Morning Folks!!
Yesterday I sent the following email out to the TRAFFIC mailing list. I decided to post it here as well.
T.R.A.F.F.I.C. has always been the show for domainers by domainers. The method behind the madness when we created TRAFFIC was to bring folks together that knew each other but had never met each other. Some had done business for years. So TRAFFIC revolved around several things. First and foremost was to slow everyone down for a couple days. Give them important content to help you grow your businesses and meet the right companies to do that. Then after a 12 hour day we would have a pretty darn good party or two. The key in the formula was to break bread with each other to form deeper more meaningful relationships and it was a good way to meet new people at every meal.
As the industry matured the meals have become less attended but still a very important part of the equation. Many now have private dinners and small gatherings. We never know and we pay for those meals whether they are served or not. It is also where we have our greatest expense. Where we have to predict the most and make those projections early on. That is the reason we have Early Bird pricing. The more we know early, the better we can plan. However we still have to guess about other things and there is never a way to accurately predict how many folks will come to any particular show.
So the point of all this is that I need your input. We can continue the formula we have used that has set the standard, or we can eliminate many of the meals and scale down the others. This would allow us to do a $995 early bird as well as reduce the spouse rate considerably. Does that have value to you? Will that $500 make you more likely to come and sign up early? Do you prefer being fed like royalty? This is YOUR show. The choice is YOURS. We just want to give folks what they want. So give us some feedback. We will weigh the overall response and report back to you in the next few weeks.
The changes could look like this.
1. Instead of a full breakfast, it would just be a continental breakfast or none at all.
2. Instead of a sit down lunch we will serve a Caesar salad or cold sandwich on one day and have our Keynote and Main affair at lunch on the second day.
3. Opening cocktail party will have limited food and drinks.
4. Dinners would be eliminated. Just a cocktail hour after each day, maybe.
That would be an outline of what could change to bring prices down. Cut more meals and the prices can go down even further. Your choice. On the other hand you may like what we do and how we do it and you see no reason to change the formula that has set the standard. Your wish is our command. Just share with us your thoughts and have faith that after listening to all suggestions, we will give You what YOU want..
So, do you want the no frills TRAFFIC with a $995 Early Bird Price or do you want the full deal at $1495? Your money, your show, your business, your decision. Let us know. Our ONLY agenda is YOUR agenda! We are listening.
Thank You!
Rick and Howard
Javier Zaffaroni
The meals were one of the best things of the conference, keep the good food!
Danny Pryor
The formula works. Don’t change a thing. The copy cats will eventually go away because they’re not seeing the bigger picture.
Tim Davids
Breakfast can be light…lunch should be great since most will attend…evening cocktails for sure with enough food to keep your stomach from growling.
Anunt
Why come to the show when you can bid online from home on the live auctions. You stop the online bidding and I bet your show will be packed again but people will not like this idea…but then again…it’s not personal, it’s business…you want to make friends…or you want to make money…it’s totally upto you…good luck!
Chef Patrick
I haven’t attended yet but I wouldn’t change a thing.
I plan on attending the New York event and want nothing but the best of everything. If your going to spend the money then spend the money and live good.
I really don’t think I would attend if it was downgraded.
Now if you want to create an event that is for the budget domainers, create something for the web. An online series of webinars.
Scott Petretta
I am a domainer and I have A.D.D. I think alot of us do. So a sitdown dinner can feel restrictive. Also, I think alot of people prefer a light breakfast.
Edwin
The formula they had going at TRAFFIC CCTLD, where you have a really full breakfast, a light stand-up lunch with various sandwiches, salads, soups etc. and a”proper” catered dinner with drinks seemed to work pretty well to me.
If you have full meals every mealtime, I guess that could get pretty intense, food-wise (and people must be really sleepy from all that food), but then I’ve not experienced a US-based TRAFFIC show directly…
John
Isn’t the sponsors covering food etc? What about the other $1000, what expenses are covered there?