Hi, thanks for joining us for
today's webcast, Judging A
Book by It's Cover--
What Does Your Web Cast
Say About Your
Event and Your Brand?
I am Erica St. Angel, I'll be
moderating for you today.
And I'm delighted to have Mark
Pinvidic, managing partner at
Noble Financial as
our presenter.
A couple notes of
housekeeping.
You'll see in the player around
you some buttons.
There's a speech bubble and that
will allow you to ask a
question of us at any time so
just click on that link, and
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at the end.
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presentation, as well as a link
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that Mark's going to be
talking about today.
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username and password in order
to log in, but it is public.
And with that, I'm going to
turn it over to Mark, and
thanks for joining us.
Well good morning and thank you
so much here and chairs
over here the cameraman here at
the first thing that by the
way if you've not been to
Madison, Wisconsin I highly
encourage it came in last night
about seven thirty Quiet
little place.
This morning we took a great
walk on the lake.
What's the lake called?
Monona and Mendota.
We're on an isthmus.
There are two.
Monona and Mendota.
There are two.
Anyway, it's a beautiful
little city.
Anyway, so I thought I'd
tell you a little
bit about Noble Financial.
This is our 25th year of
operation, we started in 1984.
Obviously, I was not one of
the founding partners.
I'm far too young to be one
of the founding partners.
But seriously, I've been with
the company for about 9 years.
I'm principally responsible
for the branding and the
marketing of the company.
We have four principal
divisions.
Equity research, institutional
sales, equity trading, and
investment banking.
We're what you would refer to
as a full service capital
markets firm.
Let's talk a little bit
about research.
So we have a bunch of
real smart guys.
We've got actually 10
research analysts,
senior research analysts.
Each of these 10 people will
look into public companies in
a particular industry sector.
So they will take between 12 and
20 companies that they'll
look at them in depth.
In addition to the financial
analysis, they'll also look at
the operations the company,
and anything that
might affect the stock.
Sales, institutional sales.
More or less these guys, and
women, are the brokers of the
relationship.
What they will be doing is
they'll take the information
from our research analysts,
talk to our clients and
discuss the stocks they're
talking about, and hopefully
they'll buy those stocks.
Trading.
So really what we do is, it
all comes down trading.
What happens if they're going
to buy the stock?
They buy it through
us hopefully.
We get a commission.
It used to be called the
nickel business.
The reason it was called the
nickel business is that we got
paid $0.05 for every share
that we traded.
Nowadays, there's a little more
pressure, so it's down
$0.02 and $0.03 a share.
But that's principally how we
get paid from our research.
Next is bankers, or investment
bankers and, unlike
traditional banks, we raise
money through selling the
equities of the company.
Now you've all heard of IPOs.
That's one way, but ongoing they
need money for capital
projects, cash flow.
What we'll do is we'll structure
a deal, a banking
deal, and we'll also sell it
to our clients, which are
institutional clients.
So that's, in a nutshell,
who we are.
And I think it's important to
note that we used to be a
brokerage firm.
A traditional brokerage firm,
so we would sell equities--
stocks and bonds--
to regular folks
on the street.
Call it retail brokerage.
About nine years ago, about when
I joined the company, we
moved from that platform
to institutional sales.
So we sell to institutions
only.
So I think that it's certainly--
when you take a
look, we've got 2,000 sell-side
firms like us, and
we've got about 3,500
institutional clients.
So considering all of that, it's
a very crowded street,
and it's extremely difficult
to get noticed out there.
Unless, of course,
you're standing
beside Heather Locklear.
Now, I had to bring this slide,
because I'm assuming
that most of you do not have a
picture with Heather Locklear
and, I have. But anyway, I had
a great time working with
Heather Locklear several
years ago.
You can tell by the hair color
it was a few years ago.
But, seriously, flawless
execution and attention to
detail really does stand out.
And I think it's very important
to note that in
these days, how you position
your company--
and all those people that you
bring on your team, become
part of your team.
So those suppliers like Sonic
Foundry, they can help you
win, or they can help
you lose the game.
I had to put this slide in,
because there's no way I could
make up this slide.
But this is from one
of our conferences.
And this is actually the
comment we received.
At the end of every conference,
we ask for all
participants to respond, and
to give us a very detailed
account of what they thought
of our conference.
I'll talk about the conference
in a second.
This is actually what one
of the clients said--
Your use of Media Site places
you in rarefied air among Wall
Street conferences.
