In this episode of The Business of Meetings, Eric Rozenberg shares how to turn three days at IMEX America into opportunities that can impact your business for the next year. He explains why preparation, intentional networking, meaningful conversations, and market intelligence matter more than simply collecting contacts. Eric also shares practical strategies for making valuable connections, leaving room for serendipity, following up effectively, and turning what you learn at IMEX into measurable business results.
Next week, Eric and thousands of others in our industry will descend on Las Vegas for IMEX America.
Today, Eric explains how to turn a trade show into an investment, not just an event. Stay tuned for more!
Before IMEX
Before you go, identify three main outcomes you want from your attendance. You might want three conversations with potential clients, two strategic partners, to understand what buyers are saying about AI, to reconnect with five relationships that matter, or to find one idea that could materially improve your business.
Who You Meet
Be intentional about who you need to meet. Research the exhibitors, speakers, and attendees you already know, and reach out now instead of hoping to bump into them.
Prepare Your Luck
Serendipity matters, and some of the best connections can happen unexpectedly. But don’t count on serendipity alone. It’s not enough. Prepare your luck by doing the work beforehand, while also leaving room for unexpected opportunities.
What Do You Do?
When someone asks what you do, be ready to answer clearly. If it takes you three minutes to explain your business, IMEX will expose that weakness very quickly. Be ready to communicate what you do in a way that can start a conversation.
Stop Collecting Contacts
During the show, stop collecting contacts and start creating conversation. Being interested in the people you’re talking to is far more valuable than simply collecting business cards or batch scans.
Stop Pitching
Pitching is tiring, and it doesn’t work, so don’t do it. Ask engaging questions, like what people are seeing in the market, what has changed in their business, where AI is actually helping, what clients are asking for today, and who they think you absolutely need to meet.
Don’t Over-Schedule
Don’t schedule yourself from 8 a.m. until midnight. Some of the highest-value conversations happen walking between booths, over coffee, while waiting for an Uber, or because somebody says, “You two should meet.” Leave time open for spontaneous conversations that are both genuine and worthwhile.
Market Intelligence
You’ll be surrounded by customers, competitors, suppliers, technology companies, destinations, hotels, associations, and industry leaders. Use that access to study the industry. Look at what people are buying, problems that keep coming up, the type of language customers are using, where money is moving, which capabilities are becoming commodities, where margins are being created, what AI could eliminate, and what clients will happily pay more for.
Enjoy the Show
Enjoy IMEX, enjoy meeting people in the industry, and enjoy the evenings. Nothing replaces being there in person, and nothing replaces the magic of in-person connection.
Follow Up
Block time to follow up within 48 hours of returning. Make the follow-up useful. If someone mentioned a problem, send a resource, a person, or an idea that continues the conversation.
Keep Building Your Network
Not every contact will become an opportunity. Separate contacts into buckets for opportunity, relationship, and intelligence. The industry is vast, and people are moving, so continuously building your network is extremely important.
Three Things That Matter
When you leave Las Vegas, take a blank piece of paper and ask yourself: if IMEX is a great investment this year, what will have happened by the time you come home? Write three answers. Your objective is to come home with three things that can change what happens in your business over the next 12 months.
Prepare, Then Execute
Prepare, and then leave room for serendipity. Meet fewer people, have better conversations, ask better questions, and listen to what the market is telling you. When you come home, execute and be accountable. That’s how you turn a trade show into an investment.
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“Don’t go to IMEX to be busy. Go with intention.”
Eric Rozenberg
Full transcript of episode 343 of The Business of Meetings podcast, a solo episode with Eric Rozenberg. Lightly edited for readability.
Eric Rozenberg: Hello and welcome to a new episode of The Business of Meetings podcast. Today I want to talk about IMEX because next week, together with thousands of people from our industry, we’re going to descend on Las Vegas for IMEX America, and most of us will probably make the same mistake.
They’ll confuse being busy with being productive. Most people prepare for IMEX by booking their flight, downloading the app, setting up some meetings in their calendar. That’s great, but that’s logistics. That is not strategy. And that’s what I want to talk about today.
Because 20 meetings, four receptions, two dinners, 47 badge scans, a suitcase full of swag. Wonderful. Then they come home exhausted and they say, “IMEX was amazing.” And yes, it’s amazing. And yes, Wednesday night is MPI Rendezvous, and it’s actually my favorite party of the year. And my question is, what did it actually produce? Because if you are investing three to four days of your time, flight, hotel, meals, and most importantly 3 to four days of your time, your attention, you should know what return you’re trying to create. So, here are some ideas of things to do before, during, and after.
