How Will You Know If You’ve Never Tried?
This is another episode influenced by a conversation I saw on Facebook. Someone had posted a meme about people who’ve never attended a conference, implying that those people were elitist, know-it-alls, and they didn’t think there was any value in them going. What was interesting was how many who were commenting said they had never attended a conference. How can you say there’s no value, if you’ve never been?
Listen to this new 9-minute episode for my perspective on this.
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How will you know if you’ve never tried? Listen to this episode and see what I’m talking about. Hi, it’s Alan Berg. Welcome back to another episode of the “Wedding Business Solutions Podcast.” This was influenced by something that I saw on Facebook today. Somebody had put up a little meme kind of a thing about people not going to events, you know, conferences and stuff like that. And you know, the gist of it basically was there are people who think, “Hey I know it all and I don’t have to come to this.” And it was a picture of people kind of looking elitist. And it was interesting the conversation that went by because some people were saying, you know, they’d never been, never been, and there were different reasons why. And what was interesting is people talking about how they didn’t think it was a value for them, but they had never been.
Now with anything that we do in our lives, the only way we can judge if there is a value to it is if we have done it. And then we can say there was a value or there wasn’t a value. And whether that’s buying a product or having a service, and then being able to say, like we recently had painting done in our house. And I can honestly say it was fantastic. Because we’ve experienced it with them. We were referred to them by people who said they had a great experience. But our personal experience is the one that we can now relate to other people and say, “Yes, there was a good return on our investment for that.”
We’ve had other times recently. I mentioned that another episode we were on vacation and we went to different restaurants and stores and stuff where the experience in one versus another was greatly influenced by the eye contact and the smiling of the person who worked at that restaurant or that business. Not the quality of the food necessarily, but the experience there. We were at one restaurant which was a nicer restaurant, a little bit more expensive. And those of you that know me know that I like my bourbon. And I said to the waitress, you know, “What kind of bourbon do you have?” And she’s named a few, a couple of which were whiskeys, but they weren’t bourbons. Which again, I think they should all know that at a higher end place certainly, but let’s not go there. But I said, you know, “Could you go find out? I’m looking for something that’s not just the usuals.” Now I will drink Maker’s Mark and I’ll drink Woodford. I like those. I think it’s great. Jim Beam, not really. But I’m looking for something nicer if I’m having a nicer dinner. So she said she’ll check. She left and never came back and told me. Now I could have said something, but I said, you know what? I’m just not going to have tonight. Right? If it’s not important enough for her to go find out, that affects her check then, right? That affects her there.
But let’s again, talk about return on investment. If you’ve never been to a conference or a particular conference, you can’t say whether or not there’s a value for you. You can only say that you didn’t spend the money. That’s all you can do because having never been there, you can’t say that there was no value to you. I personally go to conferences and the value for me. There’s different kinds of conferences, ones I’m speaking at and ones I’m attending. The ones that I’m speaking at, the value for me is not being on stage. I know there are a lot of people say, “Hey, I want to do what you do. I want to get on stage.” That’s not the value for me. The value for me is in the hallway. The value is in the questions you ask. The value is at the meals and at the bar. And those of you have met me at conferences know I’m very accessible because to me that’s important. First of all, we’re just people. This happens to be what I do for a living. But I’m going to learn and I’m going to come up with new topics because of meeting you in the hallway, at the restaurants, at the bars, and things like that. If you heard the episode I did with Rob Ferre, we were talking about social capital. And Rob and I met at a conference and I saw him and another guy, Alex Reyes, and I said, “Hey, you guys want to get something to eat?” And we went and got something to eat and that was the beginning of our friendship.
So the value isn’t just in the sessions. The value is in the networking. But when I go to a National Speakers Association conference, I don’t even check the schedule until I’m on my way. Because I’m going. I know that I’m going. I know I’m going to meet some new people. That’s part of what I’m there for is to meet new people, make these connections. Partly there for the sessions. I’m going to get value there as well. From all of them? No. But that’s the point. I don’t know what the value is until I go. Sometimes I go with an agenda where there’s a certain thing I want to do or I want to learn about. Such as in 2013, I went to a conference deciding whether or not I should niche my business and stay within the wedding and event industry or expand outside of that. And by going to this conference and by sessions plus talking to other people, I was able to make that decision and make it an informed decision.