And, I find it quite remarkable,
as you can see
this Craig Pieringer is with
Wells Capital Management.
$355 billion dollars
under management.
And he found, the most
significant thing that stood
out at our conference, and I'm
going to show you in a second,
we did a lot of things to make
our conferences stand out, he
found was Media Site.
So our conferences, and
you can take a look.
You can see at the
hard Rock in '05.
We were in Charlotte, North
Carolina in '06.
We were in Charleston, South
Carolina in '07.
We were in Las Vegas in '08.
This year we're in
south Florida.
It is the single most
important event
we have every year.
And really what it does, it
brings together our bankers,
our research analysts,
and our sales
people, with our clients.
And essentially, the simple
version is, the public company
executive gets to speak about
the company, and the investors
listen to their story.
Hopefully, they'll buy.
Again of course, big
trades for us.
In addition to that, we develop
relationships with the
public company CEOs, CFOs and
tenants, and this is what
leads to our banking.
So we have 400 attend.
We bring together the CEOs,
principally CEOs, sometimes
CFOs or, both, and the fund
managers from all
parts of the world.
Mostly from North America.
We do have them in from England
and Holland, as well.
And believe when I tell you
these are 400 people who've
been there, and done that.
They've pretty much
done everything.
They're very wealthy, affluent,
and they're business
leaders, and fund leaders.
So there's not a lot of things
you can do shock them, except
for maybe, in '06, we put them
in NASCAR race cars at,
actually the Lowe's
motor speedway.
All 400 people got into race
cars, and did four laps at 180
miles an hour.
And then the next year, we had
them from the USS Yorktown,
which is an aircraft carrier,
just over the Charleston Bay--
And they all flew in a kind of
a James Bond-esque trip.
Up, down, 30-degree angles, and
it was quite something.
In '08, we put them in Hummers
in the desert, at night, with
explosions and helicopters
all that kind of stuff.
And Jared, let's show them
what we did this year.
[VIDEO PLAYBACK]
-You gotta have mojo, baby.
Yeah!
Hit it!
Welcome to my underground
lair.
Hello, hello.
-Hello, Austin Powers care
to have a little fun?
-Care to have a little fun?
-No, actually I have
to save the world.
-Welcome to all of you.
And I wish you all a fantastic
conference, and I'm looking
forward to [UNINTELLIGIBLE]
with you here.
Thank you very much.
-Hard Rock is one of
the most recognized
brands in the world.
When we do brand studies, Hard
Rock comes up anywhere from
6th to 12th on a worldwide
recognition.
With only 160-some locations
around the
world, it's truly amazing.
-Finally those capitalist pigs
will pay for their crimes, eh?
Hey comrades?
Hey?
-Austin, we won.
So, it's very simple.
Our conferences are regularly
ranked among the
best. And I say that--
we give them the choice of poor,
fair, good, great, and
the best. And most often we're
ranked as the best. So they
come expecting the best, and I
believe Sonic Foundry truly is
the best.
So why did I choose
Sonic Foundry?
This is probably a very selfish
reason, but when I
have to put together an event of
this size, I like to think
that I can point to the room, or
rooms-- and we usually have
four simultaneous presentations
going on in four
rooms, or sometimes five--
I can take the operators from
Sonic Foundry, point to the
room, and that's it.
They just set it up.
There's really nothing
more I have to say.
They've done five
events for us.
It's quite remarkable.
Point and shoot, if you will.
They really don't screw up.
They have flawless broadcasts
from all rooms, and they run
simultaneously.
I think in the five events that
we've done with Sonic
Foundry, I remember one event,
one broadcast, that the sound
didn't work for about
the first minute.
That's it.
And that's probably around, I
guess around 4,000 broadcasts.
Amazing quality.
Streaming, high definition
video.
About that buffering stuff, I
did look at the competition,
and a lot of times you had
to wait for it to buffer.
Very annoying, and just not
a high quality product.
This one I think is the
most important.
As you can see my body language,
when the video
didn't work, you'd start getting
a little bit nervous.
But it gives you a chance
to see the CEO.
It gives you an insight of
what they're thinking.
It shows you the passion.
And believe me these
guys are very
passionate about their business.
And it also tells you if they're
telling the truth.
So, I find that it's probably
the most important aspect of a
webcast, is that
video portion.
To actually see the presenter,
and it makes it
so much more watchable.
