CHICAGO — Hosted-buyer programs and personalized matchmaking at trade shows and events are more important than ever as attendees, exhibitors, and sponsors expect a high return on investment for participating in events and are used to a culture where curation and efficiency are the standard. It’s all about serving your community.
Trade Show Executive talked with Nancy Mastroianni, Head of Investors and Networks, HLTH, Inc., to find out how her team is taking HLTH’s hosted-buyer program to the next level by understanding the keys to success: technology integration, passion, realistic staffing, and clear strategies.
Critical Components of a Winning Hosted-Buyer Program
When considering implementing a hosted-buyer program at an event, an organizer needs to deeply understand the participants’ needs and expectations, both from a sponsor and buyer perspective.
Mastroianni says that, as an organizer, you want to approach a hosted-buyer program from the perspective of driving meaningful value to both groups and solving a problem in a way that both groups feel they get something out of the experience.
“An important point is you need to have clear rules of engagement from the start — what your plans are, how many sponsors and buyers will be there — it’s a bit of a math game to make sure all the sponsor meetings fulfill all the buyer meetings,” Mastroianni said.
To keep all the key stakeholders engaged, Mastroianni says organizers should create an environment where they provide a detailed pre-event, onsite, and post-event plan. This means checking people in, making sure seats are filled, chasing down no-shows, and collecting NPS scores.
“It’s not transactional; we’re managing this complicated dating relationship. We may have people wanting to date each other, they’ve never met, or they don’t even know about each other,” Mastroianni said. “Think about a cool, innovative company with a new technology that’s solved an amazing problem. I’ve seen this a number of times at HLTH, and they are by far the most requested company for meetings. We want to ensure we look at the data as the program evolves because that tells us a part of the story and what is up and coming. You never know what is trending ahead of time, and it gives you indications of what is trending as solution providers (sponsors) shift and evolve.”
The Hidden Hosted Buyer Pitfalls: What to Know Before You Proceed
“The number one mistake: Do not try to do it manually on an Excel spreadsheet. There are affordable technologies out there, and there are a variety of options, so you can spend a very moderate amount of money to get it automated. Your teams will be more strategic about matchmaking and less about administrating an elaborate spreadsheet. Embrace the technology,” Mastroianni said.
The second common mistake Mastroianni notes is not having realistic expectations of the labor and staff involved in executing a successful program. It takes people-power and resources to run an effective program.
You should think about who is recruiting the buyers. You need to know who your target audience for the program is, what the recruiting strategy looks like, and how you’re connecting with those buyers, whether it’s email, phone call, or LinkedIn, Sales Navigator, etc., according to Mastroianni.
“And the last thing, and it sounds like a silly thing, but if you can have your systems talking to each other, so you’re not manually moving Excel files from system A to system B, it’s a much better customer experience,” Mastroianni said.
Beyond the Numbers: Meaningful Ways to Measure Success
When you first launch matchmaking programs, success isn’t only measured by how much money they generate. These programs can require a short-term investment, but the long-term impacts of giving participants something unique and the brand loyalty that follows can be worth the front-end investment.
“When you approach a program launch from the mindset that from day one, we are going to invest in this as a truly unique experience, something that stands out and drives incremental revenue. How can you make a very lasting first experience? What’s the long game on the model compared to the short game? If you look at the potential for a community to really thrive and invest in that community, that’s where you get these exciting programs at HLTH,” Mastroianni said.
When measuring the success of their hosted-buyer program, Mastroianni said that the team looks at the total number of meetings, the total number of buyers they confirmed, and the total number of sponsors who participated. They also look at NPS scores from sponsors and buyers and conduct dedicated surveys of the program’s participants.
“[It’s also the] unscientific feedback like direct conversations from people who walk up to us; that unscientific level of appreciation people show you in-person [matters]. There’s a very big in-person part to this, and at HLTH, we had 200+ tables, 15-minute meetings, over 4,000 meetings, and time slots running all day long. You see a sea of people, and they find a rhythm, and then they get the benefit,” Mastroianni said. “What matters most — making sure they get the outcome they’re looking for.”
Mastroianni explained that HLTH has four sectors, and each sector has critical buyer candidates looking to solve its problem.
“We have vendors who sell across those segments and have a given solution. You’ve got targeted vendors who are hitting certain segmented audiences, and sometimes a vendor can only sell into one segment, sometimes, they’re selling to all the segments. Everyone is different, but we’re trying to make sure we have the right pool of vendors and buyers so that we can get our matchmaking technology to bring the right people together.”
A Closer Look at HLTH’s Investor Connect Program
One way HLTH looks to disrupt the healthcare events landscape is by supporting startups at the show and being the place where investments and deals that will shape the future are made.
“The investor startup area is a very important area,” Mastroianni said. “We used to say in the old days [startups] pay the same price as everybody else, which is contrary to a startup. At HLTH, we create a very affordable price point for them to come in and have either attend or invest in an affordable turnkey kiosk.”
Mastroianni said that most startups come to the show with their No. 1 objective being to find investors, and investors come to the show looking for innovative products and solutions to invest in.
“You’ve got two groups of people with different objectives than everyone else, so we created this experiential lounge. I want to differentiate [between Investor Connect and other hosted buyer/matchmaking programs] because investors have certain objectives and may only be looking for specific things and will have specific objectives in who they want to meet. We run an investor-driven matchmaking program. We want to nurture that ecosystem because we see value in both what the investors and startups bring to the table, and we want to help them come together because that’s the next generation of companies.”
The Investor Connect Program differs from the HLTH Market Connect Program in that for Market Connect, both parties opt into meeting each other, and both have equal control and “skin in the game.”
The Power of Curated Programs: Making Your Show Stand Out
A benefit of a well-run hosted-buyer program is that it attracts a higher-level audience — think C-suite and other executives whose busy schedules are more conducive to a pre-planned one-to-one meetings schedule than walking the entirety of the show floor.
“We want to be sure we’re driving that value for sponsors and the buyers,” Mastroianni said. “If we have the Chief Innovation Officer of a healthcare system and they have a specific problem they’re trying to solve, we need to create a way for them to find those vendors super-efficiently. That’s where hosted-buyer programs are incredibly valuable as giving them something back in exchange for the time they’re giving me.
“If you want to create something that’s sort of a standout differentiator in the experience, this is where a hosted-buyers program can really stand out, and it gives a measurable, meaningful value in the return it gives to sponsors.”
