Not Your Father’s Event or Even Mine: Streaming Media Goes Mainstream.

One of the seminar speakers last week announced that “Integrating Online Events and Streaming Media into Your Marketing Mix” (the latest and very successful effortof AMAHouston’s Interactive Special Interest Group) is a paradigm shift.

That’s accurate one way – the way that new technologies continually affect marketing, advertising and sales. The phrase does streaming media and webcasting a disservice, though: there are a lot of people around for whom paradigm shift is real 1960s-speak. Therefore shopworn.

Online eventing is the exact opposite of worn out and it’s not even close to the good old days of meetings and even conference calls.

As more than 80 AMAHouston members and non-member marketers heard at the HESS Club, online meetings and associated webinars are vivid, hard-working and generative of immense buzz when used according to the rapidly developing “best practices” of the event/meeting industry. Three speakers came to deliver the best-practices message, presenting strategy, tactics and theory rolled into a couple of thoughtful hours.

VISION Production Group’s Tracey Shappro was the Strategist, laying out “global” opportunities for groups to streamline product introductions, reduce costs and increase the effective reach of their efforts to an expanding range of stakeholders. This is over and above estimated cost savings. For which Shappro presented strong research findings. (Hewlett-Packard, f’rinstance, saved $1.2 million its first year of online eventing.)

This strategic view is what Danny Gavin, Director of Marketing at Brian Gavin Diamonds, referred to (I think) when he said, “This seminar really cemented the idea that people need to embrace the technology. Initially event planners were absolutely terrified that webinars would take away their jobs. In reality, webinars have enhanced their positions. Those who don’t use them will end up without a job.”

Scott Justis from LD Systems was the morning’s Tactician and could hardly be bettered for a look at the basic blocking and tackling, the “practical logistics” of webcasting. If you ask him nicely, he will likely turn his presentation into a checklist of everything you need to consider to prevent disaster and assure success. The real nugget: no level of self-confidence can replace the webcaster’s need to rehearse, rehearse, rehearse.

Shawn Shadfar of omNovia Technologies had a mantra, Event = (Live + Webcast)…almost Einsteinian and fresher than paradigm shift. Shadfar played the Theorist, moving quickly from the concept of the new-era event to real-time action generation. He contributed the best LOL-line of the day: “If you are planning on a webcast, do NOT involve your IT department.”

This is where the best practices come in. STANANDLOU Account Exec Kate Wiggins said, “The panel of speakers really showcased the impact a well-planned and produced webcast can have on its audience.”

Online event examples were pretty large-scale, begging just one question. Mary Paulette, who’s an Associate Marketing Director for American General Life Companies, noted, “It was hard to get a sense of how webcasting might work for small organizations; I thought the Q&As were most informative.”

So Susan Farrell, President of Captavi, gets an extra attagirl for Q-and-A control and overall moderating. (Never mind the score from the Mali referee.)

Gavin sent one extra reminder. “Don’t be afraid of technology. The faster one embraces it the faster one can reap its benefits.”

Online events aren’t anything like your daddy’s sales conferences. Not like my dad’s, either. BTW, I’m Richard Laurence Baron, AMA volunteer and principal of Signalwrite Marketing. Happy Father’s Day.

Journalism Week 1927 photo from Missouri U’s J-School Site © 2009 The Curators of the University of Missouri.