Smart technology.
I don't know how it works,
but it works.
And like so many people that
are busy, you don't want to
learn a technology, you
just want it to work.
You just want to push the
button and it works.
And our catalog-- you pull up
our catalog, you sign in.
I mean it's very simple to
operate, it's just great
technology.
The after life.
Erica and I were talking earlier
about this, what we're
doing this morning.
And she was saying that over
the next couple weeks,
probably a lot of people will
tune in and look at this.
I'm sure they're going to edit
and put the video back in, but
the after life for us is
extremely important.
We run 140-150 companies over
a course of two days.
Quite often, they would like
to see two or three they're
presenting at the same time,
if they're live at the
conference, or if they're
watching the webcast. And we
have found that even as
much as months later,
people are tuning in.
So the afterlife is extremely
important.
And again, when you add video
to the PowerPoint, their
presentation's so much
more watchable.
It's a whole different
experience.
The marketing angle.
The first year we used Sonic
Foundry, after the
presentations, many CEOs and
CFOs actually asked us if they
get a DVD of their
presentation.
Believe me, that does not happen
with the traditional
webcast. The traditional web
casts are pretty boring.
They're really nothing more
than a PowerPoint with a
talking head in the
background.
And what they looked at is that
they can actually promote
their company because their
CEO or CFO is talking on
behalf of that company.
And quite frankly, we use it
to promote our conferences.
It's our principal way we
promote our conferences.
If you want to find what they're
like, tune in to a
couple webcasts.
So it lives on for sometimes
three, four, and six months.
The other reason is that
like these guys.
There's no way I'd come to
Wisconsin in October.
Although I must say it's been
a real treat coming here.
It's a beautiful city.
But this is a likable company
to work with.
They're easy to work with.
They're fair, and I can't
say more about them.
They make us look good.
You know, years and years
ago, Vidal Sasson
put his wife on camera.
And he did this special
haircut.
And he used to say, if
you don't look good,
we don't look good.
And that's really what I'd
say about Sonic Foundry.
By bringing them into
my conference, they
become part of me.
They make me look good and
that's what it's about.
Erica.
Thanks, Mark.
That was great.
And we have several questions
coming and I just wanted to
remind if you'd like to ask a
question, there is a little
speech bubble.
Click on that and type it in,
and if for some reason we
don't get to your question
today, please provide your
email address.
And then that way Mark can
follow up with you directly
afterwards.
So the first question I wanted
to ask you was, you said this
is the most important event
you do in a year, and yet
you're using sort of cutting
edge technology.
I mean, you're pushing the
envelope in terms of
introducing technology
into that event.
Was that risky for you
when you began?
Yes, to a certain extent.
I think the biggest
risk is this--
The traditional PowerPoint that
they're used to, it's was
no big deal, OK?
But this CEO or CFO actually
had to be on camera.
And that was my biggest concern,
because I didn't tell
them they were going to be on
camera the first year we did
with video.
And I must say a few of
them were kind of--
Oh, I didn't know it was
going to be on video.
But we had no technical
glitches at all.
We had no problems with the
broadcast. And I was hooked.
And then, the next year I
actually used the video as a
marketing piece.
So the first year, I was a bit
concerned that they would be.
And I did get a few comments
like that.
But the second year I used the
video as marketing piece, and
it actually improved
my attendance.
That's great.
And that was the other question
I was going to ask
you, too, about CEOs.
In the financial industry
obviously transparency is
really important, and you
mentioned the passion you can
convey when you are
using video.
But you did have some
naysayers or some--
How did you help them through
that process?
And what happened on
the other side?
That's interesting, because one
of the things that really
helped is, you guys
sent us a little--
actually a web cast of how
to get prepared for your
broadcast. What you should
be aware of on
camera, like this morning.
Those types of things.
And I got several
comments that it
was very, very helpful.
You have to remember that a
great deal of the webcasting
at a financial conference, it's
the outcropping, or we're
bringing it to life from almost
nothing more than a
regulatory concern that got
exposed to everyone.
And I want to show
you something.
In our conference book from
this year, this is a good
example, I even used it as a
full promotional page in our
conference book.
So it's got it's own life now.
And I really do believe it's
because it's easy to use, and
it has video, which is
extremely important.
So we have a question about the
difference between video
conferencing and what people
are watching right now.
Have you ever used any other
kind of back and forth
technology, or has this always
been one-to-many?
