UFI Comment
Kai Hattendorf
UFI Managing Director
Total
customer-centricity
s I look back over recent editions of this
magazine, I am amazed by all the coverage of
M&A and digital initiatives, showing how our
industry is in a state of constant transition.
We are always adapting to the ever-changing needs of the
exhibition and business event markets – and it’s a topic on
everybody’s lips today.
However, there is another subject that deserves just
as much attention – and that’s just how much we put our
customers at the centre of our strategic thoughts and
actions.
It’s something that’s cropped up quite a lot recently. It
was discussed at our Global CEO Summit in London as
well as at our Asia-Pacific Conference in Tokyo. What’s
more, it was shown to be a hot topic by the UFI/Explori
Global Visitor Insights study, which provided consolidated
global feedback from 13,000 trade show visitors.
The study revealed that getting the basics right around a
good event goes a long way. Queuing times at registration
and the quality of catering are the most-cited frustrations
for show visitors – both of which should be easy to fix for
organisers.
When it comes to registration queues, digital
innovations allow us to rethink the whole process, with
trends such as facial recognition at the entrance gates
gaining ground. However, here, as is so often the case,
technology alone is just as much hype as it is a real
solution.
With all the talk about data-based business models and
the power of analytics, one comment from Eddie Choi,
speaking on the UFI stage in Tokyo, particularly resonated
with me. “It’s great to analyse data and to build metrics.
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Issue 2 2019
But most metrics are not focused in the customers’ reality,”
he said. He also warned that metrics can mislead us into
thinking there’s a problem, or conversely give a false sense
of achievement.
His advice to all organisers in the room was simple –
don’t lose your focus on exhibitors coming to the show to
do business and make connections. And don’t rely on too
many digital customer touchpoints to stay connected, but
keep contact direct and personal.
This was echoed by Tadeo Ishizumi, President of Reed
Japan, who has generated hundreds of millions of US
dollars in revenues for Reed’s Japanese business. He says
that perhaps the most critical success factors are the
calls and personal visits that show teams make to their
customers.
Stephane Forseilles, Easyfair’s Group Head of
Technology and Digital Transformation, reinforced this
argument. Although a firm believer in the potential of
digital technology to make exhibitions succeed in the
digital age, he is also very critical of many approaches.
When asked what he would want to see as the result
of a successful digital transformation, he simply said:
“Extreme customer-centricity”, and urged everyone to
focus on visitor satisfaction over short-term, digital, add-on
business.
We will continue to discuss customer-centricity, and
how this builds trust between exhibitors, visitors, and
show organisers, at upcoming UFI events in the first half
of this year – in Dubai in April, as well as in Birmingham
in May. You will find more information about these events
in this edition of Exhibition World. I look forward to seeing
many of you there!
w w w.exhibitionworld.co.uk