By: PMA
HILLSBOROUGH, NJ (October 1, 2014) n Professional Management Associates, LLC (PMA) has once again produced an extremely successful annual conference for The American Association of Feline Practitioners (AAFP). This year’s multi-faceted meeting was held in Indianapolis, Indiana, September 18-21, 2014 and drew 862 total attendees, an increase of 28% over the previous year. Under PMA’s direction, the AAFP’s annual conference has gone from a small yearly gathering to being recognized as the leading feline healthcare forum.
“When we began working with AAFP in 2005, their annual conference garnered about 370 attendees, we nearly tripled that number this year,” said Joanne Cole, Managing Member of PMA. “AAFP Executive Director, Heather O’Steen, and her team of marketing, communication, and event management specialists have grown and transformed the annual conference into a ‘can’t miss’ event for feline healthcare practitioners both nationally and internationally.”
PMA specializes in event management from start to finish and its experienced planning staff negotiates the best contracts, works directly with vendors, develops and manages the event budget, attends to all of the details, and increases profitability while decreasing cost. For AAFP’s conference, PMA coordinated a speaker line-up of the most influential academic and industry experts and professionals who shared the latest research, exchanged ideas, and formulated future plans on how to elevate the level of feline healthcare worldwide. In addition to educational lectures and seminars, PMA made sure attendees had some fun outside of the lecture hall and organized offsite events such as a 5K Fun Run and an elegant “Black, White and Red Affair” at the Indiana State Museum. The cocktail party included live jazz music, dancing, unique museum gallery exhibits, and even gondola rides!
The AAFP’s annual conference not only showcased PMA’s event management strengths, but allowed PMA to flex its marketing and social media muscles as well. PMA turned the conference from a once offline meeting, to an online, fully interactive event. Conference attendees participated in a variety of fun social media photo contests, could relax and check their email/update their social media pages in the virtual café, and more!
“With PMA at the helm, this year’s AAFP annual conference program was outstanding, execution was flawless, and social events were high-energy. In short, the conference was a unanimous success,” said Marcus Brown, DVM and President of the AAFP. “The entire AAFP Board has received an overwhelming amount of glowing comments from attendees about the speakers, offsite events, hotel, and conference location. We’re truly grateful to PMA for making a conference of this magnitude possible and are already looking forward to where PMA takes this meeting in 2015!”
For more information on PMA, visit: www.association-partners.com.
About Professional Management Associates, LLC
Founded in 1984, Professional Management Associates, LLC, is a full-service association management company serving national and state-level trade associations, professional societies, user groups, business networks, and membership organizations. PMA was one of only 24 dual-accredited association management companies in the world. For more information about PMA, visit: www.association-partners.com.