I have only use the
one-to-many.
That's all I've used,
so I can't comment
one the other one.
Although I've participated in
them, but I've not use them.
The two-way is pretty
cool, too.
There's not a real utility for
us for a two-way at our
conference.
But if there ever was
I'd explore it.
And, traditionally for those
of you who aren't familiar,
video conferencing is where you
have two end-points, so
there's technology sitting at
both places, and that allows
people to talk back and forth.
But for most conferences, it's
really about capturing what
that presenter is conveying at
the podium, and sharing that
online and on site.
And you have both audiences
for your event.
You have people physically
sitting in the room watching.
And how has that worked, in
terms of-- do you find people
going back to watch again, or
more new people being exposed?
Oh absolutely, in fact what we
do at our conference is, you
people set up three
or four monitors
right outside the doors.
And for those investors that
miss one, or if they want to
catch what he said, or they
want to see his expression
again, they can go back,
sit down and--
I think it takes you what?
14 or 15 or 18 seconds, or
whatever it is to upload it.
Not very long.
And the catalog becomes, if you
will, live at the event.
So you asked me one of the
features that we've had.
And the other thing is, a lot
of them will write down on
their schedule the ones who
want to see in person.
They'll say the ones they
want to see on webcasts.
And then they'll also put down
the companies that they'd like
to meet directly, on a one on
one basis with the CEO, so it
gives them lot of flexibility.
That's great.
And some questions about ROI.
That's obviously a huge
topic in the media
industry right now.
Is how do you prove the
value of the event?
And especially when you're
adding maybe a new technology
or new mode of communicating.
How have you shown the ROI, or
how have you evaluated the ROI
of webcasting?
From our perspective,
or from theirs?
Either way.
OK.
Well, we charge the companies
for the service.
And I find it's not that
difficult to tell them they're
going to get return on
their investment.
Simply because this thing
does have an afterlife.
If it's simply a PowerPoint,
they
could email it to someone.
But because of that tactility
of the video, I have had
virtually no complaints about
the cost, or paying for it, or
from my standpoint, I
believe it's part of
the marketing mix.
It has to be there.
So it is one of the attractions
for me to get a
full attendance.
So, an ROI is always based on
the kind of business we do
after the conference.
In terms of branding the
experience of the player like
you're watching right now.
You'd mentioned that this needs
to be a really polished
event because these are
people who've been
there and done that.
They've been exposed
to a lot of things.
Can you talk a little bit
about what that player
experience--
why you prefer that over maybe
some of the other technologies
you've used?
Well, its simplicity.
I would say that clearly that's
what it-- well, there's
two things.
The fact that it doesn't buffer
all the time, which I
find completely annoying.
That little thing that's going
around and it's waiting for it
to catch up.
You start losing the feel,
the flow, of what
the person's saying.
So, I think that is
very important.
And it's simple.
There's really nothing to-- you
just look at and it's very
straightforward.
You know exactly
how to run it.
And that quote that we got--
when I get a comment like that
back, it tells me I'm doing
something right.
And as I showed you, we're
actually marketing this as
Noble High Definition Video.
So we've actually taken
that branding and
brought it back to us.
So, Sonic Foundry's been
very easy to work with.
So, if there's things that I
would like to see more on the
viewer, you guys have
always come through.
Delivered.
That's great.
What was the very first time you
used webcasting for your
conference?
From the very beginning,
you've always used it?
Yes.
The first year we used a
traditional web cast. And we
made that optional.
And, I'm not going to
say who it was.
But the optional part I didn't
like, because this one was,
and this one wasn't.
And for the investors, if they
wanted to go back and watch
and they couldn't, because of
the choice of the company, I
found it wasn't the
same kind of value
proposition that it was.
If investors knew, they
would all broadcast.
So I changed that the
second year, when I
moved to Sonic Foundry.
I made it mandatory for all the
companies to present and
use our webcasting.
So the first experience, we
had several failures.
We had down time.
It just didn't go as smoothly.
I would have to say that those
of you watching that plan
large meetings, you know
what I'm talking about.
How important it is for the
company that you've used to
make it easy for you.
And, his name is Justin
Hartman if you
want to know his name.
But he's been at
all our events.
And I literally say, Justin--
this hotel, those are the four
rooms. And that's it.
I literally don't
even look again.
So professional, hides all the
wires, everything's done.
