefits that are derived from such events including profits. One important areas that has consequently been left out is satisfaction of the attendees of such conferences that can ensure their retention and attraction of others through referrals. This study therefore sought to examine how conference events can retain existing customers and attract new ones. The research aim at determining factors that influence clients participation to Annual Conferences and Events, explore the appropriate retention strategies for participants in annual Conferences and Events in addition to determining the impact of satisfaction in Annual Conferences and Events on retention of customers and attraction of new one. A mixed methodology is adopted where there is use of both quantitative and qualitative data. The data will be collected from existing secondary sources as well as primary sources using questionnaires, observation and focus group discussions. The analysis will be done using SPSS tool, Excel program and thematic analysis.

Research Topic:

“How Can Annual Conference Events Retain Existing Customers and Attract New Ones. What Factors Affect Participants Increase On Annual Conference Events”

Rational, Aims and Objectives of the study

Annual conferences fall in the event tourism sector and entails market for meetings, incentives, conferences and events (MICE). The sector further consist of fairs exhibition, festivals, as well as public sector events. Annual conferences events have contributes greatly to the economy of travel and sector through generation of significant income in places where they are well implemented. Consequently, past scholars have majorly focused on assessment of economic impact of specific events including conferences and conventions. For instance Jones and Li (2015, p.117), examined the economic importance of meetings and conferences and established that due to the costs incurred in organizing such events, there must be targeted benefits to offset such costs. According to Events Industry Council (2018), conference events are crucial since they foster national economy and key business sectors. Events Industry Council (2018) established that in the United States the meetings and Events industry generates hundreds of billions of dollars revenue wise and support millions of jobs thus improving the economy. In the United Kingdom, Rudd et al. (2013) explored the economic impact of having more meetings to specific cities. According to the study, in 2011, around 1.3 million events were organized in the UK and attracted in excess of 116.1 million participants generating incomes of around £40 billion.

Despite the economic benefits of annual conferences and events, management have not been satisfied with the retention rates. According to Higgins (2017), Events planners places much emphasis on profit margins and revenues and fail to consider participant’s satisfaction. Consequently, participations expectation may fail to be met leading to their failure to return and bring their colleagues and friends. Walker (2014) emphasizes on the importance of creating repeat customers and provide statics to support this. Accordingly, a reduction of customer defection rate by 5 percent can lead to profit increment by between 5 and 95 percent. Further, Walker (2014) outlines that 6 to 7 times costs are incurred in the acquisition of new customer in comparison with retention of new ones. Additionally, the chances of convincing a new customer to make a repeat purchase are 60 to 70 percent as compared to 5 to 20 percent for new ones. Therefore, it is critical for annual conference management to make effort of satisfying their participants to increase prospects of future attendance. Despite the importance of retaining existing customer and attracting new ones in the Events sector, there is little research conducted on the subject. Hence, the present study aims at exploring the strategies used by Annual conference events to retain existing clients and attract new ones. The research will specifically explore factors that have an effect on participants increase on annual conference and Events.

The study will be guided by the following research objectives.

a) To determine factors that influence clients participation to Annual Conferences and Events

b) To explore the appropriate retention strategies for participants in annual Conferences and Events

c) To determine the impact of satisfaction in Annual Conferences and Events on retention of customers and attraction of new ones

Literature Review

Customers’ retention and attraction is critical to the MICE industry where Annual Conference events are classified (Getz, et al. 2008, p.403). Different theories have been advanced to demonstrate the importance of retaining existing customers and attracting new ones. According to Sharma and Patterson (1999, p.151) relationship commitment model, three factors; “communication effectiveness, technical quality and functional quality” which are moderated by trust in relationship, have an impact on relationship commitment. Hence, according to the model, when the clients perceives that the service provider will be relied on to act in the best long term interest of the customers, satisfaction will be achieved leading to retention. The service quality provided should meet the expectation of the customers for satisfaction to be achieved as per Sharma and Patterson (1999, p.165) relationship commitment model. Moreover, the model emphasizes on the need to communicate to clients in a timely manner and in a language that they are able to relate to.

