Do you have a New Years’ resolution? Well, here’s an idea: Research, plan and create an agenda full of events, conferences, seminars that are interesting for your profession, that may enhance your career, expand your network and create new business and wealth.
I truly believe that PR actions are more than press releases, articles, and media relations. Identifying the most interesting speaking opportunities is also a key part of a comprehensive plan. Participating in events and conferences – especially if you can participate as a speaker or panelist - can help raise your personal profile (and your company’s profile) with key customers and the media.
Important advice: speaking opportunities should never be taken as company or product promotion; it’s better that you focus in the challenges that you and your company overcame and the way you did it, or speak about your clients’ results and how they grew their businesses thanks to your products / services. Highlight your professional expertise in your field of knowledge. Let your actions speak for you. Showing the right cases and building trust in your audience will definitely provide the opportunity for generating customer leads upon your audience or even the media’s audience (there’s usually always some press coverage of every event).
Now research!
Your chamber of commerce is an excellent place to start your research. They usually handle an agenda of quarterly events. Rotary clubs in your area are also a good source of local leaders that can be a great audience.
Your own company, your partners, your directors, can bring great ideas to the table when it comes to speaking engagements and events they attended or they plan to attend.
The media you read will also be a great source of information.
And of course there’s the Web. Now it’s easier than ever to log online and with a simple set of keywords, discover a world of events in your city and nation wide.
Give it a try and you might even find amazing information in some of previous year’s presentations. I always get a sense of what’s going on in an industry or a market by presentations that experts presented in events and forums and that you can download in many cases, from events websites.
Go ahead, plan for your yearly event agenda!