--- title: "Commuting to Events: Get a Room Even If Your House Is Nearby" id: "24905" type: "post" slug: "commuting-to-events-get-a-room-even-if-your-house-is-nearby" published_at: "2014-09-04T17:41:31+00:00" modified_at: "2026-11-09T18:24:22+00:00" url: "https://associationsnow.com/2014/09/04/commuting-to-events-get-a-room-even-if-your-house-is-nearby/" markdown_url: "https://associationsnow.com/2014/09/04/commuting-to-events-get-a-room-even-if-your-house-is-nearby.md" excerpt: "The conference may be in town, but one association management pro advises against commuting to the event. Also: the story behind the data champion fueling much of BuzzFeed’s growth." taxonomy_category: - "Meetings / Events" taxonomy_post_tag: - "AssociationsNow" - "attendee tips" - "conferences" - "event planning" - "Meetings" taxonomy_content_format: - "Article" taxonomy_role: - "Association CEO / Executive Director" - "Manager" taxonomy_persona: - "Association Professionals" --- [Home](https://associationsnow.com/) » [Articles](https://associationsnow.com/format/article/) » Commuting to Events: Get a Room Even If Your House Is Nearby You may not have to travel far to get to a local conference, but that doesn’t mean it’s a good idea to skip the stay at the hotel. On his blog, Association Executive Management’s David M. Patt [argues that attendees (opens in a new tab)](http://aem-patt.com/aem-blog/index.php?itemid=1883) , even local ones, should stay in the conference hotel as a way to keep focused on their primary task—namely, attending the event. “[A]t 4:00 p.m. you should not be deciding whether to attend an educational session, go back to the office, or get home early,” he writes. “You should be at the conference.” Staying at a hotel, he argues, keeps you from worrying about potential traffic tie-ups and which method of commuting is best. It also removes the temptation to do office work instead of attending conference sessions. “You can save money by not purchasing a plane ticket,” he notes. Thoughts? Agree or disagree? ### Thinking Inside the Data Box > How did [@BuzzFeed (opens in a new tab)](https://twitter.com/BuzzFeed?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw) > grow traffic 5x in 2 years? Data. The answer is they intelligently use data: [http://t.co/YFehuHWzex (opens in a new tab)](http://t.co/YFehuHWzex) > > — Google Analytics (@googleanalytics) [September 3, 2014 (opens in a new tab)](https://twitter.com/googleanalytics/status/507197315128377344?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw) **Everyone knows *BuzzFeed* has tons and tons of traffic**, and some would dismiss that success as the result of cat lists and clickbait. But one employee, Dao Nguyen, has worked wonders in fueling *BuzzFeed*‘s rapid growth with data. “We have a lot of data; she is really good at seeing what it means,” *BuzzFeed* editor-in-chief Ben Smith told *Inc.*magazine’s Christine Lagorio-Chafkin [in a profile of Nguyen (opens in a new tab)](http://www.inc.com/christine-lagorio/buzzfeed-secret-growth-weapon.html?cid=sf01001) . For example, there’s the way Nguyen re-examined the company’s editorial tactics on weekends. As Lagorio-Chafkin writes: “Nguyen says she decided to try to boost *BuzzFeed*‘s lackluster weekend traffic by first approaching an editorial director and asking about her current strategy for socially promoting existing content, because she recognized the site being shorter-staffed on the weekends necessitated such an approach.” So now, *BuzzFeed* has a small bit of code that tells editors on Fridays the top 20 posts that should be promoted as a result of the data team’s analysis. For the full story—and a few tactics Nguyen has employed that your association’s editorial team may want to replicate—[head over to Inc.com (opens in a new tab)](http://www.inc.com/christine-lagorio/buzzfeed-secret-growth-weapon.html?cid=sf01001) . *(ht @[googleanalytics (opens in a new tab)](https://twitter.com/googleanalytics/) )* ### Other good reads **A big branding problem:** The mobile-payment service Isis Wallet [is undergoing a name change, to Softcard (opens in a new tab)](http://www.pcworld.com/article/2601980/isis-wallet-mobile-payment-service-changes-its-name-to-softcard.html) , because it had previously shared a name [with the terrorist group Islamic State of Iraq and Syria, or ISIS (opens in a new tab)](http://www.cnet.com/news/isis-mobile-wallet-to-change-name/) . **App of the day:** The iOS app [Reporter (opens in a new tab)](http://www.reporter-app.com/) periodically surveys you about what you’re doing. In other words, it allows you to get analytics about how you use your time. **Twitter’s short experiment** in messing with its typeface is over: Gotham is gone, [and Helvetica Neue is back (opens in a new tab)](http://www.theverge.com/2014/9/3/6102655/helvetica-neue-returns-to-twitter-because-no-one-liked-gotham) . (iStock/Thinkstock) [Ernie Smith](https://associationsnow.com/author/ernie-smith/) Ernie Smith is a former senior editor for Associations Now. 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