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Unfortunately, I was only able to attend the first half of the event but, for what it’s worth, the following is an inside look at the event, along with some of the stand-out moments from the speakers.

Venue:

The Raddisson Heathrow hotel was the venue for Focus Marketing this year.  A few of us northerners grumbled about the increase in travel required compared to the last couple of years (which is a bit rich considering that most of the speakers and organizers had to travel all the way across the Atlantic), but its proximity to Heathrow airport made it a sensible choice.

The hotel is, as you would expect considering the location, very elegant and the facilities were excellent.  The room was a standard size, but offered plush furnishings and a private bathroom that looked like it had been installed yesterday (I mean it looked good, not that it was filled with sawdust and workman’s tools).

Luxury however, comes at a price and, even with the seminar discount, the cost of a room was in excess of £100 per night - a cost that was eased somewhat with the inclusion of breakfast and lunch - which may explain why so many opted to arrive on the morning of the first day of the event, rather than the night before.  Tea and coffee were served throughout the day and the usual boring British biscuits were eschewed in favour of fresh Danish pastries and over-sized muffins.

Price notwithstanding, I would not be unhappy to return to this venue in 2009.

Seminar:

Presenter for the last two year, Robert Puddy has passed the reins to Pat Lovell and Sean Roach who both seemed perfectly at home in this role.

Both Pat and Sean were speakers at last years event and had little trouble filling the gaps between lectures with Q&A sessions and prize draws.  Sean, who is never short of something to say, led the discussions, but it was nice to see Pat - who didn’t seem nearly as comfortable on stage - continuing to maintain a presence alongside his partner.

The contrast in presentation between this year’s event and those of the last two was palpable; this was a slick, organised affair, with a strong American flavour.  I couldn’t help but miss the casual, relaxed atmosphere of the previous seminars, but the controlled structure meant that the seminar moved along at a rapid pace with little or no time wasted.

Much credit for this must go to the staff working at the back of the room who ensured there were never any evident technical problems to delay proceedings.  Every time a speaker took to the stage, slides, sound, and cameras were already in place and ready to go.

Pat and Sean offered some interesting house rules at the beginning of the first day, one of which was to turn mobile phones off while the seminar was in session.  To enforce this rule, it was explained that if anyone’s phone was to go off during the event, this would be seen as the culprit’s agreement to donate £100 to charity.  Failure to do so would result in ejection from the event!

I’m not sure whether this rule would have been enforced to this extent but, the few individuals who were caught with their phone out, didn’t seem keen to put this to the test and paid up.

Another entertaining feature were numerous prize draws that were made at the end of each break.  If you name was drawn, but you were late coming back to the room, your name was discarded from future prize draws.  This was a clever incentive to keep breaks to the agreed length and prevent wasted time.

The prizes ranged from lottery ‘scratch cards’ to a holiday cruise but, although this was a generous and amusing feature of the event, I can’t help feeling that some of the prizes were somewhat misjudged.

Winning a prize is a pleasure in itself which is why we are willing to put dozens of pound coins into a grab-machine to try and win a soft toy that we could probably have purchased at Woolworths for £1.99.  At the end of the day, we like to have something to own that reminds us that we won a prize.

Sean expressed surprise over the lack of enthusiasm for the ‘scratch-card prizes’ that offered a chance to win up to one million pounds.  He may have intended it to be ‘tongue-in-cheek’, but he might have underestimated the fact that, unless the card turned out to contain a prize, all that remained was a piece of card.  A plastic key-ring with the seminar logo would probably have been received and used with more pride, despite it’s lower monetary value.

I was also curious about the choice of intermediate prizes that consisted of money and stamp presentation packs with themes including Winston Churchill, Queen Elizabeth, and the Prince of Wales.  It seems to me that tourists often find British history and the monarchy far more interesting than do the average citizen.  I also couldn’t help wondering if this was an assumption of a national pride that isn’t quite at the level of that displayed by citizens of other countries.

These were not inexpensive gifts and I felt a little troubled that so much time and thought had gone in to carefully selecting items that were perhaps assumed to carry a cultural significance much higher than exists among the general populace.

Or maybe I’m over-thinking it.

Whatever the case, it was apparent that a lot of effort had been expended to try and keep the attendees level of interest high, and to ensure that everyone left the event with more than just an education in online business.  For the most part this goal was achieved and well-earned.

(Part Two will be posted tomorrow.  I will be reviewing the lectures and discussing GotAccess)

This entry was posted on Tuesday, October 21st, 2008 at 1:17 pm and is filed under Events, Reviews, Training. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.