Another theory that underpins retention and attraction of customers is holistic approach by Ranaweera and Prabhu (2003, p.374). The theory explores the combined impacts of satisfaction, trust as well as switching barriers on client retention. According to the theory, the more satisfied the customers are, the more the organization is likely to retain them. Hence, annual conference management should be keen to satisfy their clients to increase satisfaction and consequently retention of existing customers and attraction of new ones through referrals. Another important concept in this theory is trust, which is perceived as a one party’s confidence in the other’s reliability and integrity (Henn, and Bathelt, 2015, p.104). Trust in addition to fostering the value of relationship between parties, is a critical factor as far as the perceived quality of services is concerned. Perceived switching barriers on the other hand assist with retention where the clients feel they need resources and opportunities to switch to new providers. Annual conference management hence need to create switching barriers that hinders clients from switching to other providers.

Existing literature points to a number of factors that influences client’s participation to Annual Conferences events. According to Rogers, and Davidson, (2015), the conference program itself has the capability of influencing satisfaction of the clients through provision of opportunity for keeping up with variations in their fields of practices, in addition to learning new skills. The view is supported by Lu and Cai (2011, p.37) who found that clients who enjoyed educational benefits were more satisfied with annual conferences and had high likelihood of returning and informing their colleague to attend. Hence, event managers need to maximize benefits to the participants to increase their satisfaction and consequently retention of existing customers and attraction of new ones. Similarly, Tanford et al. (2012, p.290) highlighted a number of factors that influence attendance of annual conference events. The factors included program, networking, location, cost as well as external activities. These factors were found to be key determinants of attendee’s intention to return in future and to refer others. Hence, the event management should select appropriate location, minimize costs and ensure maximum networking to retain clients and attract new ones.

Past research has also sought to explore retention strategies for participants in annual Conferences and Events (Walker, 2014; Dabholkar 2015; Jones, 2017). According to Walker (2014), there are several steps that can be followed to win repeat attendees and attract new one for future conferences. The first step or strategy is reminding the past attendees of what was special in the previous conference. One effective way of doing this is through sending to them well designed and produced event report that points out the primary points of the previous conference. Another strategy highlighted by Walker (2014) is involvement of past delegates in the planning process. The past attendees need to give their opinion and suggestion for improvement from previous conferences. Such gestures make them feel part of the process and lead to more participation. According to Dabholkar, (2015, p.483) a strategy that can be used to retain participants and attract new ones is recognition. Some of the ways proposed for making returning clients feel special include sending them handwritten invitation with customized messages expressing how much one is looking forward to see them again. Jones, (2017) on the other hand views rewarding as a strategy that can be used to retain and attract new clients. Rewards need not be in form of money only but can also be in form of small discounts awarded to the companies. Such small gestures can influence the approval of participation to the annual conference events by the senior management. Hence, annual events managers need to come up with some simple rewards to attract new participants and retain the existing ones.

Key concepts

There are several key concepts that will be used in the research. The first key concept is factors that influence participation to annual conference events. From the literature reviewed, some of the factors include conference program, potential benefits, networking, location, cost as well as external activities (Rogers, and Davidson, 2015; Lu and Cai 2011, p.37). The study will seek to examine these and more factors and how their influence on participation of annual conference events. The existing data from conference event industry and primary data that will be collected using questionnaires, observations and focus groups will be used to elaborate on this key concept.

Another key concept that will be explored is the strategies used to retain and attract participants for annual conferences events. Some of the strategies that have been explored in literature and which will be considered in the present paper include reminding, participants, involving them, recognition, and rewards (Walker, 2014; Dabholkar 2015; Jones, 2017). Through the use of secondary data and primary data, these strategies and others will be critically examined.

The last key concept is determination of how satisfaction influences retention in annual conference events. As established in theoretical literature, satisfaction leads to increased loyalty hence retention of existing customers and attraction of news ones (Ranaweera and Prabhu, 2003, p.374). This concept will be reviewed further through review of existing data and collection of primary data through questionnaires, observation and focus group discussions.