But I find it funny that people are saying how there’s no value to them or where they say, you know, “I don’t have the time.” You know, we don’t have the time for anything. We make things a priority. And therefore we make the time because we’re going to take the same 24 hours that we always have and we’re going to decide what to do with them. So when I decide, like in July, to go to the National Speakers Association conference and spend my money, and my conferences are usually a lot more expensive than the ones in the wedding and event industry. You know, the ticket price, you know, plus the hotel plus… The ticket price is usually many more times. I mean like a Wedding MBA conference, my ticket price for National Speakers is 4, 5, 6 times what that costs. But the ROI for me is in the relationships and in the education and in the information and then the chance encounters. It’s why I try to go, yes, I want to see my friends, but I also want to get outside of the cliques and meet new people.
I don’t get assigned seating at a meal and say “I want to sit with these people.” I say, “Please put me someplace,” and I don’t know who I’m going to be with and that’s the fun. So saying that there’s no value in something and never having tried it, or never having gone to a conference and saying no value is really, I’m just going to say it. It’s wrong. It’s wrong because you don’t know that. You don’t know that there’s no value. You know that you saved the money. That’s the only value you’ve achieved by not going. But you don’t know what the value might have been had you gone. That person that you could reach out to and bounce ideas off of. That person who might become a lifelong friend. That person where you’re heading to a city and you might end up hanging out with them or you might need help in that city. Or you might need help with a certain software or something and somebody’s going to help you with that because you went.
So what’s the value? You don’t know. But you have to keep an open mind and say, “There might be value to this if I go.” But guaranteed, you’re going to get no value from it if you don’t. So if you want to not go, that’s fine. I’m not telling you that you’re wrong if you don’t go. What I’m saying is you can’t say that there’s no value to it if you’ve never been. And then you also have to go with the right attitude, and the attitude is an open mind to say, “Yeah, I’m going to meet some people or I’m not going to get any value from that or from them.” That’s going to happen. But I’m looking for that nugget. I’m looking for that person. I have a bookshelf full of books of speaker friends who I’ve met at conferences. And I read their books and I say, “You know, these could be valuable to my customers. Can I get some signed copies?” Some of which I got for free. Some I had to pay shipping. Some I had to buy the books. But I have those books because I met the authors because I went to the conference. The value is there.
And again, not having the time is just an excuse because you can make the time. If you’re working full time, you get vacation time. You get to decide what to do with it. If you decide to take a day off, great. I also see people not doing that when there’s an event in their town, in their area, and choosing not to go with that one day off. Now, even if you don’t want to use your whole vacation time, you could probably get a day off if you needed a day off, right? With enough notice, you can probably do that. So if you want to go or not go, that’s fine. I’m not telling you, you know, you’re wrong one way or another. What I’m saying is don’t say that there’s no value if you’ve never been. Because you just don’t know. You don’t know what that value is. And to me that’s the fun part. Not knowing what the value is. I’m a very organized person, but when I go on vacations and things and go to conferences, I don’t want every moment planned out. I want it to be, “Oh hey, what’s going to happen now? And who’s hanging out? And who can I meet at the restaurant? The bar? In the hallway?” That’s the fun part as opposed to being so regimented. Even though I’m very organized, I don’t want it to be that regimented.
So, I hope to see you at another event. I hope it’s the first time you’re going to that event. And that you’re just keeping an open mind on that. And if you do, and if you did it because of this, please let me know. And I look forward to seeing you somewhere at an event having fun. Thanks.
I’m Alan Berg. Thanks for listening. If you have any questions about this or if you’d like to suggest other topics for “The Wedding Business Solutions Podcast” please let me know. My email is [email protected]. Look forward to seeing you on the next episode. Thanks.
Listen to this and all episodes on Apple Podcast, YouTube or your favorite app/site:
- Apple Podcast:
- YouTube: www.WeddingBusinessSolutionsPodcast.tv
- Spotify: https://spoti.fi/3sGsuB8
- Stitcher:
- Google Podcast:
- iHeart Radio: https://ihr.fm/31C9Mic
- Pandora:
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