The EOA Conference 2022

No. of delegates: 650

Location: The ACC Liverpool

Event type: Conference and Exhibition

Event objectives:

The EOA Annual Conference 2022 set out to be bigger and better than ever before. As the first year back together in person after the pandemic, the client wanted the event to be jam-packed with plenty of networking and lots of celebrating!

The main focus of the event was to bring the community together, to share experiences and best practices in employee ownership. The client was also keen to use the opportunity to demonstrate the benefits of employee ownership to businesses considering becoming employee owned for good!

We have been working in collaboration with EOA to deliver this annual conference since 2020. In the first year of this partnership, we were able to overcome the challenges of the pandemic by creating a virtual solution to the event. It was throughout our own ongoing support with the conference that we were inspired to become an employee owned organisation ourselves!

Event overview:

The two day event hosted over 650 guests across 30 sessions, including keynote interviews, speed seminars, and case study seminars. In addition to this vibrant and engaging programme of events, the creation of a 30-stand exhibition and networking space allowed both informal and topic-based networking. Throughout the entire duration of the event, attendees were able to share their unique expertise and insights whilst at the ACC Liverpool.

After a busy first day it was time for the true celebrations to begin. Guests were invited to a welcome drinks reception overlooking the Mersey, followed by the gala dinner. Guests were served a delicious 3 course meal, which was topped off with an awards ceremony, highlighting the best of stories for the year from within the employee owned community.

The celebrations didn’t stop there! After the awards ceremony and dinner it was time for the ultimate party as guests took part in an incredible silent disco experience. One of the strongest pieces of feedback we received from this event was in relation to this disco, and how it ended far too soon! Guests were left wanting more as they had to put down their headphones at 1am, to be up and raring to go for day two of the conference.

The second day of the conference came with plenty more engaging sessions and networking opportunities, with some fabulous activities provided by employee owner organisations to spark conversations in the exhibition hall too. In order to ensure the success of an event with the wide scale and scope of the annual EO conference, there’s a huge body of organisation and work required by all involved in bringing this event to life. From making table plans and sponsor banners, to organising hotel room bookings and booking guests on to each session, our event team took care of every single element with a high attention to detail maintained throughout the execution.

Event marketing:

We took primary responsibility for the marketing of the entire event. Gathering data from previous conferences, we soon understood the most popular session topics, their target audience and the best ways to capture the interests of these audiences. It was around these data driven insights that we then built the marketing strategy for the event.

We opted for a personalised approach, splitting the audience so we could target them more specifically with their interests. This personalisation process was segmented by the length of time they have been EO members for, if they were exploring the idea of becoming a member, or by job title, for example.

We also created the event website. This was created as an extension of their own website, for easy access and management as well as a cohesive digital experience. We added a home page on their own website that linked through to the additional pages, including tickets page, agenda, speakers and exhibitors. So visitors could easily find all of the information about the event.

Thanks to this strategy, a total of 16 different email campaigns, a bank set of social media assets and an accompanying PR campaign, we were able to smash the ticket sales target by 30%.

Results:

The event was a huge success for everyone involved, the guests, the sponsors, the exhibitors, the speakers, the hosts and the event team! We can not wait to do it all over again next year. For more information on becoming employee owned, like us, visit www.employeeownership.co.uk.