So, part of it for me is that,
like I said, it's the Vidal
Sassoon touch.
You make me look good, and
so that goes a long ways.
And before doing webcasting,
had you also done video
production, or alongside
that, more traditional
creating CDs and--?
Yes.
Well, in other lives I have, and
my brother is big into the
video stuff.
I'm still not very technically
wise in video and all the
other things go around it.
But yeah, I've had quite
a bit of experience.
What happened is, when I met
your company, what got my
attention was that
video component.
I knew that, that
would be big.
Some of the conferences
out there right now
have a video component.
But it's not live, it's
the next day.
I find that just
close to silly.
So if you're going to have
video, it should be live.
It should be right there,
when you need it.
Great.
A question about the split
between your live and
on-demand viewing.
What do you see in general?
Have you found that your
attendance has suffered at all
because your presentations
are webcasts?
Well, I would think it's going
too far to say that this
replaces being there.
One of the reasons that we go so
far in creating an event--
I was talking about the
race cars and all
that kind of stuff--
is so we don't cannibalize our
attendance by having a great
video product.
So I mean, yes, you have to make
sure that when they're
there, that all the events--
the social events, the
business events, are
all first class.
So I don't believe it's
cannibalized our attendance in
any way, shape, or form.
And as I guess I said, you saw
one of the people who did
attend and what his
comment was.
His comment was, rarefied air.
I mean, so I don't find
it's a deterrent all.
In fact, it adds.
And we were talking before about
the live and on-demand.
Generally-speaking, we at Sonic
Foundry see about a
third live, and then two-thirds
of your total
audience then watching
on-demand.
Are you finding a similar
type of split?
I'd say yes, about that.
Yeah, so it's not to say that
a third of your entire
audience is going to tune in,
but if you look at a year, you
might have 300 views during
the live event.
Remember that we have four
tracks simultaneously, so they
can't watch them all live.
So they're going to take one and
watch that one afterwards
or whatever.
We try to, when we have the
live event-- and of course
that translates into
the video product--
we try to make sure that we
don't have four health care
companies or four high
tech companies
presenting at the same time.
So we do get a fairly good live
viewership, but certainly
it moves up after the event.
Particularly the second day,
sometimes the third day.
Our biggest day is always
on a Monday.
And it seems for whatever reason
to get the highest
viewership on Wednesday.
And a tactical question about
how do you let people know
where to go.
Do you market the
catalog or the
presentations ahead of time?
Or is it something you send
out on the day of?
We do press releases on it, we
have it in our book, we have
it on our web site,
we do emails.
We actually use the--
and as I said earlier, we
actually market our upcoming
conferences by using
the video product.
Great.
Let's see, how long do you
recommend leaving the
on-demand content available
after the event?
Is it up for one month, or six
months, or a year, or forever?
Well, I think that two
or three months is
just fine, I think.
I keep it up for a long time,
but I've got a long-standing
relationship with Sonic Foundry,
and I extensively use
the product that we create
for marketing.
So I keep them up longer than
most would, but I think the
real utility is two
to three months.
And it probably depends, too,
on your type of conference,
and how rapidly refreshed that
content is, and if new things
are coming along.
And do you have any plans to
expand conference coverage, or
other things that Noble
Financial-- has this led to
other interests in webcasting
in the company?
Well, outside of our
large conference,
we've also done webcasts--
kind of mini-conferences.
We did one with Sonic Foundry
in Boston earlier this year
which was very, very
successful.
Similar kind of format.
We only had one room
and we brought only
local clients to it.
It's a little bit different than
a destination conference,
like our big conference.
But our goal is to actually have
two conferences a year,
so that would automatically
expand to that.
But other ways and means of
webcasting, I haven't looked
at any others, other than
our conference.
Well, we're at the top of the
half hour, so I want to thank
you for tuning in.
And any other parting advice?
One last takeaway?
Wish we could have
shown the video.
Well, we'll have that
available for
you in a link, too.
And again, if you want to watch
this again, just click
the link that [? Kate ?]
sent to you to watch
this webcast. Feel
free to share that.
It's publicly available for
a month on our website.
And also if you have other
questions for Mark just use
the ask button.
Those will continue
to come in--
It's a bubble, right?
Ask bubble?
It is, it's a bubble.
Speech bubble.
Those will continue to
come in to Mark.
I want to thank you again for
joining us today, and thanks
for watching.
Thank You.
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