Q & A

 

Lee Rubenstein
President and COO

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You have a very impressive background in communications and marketing; what attracted you to take the position of president and COO of TBA Global?

I saw a great opportunity with TBA Global as I believe it is leading the evolution from primarily an ‘events’ agency to a full service connective communications and marketing agency. This offering addresses critical client demands – as now more than ever brands must connect with key audiences internally and externally, at more levels and more regularly, with a consistently high quality experience. With 19 offices, TBA Global had already assembled tremendous creative and production resources including communications and marketing strategy, event planning, consumer marketing, entertainment and destination management. Our focus now is to connect all these offerings for our clients.

I know you've been with TBA a grand total of 6 months, but can you share some of your goals for the company in the next year? In five years?

Our vision for the company is to connect brands and people, and we will continue to stay focused on what our clients want and need so our 6 month, yearly, and 5-year plans will always evolve. Our clients need to connect with key audiences internally and externally, at intellectual and visceral levels. To best accomplish this we introduced our connective model, which pulls together all our tools and methodologies to create and enhance audience connections to deliver long term benefits.

Our goal is to build awareness about how we can help them increase the power of the experience they are delivering through TBA as we energize and evolve the industry over time. To that end, we have increased our on-staff expertise to deliver these services to our clients, and have added valuable new services.

Those additions include our Learning & Performance Improvement group. We design and deliver world class custom blended interactive learning programs such as e-learning, classroom, and print. Programs are designed to meet an adult’s learning needs, and focus on knowledge and skills transfer, and competitive performance differentiators tied to our client’s unique business objectives.

We have expanded our Entertainment offering to include a Branded Entertainment group. We still provide performers from the best known to the emerging, based on our strong relationships in the entertainment industry. However we also now provide licensing, and consumer-focused, integrated branded entertainment programs, an emerging new solution corporate marketers want as part of their brand building mix.

When I started with Special Events (1999), TBA was TBA Entertainment. Then came the big acquisition of PGI--yet I don't think of TBA Global as a DMC. How would you describe TBA's evolution? Does it mirror changes in marketing communications?

You probably don’t think of TBA Global as a DMC because TBA Global is more than a DMC, although it is an important part of our business and we’ve invested heavily in it with great people and additional resources. When we acquired PGI in 2005 we added one of the industry’s most established Destination Management teams including industry leader Kathy (“KP”) Papadimitriou to head the group.

Our evolution is based on client demands for a true integrated marketing and communications offering. The leadership of this company, prior even to the PGI acquisition, always had a vision of a full service, holistic, programmatic solution that could improve both the client and audience experience. Now our clients are saying “Since you know our audience, can you add some strategic thinking and capability to help us further our business mission with this audience throughout the year?” Our ‘Connective Workshops’ are an answer to that request.

Do you have any big events coming up you can share with my readers? (Perhaps at the 2008 Olympics?)

I’d rather not talk about upcoming programs due to client confidentiality but we are certainly working on many that I’ll be excited to share when the time is right! The last 2 weeks should give you an idea what is always on our plate – our work included an intimate LA rooftop birthday party featuring Brian Wilson, a premier technology company’s partner program for 4000+, many smaller meetings, and an arena-sized employee and shareholder meeting for a major global retailer featuring comedians, keynote speakers, and performances by The Eagles and Jennifer Lopez.

What do live events do for brands that nothing else can do?

A couple of things, incentive statistics have shown that live events where individuals are able to create memories together through experiences with their colleagues always provide a higher return for the brand, over cash and/or merchandise rewards. That’s an ‘incentive’ oriented answer.

On the communications and marketing side of events, think about the last time you came home after a weekend away on business and said “Honey, I saw the best print ad on Friday, I’ll never forget it as long as I live!” And that’s just the point, when we deliver an experience on behalf of a brand that engages all the senses—and we do our job to make it memorable on an emotional level, you’re not going to forget it, maybe ever! It is human nature to crave interaction, to build a culture of personal stories of our own experiences and to share them with others, and to desire ‘immersive’ experiences. Only through live interaction can we really relate the ‘human-ness’ of the brand, and how dedicated the brand is to excellence, service, worthy ideals, and creating a connection with their audience.

Can you tell me more about plans in regard to what a full-service communications agency should do in the electronic world? (A quote from your press release)

We are experts at helping clients use the right tools, messages, and methodologies to create and enhance critical connections. Electronic tools are an important part of this process, as they help a brand’s audience participate prior to an event in shaping the agenda, or register their thoughts and ideas. During the event, technology provides the ability to network with others who have similar unique interests, challenges, and needs. Post event, technology provides continued momentum, where concepts presented at a live event can be enhanced further. Sometimes those are just ‘how are we doing’ surveys, and other times more robust tools that make critical marketing and sales materials available and accessible in a powerful way at the time and place when the client’s customer wants them. It may be information streamed to a mobile device, or a rich media enable website, or a data collection device that ties to a CRM system, or on-demand e-learning—a full solution includes all these electronic enhancements.

What haven't I asked you that I should have?

Perhaps - what is the future of event marketing? There will be continued ongoing thought about how to get the most out of the investment made to bring attendees together after an event concludes. It makes sense to look at the event as part of an ongoing program that should continue, and to measure those results, versus looking at the event as a static ‘moment in time’. Clients want partners who think connectively and can do a lot more for them so they can leverage the most dollars possible.

Secondly, and this will be really fun for all of us, clients are going to explode the concept of Branded Entertainment aimed at consumer audiences. These become events that are re-visitable and accessible via live, online and broadcast channels, imbued with relevant entertainment value to create loyalty and repeat visits.

Featured in Special events Magazine, July 1, 2007. Interviewed by Lisa Hurley

Contact Lee Rubenstein