Research Paradigm

The present research will be based on mixed methodology design where both quantitative data and qualitative data will be used. While the quantitative data will entail close ended information that will undergo statistical evaluation and result in numerical representation, the qualitative data will be more subjective and open-ended (Creswell, and Clark, 2017). The use of qualitative data will allow the voice of participants to be represented in the study. The rational for use of mixed methodology is the nature of the study being carried out. To understand How Annual Conference Events Retain Existing Customers and Attract New Ones, it is important to have both the context in which the data is collected and carry statistical analysis and generalization, which can only be achieved through the use of mixed methodology. Further, with mixed methodology, the researcher is able to utilized different tools that enables collection of more comprehensive data that provides findings with broader perspective of the overall research problem (Creswell, and Clark, 2017).

The data to be used in the analysis will be collected using different methods. Both primary and secondary data will be utilized in the research. Secondary data will be retrieved from conference event industry which will include statistics on attendance, reasons for attendance and strategies used. The secondary data to be retrieved will be in both qualitative and quantitative form. According to Johnston, (2017, p.619) the use of secondary data is advantageous due to availability in addition to being easy to analyze especially if it has already being organized in the previous research. However, Johnston, (2017, p.624) cautions that the data may be inaccurate or out of date especially where it was collected for different research aims.

Primary data on the other hand will be collected in the form of questionnaires, observation and focus groups. Questionnaires will be close ended and will be used in the collection of quantitative data. Responses will be quantified using Likert Scales and respondents will tick appropriate responses. Questionnaires are effective in collection of huge amount of data over a short period of time. The cost of using questionnaires is also low and they can be sent online (Rowley, 2014, p.308). Primary qualitative data will be collected using observation and focus groups discussion to gain more insights on the quantitative data collected using questionnaires. Each Focus group will consist between 6 and 12 participants and the researcher will guide the discussion (Rowley, 2014). Tape recorders and note taking will be used to record responses. The use of focus groups help to obtain detailed information and personal and group feelings and has potential of saving time and money in comparison to individual interviews (Stewart, and Shamdasani, 2014)

Data analysis

Since both qualitative and quantitative data will be used, different analysis methods will be applied. The quantitative data collected using close ended questionnaires will be analyzed using excel program and SPSS software application. The data will first be checked for validity before being coded and input in excel and SPSS. Data tabulation will be conducted to determine accuracy of entry, numbers in each categories and spread of scores. Descriptive measures such as Mean, mode and medium will then be applied (Treiman, 2014). Correlations analysis will also be carried out on the data. The findings of the quantitative analysis will be presented in form of tables and figures and explanation provided.

On the other hand, qualitative data will be analyzed using thematic analysis. The method focuses on identification of patterned meanings in a given data set (Braun, Clarke, and Terry, 2014). Thematic approach can be approached in different ways. In inductive approach, the coding and development of theme are as per the content of the data while in a deductive approach, coding and theme development are as per existing concepts and ideas (Braun, Clarke, and Terry, 2014). In the present research, a deductive approach will be used where the coding and theme development will follow the outlined concepts and research objectives. The data obtained from observation and from focus group discussion will thus be coded and fitted to themes that will be formulated based on the research concepts and objectives. The final write up will entail analytic narrative and data extracts which will be compared to the existing literature.

Ethical Issues

Various ethical issues may arise in the research especially with the use of primary data. The chief ethical issues is consent by participants to take part in the study. For research to be ethical, it is imperative that informed consent be obtained from the participants. The researcher will explain the purpose of the data collection to the respondents and inform them of their rights including the right to withdraw their participation (Neuman, 2016). Risk of participation will also be explained before questionnaires and focus groups discussion can be undertaken. Another ethical issue that will be considered is anonymity and confidentiality of respondents. No identifying information of participants will be published.

References

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Events Industry Council, 2018. Meetings & Events Industry Releases New Economic Impact Data. [Online] (updated 2018). Available at [Accessed, Aug. 21, 2018].

Getz, D., 2008. Event tourism: Definition, evolution, and research. Tourism management, 29(3), pp.403-428.

Henn, S. and Bathelt, H., 2015. Knowledge generation and field reproduction in temporary clusters and the role of business conferences. Geoforum, 58, pp.104-113.

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Jones, M.L., 2017. Sustainable event management: A practical guide. Routledge.

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