Any business can host a summit meeting. They don't have to be time consuming or expensive. They just have to be meaningful enough to the participants for their investment of time.
World leaders convene for high level discussions on international trade and finance. Top industry leaders gather for an information exchange about the direction of an industry. Why not use the same approach to gather your circle of business to strengthen those relationships? Now is a good time to get this in the works.
What is a summit?
A summit is a gathering of critical people to your business. I prefer to invite my most important clients and possibly a vendor or two who I count on. The design is simple: share your perspective on how you see the niche you serve trending. Have a list of discussion questions that can help everyone involved run their businesses even better. Whether you serve a local community, or a specific niche in the marketplace, the program must be designed around that focus so everyone attending sees value.
I know how important people's time is, whether they are traveling from a distance or just a short drive, time is a resource they are giving to you -- make it count for them.
How should it be structured?
Start your meeting over dinner on the travel day people used to get there. Use this time for introductions and describing the outline for the next day. This is the gathering of your group to get to know each other better so they are ready to share in the conversation the following day.
The summit day has a tight agenda and should be finished by mid to late afternoon in order to allow people travel time to return.
What is on the agenda?
Since you assembled and hosted the meeting you should being with offering the research you’ve found about the niche everyone works in. Updates on consumer trends, financial trends, and detailed information everyone invited can benefit from and relate to. What are the issues your customers are troubled by? What are the answers they are seeking? What are the big questions they are facing? Lead them through these discussions, and if you’ve done your homework, you can lead them to great conclusions that will benefit their businesses -- and yours.
What is the payoff?
The payoff of a summit meeting of your important business contacts is simple: everyone gets something that improves their businesses, and you get the credit for calling the group together. Be sure you don’t become over-bearing and always try to have the answer or insist your products and services are the answer for everyone. That isn’t a summit; that is an elaborate sales presentation and you will hurt your business if you try this approach.
Be sure everyone feels the day was helpful, informative and unique to their current situations they are facing. They will feel they invested their time wisely. Your payoff? You are the person who organized the gathering, did the research, and the final 20 minutes of the day are yours to receive feedback on any new product or service you'd like to offer to the your market.
At this point people feel eager to give back to you and will listen and provide insightful feedback to your new idea. Some; in fact, might even be willing to give it a try. The key payoff of a summit isn’t selling the new product; it’s positioning yourself as the niche market expert and idea generator. Regardless of what you sell; it never hurts to be known as the expert.
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