Editorial
The Gist
- Charter reminder. Reinforce program participation expectations for customer advisory board meetings.
- Travel solution. Cover all travel expenses for members.
- Value guarantee. Deliver engaging, member-driven meetings.
With the conclusion of the pandemic, most professionals were eager to get “back on the road” traveling to meet face-to-face with customers, prospects, partners and colleagues again. On the other hand, we’re seeing that some executives are still a bit more reluctant to resume traveling again. This may be due to familiarity with utilizing virtual meeting technologies, recent travel delays in the news, company-imposed travel or budget restrictions, just being too busy to get out of the office — or all the above.
If these dynamics seem to be impacting your customer advisory board (CAB) members (or even your own internal folks) leading to lower-than-desired attendance at your recent meeting, or in-person commitments for your upcoming CAB meeting, there are some steps you should take to rectify the situation:
Point to Your CAB Charter
When you kicked off your CAB initiative, you (hopefully) created a program charter and provided it to your customers when recruiting them to join. It should have contained your program participation expectations, including attendance at in-person meetings as well as interim conference calls. Your members will (again, hopefully) remember their commitment to your CAB program from the onset, so you may need to (gently) remind them of your participation desires. If you didn’t create a CAB charter, doing so will spell out expectations from the start — which your CAB members will (hopefully) honor.
Related Article: Launching a Customer Advisory Board: Top 10 Questions to Ask
Pay for Customer Advisory Board Member Travel
Remember that there should be no financial burden on your customers to participate in your CAB program. That means as the host company you should pay for all travel expenses (flights, hotels, car rides), as well as meals, activities and member gifts (if any). If your customer cannot accept any travel reimbursement for any reason, they will tell you. Paying for everything should at least eliminate cost as a reason for them to not attend your next meeting.
Select Convenient Location and Date for Customer Advisory Board Meeting
Make attending your in-person CAB meetings as easy as possible. Select a major national city that is convenient to get to, typically with a single direct flight (e.g. Chicago, Dallas, Denver, etc.) and that is central to where the majority of your customers are located. Have your meeting hotel not too remote or a long distance from the airport.
In addition, pick a day that is in the middle of the week, allowing for travel time and avoid encroaching on weekends. Make sure the date is convenient to all as well — often end of the quarter can be difficult for certain industries and professions (e.g., CFOs). To find the ideal date, survey your customers.
Related Article: 5 Reasons You Need a Customer Advisory Board
Resist Hybrid Meetings for Your Customer Advisory Board
Some companies are attempting to serve both travelers and non-travelers by hosting “hybrid” meetings made up of in-person attendance and those calling in via online meeting technologies.
However, offering this will inevitably weaken your in-person attendance, as some of those offered the option to not travel will take it. In addition, the hybrid meetings we have facilitated have been difficult and substandard at best, as it’s difficult to have virtual participants follow along with the discussion. As such, hold either an in-person meeting or virtual — no hybrids.
Make the Customer Advisory Board Meeting Engaging
Most importantly, the main reason your CAB members might resist traveling to your meeting (that they likely won’t tell you) might simply be that it is not delivering enough value or engagement. If your meeting is mostly PowerPoint presentations of company and product updates, third-party speakers, or one-way communications that could easily be done online via webinar and to all your customers, your CAB members will likely not see the value in getting on a plane to join you.
To remedy this, you need to ensure your meeting agenda is CAB member-driven; that the topics are what they are asking to address, and that you are engaging your members during the meeting in getting their help and input on solutions — getting them out of their seats and contributing ideas and suggestions toward shared solutions to their challenges.
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Conclusion: Make Customer Advisory Board Participation Effortless & Valuable
Getting experienced professionals to travel is always difficult — they are busy with time and budget constraints, and may even be directed not to leave by their superiors. The key is to make their participation in your CAB meeting easy, and ensure you’re engaging with them and delivering value that they can’t get from their offices.
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