Conference Overview and Recap: The Good, The Bad and The Prices

Over the last year I have attended many conferences across the country. Some have been good, some have been bad, some have been pricey. You can read all of my conference coverage and decide which you agree/disagree with. I am a tough grader of conferences because most cost money to attend.

I would say that my favorite conference from the past year is Future of Web Apps. Streaming Media East was probably my least favorite, not because of the conference, but due to Jeff Jarvis and his continued self-promotion through one of the sessions. After Jeff and the conference organizers went at it publicly, I doubt Jeff will be back next year.

What makes a great conference great and a bad one bad? Simple. It's a recipe. You need to have the right ingredients, all combined correctly. For example, ever eat a cookie right out of the oven? Tastes like crap unless you let it cool for a few minutes. Same thing here. Making sure everything works for a conference is the same. The venue, the price, the attendees, etc., all play into the recipe.

Alex has a good overview from the startup standpoint for which conferences make the most sense to attend and those you should throw money at. He says that DEMO is the best place to show off your startup but that the fee is high (I believe $20k for 5 minutes?). If you are a startup looking to launch/build buzz at an event, Alex's post is a must read. It will save you the time of wasting your money on a bad event.

Alex fails to mention that you need MONEY to attend/present at these events. For every startup that has funding and can afford a DEMO presentation, there are 500 more that can't. Alex includes some info on PR generation while at the event. I would take it a step further and suggest that you stay in town for 1-2 days where it makes sense to meet new connections. You traveled all this way for the conference, why not maximize your buzz generation and friend potential. I use this tactic to complete interviews over the extra days.

Jeremiah touches on this with his follow-up post where he discusses that not every startup has the funds to attend the expensive events and should look local as well. Of course Jeremiah is in Silicon Valley where it seems many of the events are.

Scoble joins in the conversation by suggesting that you should use Upcoming to track conferences. "Thanks to Upcoming.org they (his friends) bring me the best events and I can look and see which ones of them are going," he notes. For local conferences and meetings, Meetup is another good source. In NYC, I haven't heard anyone mention Upcoming but Meetup is mentioned almost daily.

I have ultra-limited funds which makes it difficult to attend most conferences. Even though I receive press passes, attendance is still expensive. In most cities a decent hotel is $100/nte, airfare can run $1000+ so even without the cost of attending the conference, the costs can still go over $2k for a 5-day conference.

Here are some tips I use for reducing the costs of attendance:

• Travelzoo – this is my favorite site for travel-related info. They have awesome deals almost anywhere (at least the big cities) and can save you mega bucks. And most of the deals let you keep the points/miles you earn.
• Credit Card points/miles – this is one that most people don't take advantage of. Make sure the cards you use for these trips and expenses give you something in return. I have stayed many a free night because of these cards, and spend 21 days in Europe without paying for one night in a hotel with points.
• Flyertalk Forums – an awesome discussion board for help with travel and for maximizing your ability to earn/use points. If you are a regular traveler, this is an absolute must read.
• Cheap Airfare Guide – Markus has launched a guide to help you find the best airfare.

The truth is that it will take a bit of time to work the deals. But if you can save $1k or more, isn't it worth it? Even if you or your startup have cash, why waste it where it's not needed!

I would love to get out to Gnomedex but doubt it will happen this year. At this point I have TechCrunch20 on the calendar as the big conference for this fall. I am on the roster for Future of Web Apps but doubt that I will be able to afford the travel costs.

Finally, I reviewed Confabb last week. Confabb is looking to become the destination for conferences worldwide.

Editor's note: Alex's company, AdaptiveBlue is a sponsor of CenterNetworks.