The irony about the CeBIT email flood is that it makes them look desperate — yet their PR person told me yesterday that at this point, three weeks out from the start, they’ve already got more registrations than they did on opening day last year. So why do the emails keep coming? My guess is that at some point weeks ago, some executive somewhere signed off on a marketing plan, and now everyone’s dutifully following it. How… old-fashioned.
Thanks for the publicity, Stilgherrian. As CeBIT appears to become your favorite topic we believe you should get your own promotional code 😉
Readers of Stilgherrian’s blog are invited to attend CeBIT Australia 2008 free of charge by using the promotional code stilca08 when registering at http://www.mycebit.com.au.
Will be really interesting to see what happens now. I will keep you posted about registration numbers 🙂 – Regards, K
@K: ROFL! That is precisely how to play the game — participate in the conversation and extend it. Well done.
I know that many of the alpha geeks who I chat with via Twitter have already been flooded with invitations. However there may be, somewhere, a few uneducated individuals who have yet to hear of CeBIT or connect to running water.
We’re not quite that bureaucratic — a bit more about our marketing initiative at http://gocebit.com.au/?q=blog/get-your-blog (our trackback isn’t playing nicely with WordPress blogs atm).
@CeBIT Hahahaha oh that is hilarious.
@malini: Thanks for the linkage. I like being referred to as “feisty” too!
It’s interesting that your numbers show the email flood works in terms of boosting attendance — but do you track quality as well as quantity? Does a larger number of people through the door, but fewer alpha geeks, help?
@stil: With our audience growth over the last few years, not only have the numbers increased, but the demographic has shifted more towards business decision makers. I haven’t delved too deep into how the CRM database is managed and refined, but I do know its an ongoing, iterative process. So yes, we’re actively tracking both, as well as tracking the tracking process itself 🙂