On Wed, Jun 30, 2010 at 9:10 PM, Shalin Jain <shalinjain@gmail.com> wrote: [..]
1. Segmenting tickets
I understand there is a large student group that would want to be at this conference and benefit from it. They cannot pay a lot and hence there should be an extremely affordable Student Pass. Exclusively for them.
Student Pass - rs. 250 (Showing valid ID at registration would be must, badge will mention Student) Working Professional Pass - rs. 750 (Because people like me can easily pay that much, take away value from such conferences are much more higher)
This can significantly help increase budget for A/V and other important things that will make the event a quality one without having to solely depends on Sponsors money.
There are problems with charging that high for a ticket. The venue sponsor is right now giving us the facilities at a very nominal cost. If we charge this kind of money, it wouldn't really work for them. The registration money is purely to cover the swag and food. We're thinking of the whole early bird thing to encourage people to register early so that we can get approximate numbers.
2. Closing registrations Early
Usually registrations increase drastically towards the closing dates for registration. And this not necessarily be the event date (minus one). In indian scenario I would say over 40% of registrations happen in the last 3-days before the registrations close. Having starting registrations over two months in advance closing registrations 7 days before the event would be an excellent idea. I would highly recommend this for volunteer driven event so that planning and execution can be smoother knowing everything about the size of your audience 1 week in advance.
Being very clear about when the registrations close (just like how you are clear about Proposal submission) makes event last minute guys register 1 week before. How cool!
We could *close* the registrations a week before the conference (ie. No more booking online) and then do only spot registrations after that for a much higher price. The aim being to discourage people from not booking online.
3. Alternative to Early Bird
Discount codes are great alternative to having early bird. For instance, I would launch with discount code 'ilovepython' or similar while announcing the opening of registrations. This code can be kept to a max quantity of 50, valid for first 3 days with a cash discount of 200 rupees (on Professional Pass) pushed mainly to the mailing list, twitter and facebook group. (Just an example!)
I don't quite get this. Maybe I'm getting senile before my time but this sounds a little complicated. Does this mean that the first 50 or so people in the first 3 days can enter "Ilovepython" or something and get a ticket for less? Thanks -- ~noufal http://nibrahim.net.in