How the Association of Accounting Technicians increased attendance to their Training Provider Conference by 10% and the number of award submissions by 48%.
How the Association of Accounting Technicians increased attendance to their Training Provider Conference by 10% and the number of award submissions by 48%.
AAT is a qualification and membership body for vocational accountants who have over 500 colleges (training providers) delivering its courses to over 70,000 students.
Every year, AAT tutors gather for the annual AAT Training Provider Conference which allows them to get together, network and share best practice on delivering AAT qualifications.
Discovery
The two-day conference includes a gala dinner on the first evening and topical workshops across the two days. After dinner entertainment was normally provided, but as each year passed, there were contrasting views on the choice of entertainer, so we decided to add value to the whole event by creating an awards ceremony in its place.
Holding an awards ceremony meant we could focus directly on celebrating the successes of training providers from the previous 12 months. AAT tutors change the lives of so many, from individuals to multinational corporations. The awards would allow us to give all of our training providers the chance to be recognised.
Additionally, creating an element of competition encouraged our training providers to raise the overall teaching standards in their pursuit of being recognised by our awards.
Objectives
After adding an awards ceremony to the annual training provider conference for the first time in 2014, we wanted to increase the numbers across the two day event:
Increase attendance by 10% and
Increase the number of award submissions by 48% (from 47 to 70), thus generating £3,500 revenue from the awards.
Project period
December 2014 - May 2015
Project Team
Neil Maguire, Product Manager (Training Providers)
Andy Cordina, Marketing Manager
Huw Moxon, Marketing Campaign Manager
Graeme Johnston, Event Producer
Ross Grange, Product Manager (Training Providers)
Project Partners
As this event is managed internally, we don’t work with partners as such; we take pride in the fact that this whole event has been put together by the teams directly involved in supporting training providers to deliver AAT qualifications.
We did however work with an external agency, Thing Publishing, to help us source sponsors.
Activities
Effort and time scales
Key teams around AAT got together to discuss ‘What makes an outstanding training provider?’. We consulted with AAT tutors (from a range of training providers) to find out what they believed were the key elements in successfully delivering AAT qualifications.
We wanted to create a level playing field for the awards. Our training providers are very diverse – some private, some further education and others purely distance learning providers. Of course we have big players; those who have the largest students numbers and the biggest marketing budgets, but we were determined for this not to become a popularity contest. Training providers needed to demonstrate their achievements in delivering AAT qualifications from the previous 12 months through a well written, considered submission.
From the research, we created 13 categories to ensure all training providers could take part:
The winner in one of the categories
Best use of e-learning
Best progression to full membership
Apprenticeship training provider of the year
International training provider of the year
Distance learning provider of the year
Best new training provider
Training provider of the year: small, medium and large
Tutor of the year
Student of the year
Apprentice of the year
Distance learner of the year
Additional activity – putting the final touches to the event
Videos from students
We contacted students who voted for one of the shortlisted tutors and asked them to send in a video (no more than 30 seconds long) explaining why they voted for their tutor. These videos were then compiled and played during the awards ceremony before announcing the winner.
This added a personal touch for the six shortlisted tutors and really brought back into focus the huge impact that the people who deliver our qualifications have on students of all walks of life.
Logos and branding for training provider websites
To make entering the awards more attractive to training providers, we developed a bespoke logo for both shortlisted and award winning training providers. This gave an extra incentive for training providers to enter the awards to obtain this special AAT branding for their website and printed collateral; ultimately making them more attractive to prospective students.
Building our brand through case studies
Our brand is built on real people and how through studying, AAT has changed their lives. The awards provide the perfect opportunity for us to capture the very best of our case studies with the shortlisted providers, students and the winners of each of the categories.
Marketing
Digital
Created a microsite, allowing training providers to enquire about the awards and download application packs
An online form (embedded into the microsite) for current students to easily nominate for the tutor of the year award.
Email campaigns to training providers encouraging them to apply for the awards and explaining the benefits of entering.
Email campaigns to students encouraging them to vote for their tutor of the year.
Use of social media platforms to promote the tutor of the year nominations.
Direct
A postal mailing was sent to the Principals of all our training providers to highlight the prestige and value of entering the awards.
Trophies were created for winning training providers to showcase the achievement after the event.
Certificates were sent to all students who were shortlisted (and those who won) so they were able to have evidence for their CVs.
Social
We included articles about the awards in our bi-monthly Accounting Technician magazine.
As we had secured the Editor of PQ magazine for the judging panel, we knew we would receive additional coverage in a relevant, industry leading magazine.
Facebook and Twitter: Posts/tweets encouraging students to vote for their student of the year – this also enabled us to create a ‘buzz’ around the awards
Challenges
We faced a few challenges in the build up to the awards:
We realised that one of our categories was a little bit too specific. Even though we received entries, we will be changing this for a different award in 2016.
We had to deal with a few sensitive issues with two of our award winners where we had to put additional plans in place in case they were not able to make it.
We also had an international training provider pull out of attending (even though they were winning an award). To address this, we got them to send in a video message which was played on the night of the awards.
Achievements
Going from having a customary gala dinner with an entertainer, to a fully-fledged awards ceremony has given the whole event a lot more importance. It has brought the whole event back to the main reason our training providers teach our qualifications in the first place – to produce
a higher calibre of students, helping them to become successful by getting qualified and making them more employable.
As a result of these awards, training providers have more of an incentive to attend – not only do they get recognition from their awarding body (for winning or being shortlisted), they also receive additional logos and branding for their websites.
Targets & Statistics
Statistics 2014 vs 2015
What would we do differently?
In future, we will look a bit more closely at the timings for receiving all the award submissions and preparing them for the judging panel as we were not expecting to receive almost double the amount of submissions we received in 2014.
Feedback & Testimonials
“All the sessions I attended were very informative and beneficial. I came away feeling very positive about the new standards and apprenticeship pathways.”
“The awards is the highlight of the conference as it gives recognition for the hard work providers and students put in”
“The awards was the highlight, Martin did an excellent job in running the ceremony”
“We won an award yipeeee! The atmosphere and the AAT staff were brilliant”
