Exhibitors for the net.marketing conference in Miami are gritting their teeth. Less than a month before the interactive event is to open, the Direct Marketing Association has managed to sign on only 12 exhibitors, according to the net.marketing Web site.
As bad, sources said, is that only a small percentage of the expected 1,000 attendeess appear to have registered so far.
The DMA, which has a policy of refusing to confirm conference sign ups, said no matter what, the show must go on. It is scheduled for May 5 to 7.
"We’re not going to cancel the event, the event is going forward," said DMA spokesperson Christina Duffney.
There is clearly some scrambling behind the scenes, however. The exhibit hall, which was slated to be set up in Miami’s exhibition center, has been moved to the Hyatt Hotel where the conference sessions are running.
"Attendees will have to walk through the exhibit hall to go from the concurrent to the general sessions, so this will increase traffic," Duffney said.
And, this week, the DMA will announce that it is accepting the less-expensive tabletop exhibits for the first time. Tabletops cost $1,995 versus the exhibit booth price of $2,795 for DMA members. (The nonmember prices are $2,595 for a tabletop and $3,850 for a booth.)
The confirmed exhibitors are trying to put a good face on things. "I have to go because if I want my company to have a leadership role in the market, I have to stay the course," said Deb Goldstein, president of IDG List Services, Framingham, MA.
But others said off the record that attendance is expected to be so low, it might be worse for business to attend than to stay home.
Most of the marketing for conferences typically occurs in the weeks just before it occurs, Duffney said. The DMA has sent out a direct mail piece to about 50 of last year’s exhibitors in January. A mailing to prospective attendees followed, Jeff Handler, director of Interactive marketing for the DMA, said in an interview in January.
"We’d like to get over 1,000 (attendees) like we did last year," Handler said in that interview.
(Handler resigned to pursue other interests in February, according to the DMA. He had already completed the program for the show. Dan Goldstein, director of conference planning now handles the net.marketing program.
But the bulk of the DMA’s promotions have yet to occur, she said.
These promotions include newspaper and broadcast ads in the South Florida area and e-mail broadcasts through other membership organizations. The DMA is also working with the local Florida direct marketing group to drum up interest in net.marketing.
"The weeks leading up to the conference, we get the highest number of sign ups," Duffney said.
In addition to war nerves, a faltering economy and companies having cut back on education and travel budgets, the Miami venue was a poor choice, exhibitors said.
Last year, the show was at the New York Hilton.
"When you’re in New York, you can just hop out for lunch and a lot of the interactive companies are headquartered there," said an unnamed source. "There’s not a lot of interactive companies in Miami."
Duffney said if the show had remained in New York, the DMA would have had to raise prices. To keep prices the same as 2002, "we looked at a couple of different places and decided Miami was the best price set," she said.
Another problem might be timing. Net.marketing occurs just before the DMA catalog conference and the DM Days in New York show, which both occur in the first week of June. Any chance net.marketing would be folded into DM Days, which the DMA recently purchased?
"At this point we’re going forward with both events," Duffney said. "It’s too early to speculate right now and we’ll evaluate the options after the events."
The DMA co-owns several conferences with Primedia, the publisher of Direct and Direct Newsline.
