When I began in this industry a short 5 years ago my show schedule was 4 to 5 shows a year with all of them being in the U.S. I attended the shows for two simple reasons...
to secure new affiliates for our webcam product Secretfriends and to perpetuate our company brand AlmightyContent. A pure and simple business approach?
Between 2006 and 2008 I attended 13 shows from coast to coast hosted by 5 different organizations. Each offered something new and different with plenty of buyers and sellers attending.
Then I noticed the big shift in show attendees in 2009 with the major difference being that fewer and fewer affiliates were attending... no matter what the reason. If you take away the affiliates from a show then you might as well take away the companies that are there specifically attending to do business with affiliates... and what do you have left???
I have discussed this with two of the major show promoters and asked why there are no shows geared towards attracting a large number of affiliates and I can't seem to get a clear answer as to why. Based on my research, an average of one third of the attendees at mainstream affiliate marketing conventions are affiliates with plenty of business for everyone!
Bottom line I think that all show promoters would serve themselves best by continuing to listen to those like myself that want to attend as many of the industry shows as possible but cannot justify so due to the lack of potential customers. I know that it is nearly impossible to design a show that would accommodate the needs of everyone in this industry but I still feel most are trying to do so with less and less luck
Maybe the answer is simply make the shows smaller and more targeted then look at going to a regional schedule. As many stated there are webmasters dying to pull themselves away from the monitor for a few days to attend a friendly, fun and affordable webmaster gathering. Just my
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