Before, decide what winning IMEX looks like. So, you need to find like three outcomes that you want to reach, not 20. It’s impossible. Think about the three main outcomes you want to get from your attendance. For instance, I want three conversation with potential clients. I want to identify two strategic partners. I want to understand what buyers are saying about AI. I want to reconnect with five relationships that matter. I want to find one idea that could materially improve my business. That’s a way of planning and thinking about the outcome. And quite frankly, what I always say, it’s that it’s who do I need to meet, not who can I meet. And so you’re getting more intentional in planning your attendance to IMEX. Those are completely different questions. Who do I need to meet versus who can I meet?
So research people before the show. Look at exhibitors. Look at speakers. Look at attendees you already know. Reach out now rather than hoping to bump into them. And don’t get me wrong, I love serendipity. I believe in serendipity, and my life has been changed multiple times thanks to serendipity. But if you only count on serendipity, this is not enough. You need to prepare your luck if you want.
So the other aspect that I want to also emphasize before you go there is to be ready to answer a simple question. When you’re talking to someone and ask them about themselves, then most of the time and hopefully all of the time they will also ask you, so what do you do? So you need to be ready to answer that question, and if it takes you three minutes to explain your business, IMEX is going to expose that weakness very quickly. So those are some ideas before the show.
During the show, stop collecting contacts. Start creating conversation. Be interested in the people you’re talking to. I remember years ago for whatever reason the way that hotel representative were evaluated was by the number of business cards they were bringing, and I remember I developed a routine. So I was speaking with Josmo from Hotel XYZ, and while I was on the booth a lot of his colleague would come and ask my business card, interrupting conversation, just getting the business card, and I quickly realized that somehow they have been told that they’ll be measured by the number of business card they were bringing home, which is crazy. And I know it’s not the case anymore. I hope it’s not the case anymore, but I developed that routine.
So Josmo, I would put his business card in my left pocket of my jacket. And all the others that just want to have my business card, not even talking, I would take their business card, put it in the right pocket, and the next booth I was visiting, the next Josmo, I will take the business card and give mine. And all the others, I will give them the business card of the previous people at the previous booth. They’re not even looking at it. It’s crazy.
So anyway, the idea here is really to start creating conversation, and it’s quite frankly the most interesting thing when we are in person is to have those real conversation with people. So stop pitching. It’s tiring. It’s just like, and it doesn’t work. It’s like when you go on LinkedIn, “Oh, I would love to connect with you.” The next thing you know, if you connect with that person, you’re receiving like five pages of why you should be working with them. It’s not like that that it works. Start creating conversation and ask questions.
For instance, what are you seeing in the market right now that concerns you? What has changed most in your business over the last 12 months? Where is AI actually helping you concretely? How are you using it? What are your client asking for today that they were not asking maybe two years ago? Who is someone here you think I absolutely need to meet? Those are engaging questions, and that is something that will completely change the relationship you have and building those true conversation.
So talking about also the planning, don’t schedule yourself from 8:00 a.m. until midnight. It’s not working. It’s not sustainable. And quite frankly, some of the highest value conversation happen walking between the booths. I get it. But it’s better to have a more quality time with people. I remember conversation over a coffee, somebody that I met waiting for an Uber, or somebody they would say you two should meet. So definitely leave room for serendipity, but prepare in advance, and then make it specifically relevant for the people you’re meeting, the people you talking to. And so that is very important to engage in true and quality and genuine conversation, and it’s also how you can use IMEX as market intelligence.
So you’ll be surrounded by your customer, competitors, suppliers, technology companies, destination, hotels, association, industry leaders. This is an amazing opportunity to do research, and so you can ask question like what are people buying? What problems keep coming up? What language are customers using? Where is money moving? What capabilities are becoming commodities? Where are the margins being created? What could AI eliminate? What will client happily pay more for? So don’t just walk the floors. Study the industries during the conference, and obviously, and that’s why we love coming in person, and nothing replaced it. Enjoy the show, enjoy IMEX, enjoy meeting people in our industry, enjoy the evenings. That’s for sure.
So, we’ve talked about before, we talked about during. What do you do after? It’s fascinating to me how many people are not doing follow-up, and yes, they say, “Oh, I’ll follow up with you.” The number of people that I’ve met in my life that I say they were going to follow up with me, they just don’t follow up with me. And I was a potential buyer for them. It’s just crazy.
So you go back home on Thursday, Friday, and then what’s happening the weekend, say, “You know, I’ll tackle that on Monday.” Monday, you have block time to follow up, and then something urgent happened with a client. And you know where this is going. A few days later, you’re still with this pile of business card on your desk, and 3 weeks, a month later, it’s too late, and say, you know what, you wasted your time.
So do the follow-up block this time. Try to do that in the 48 hours following your return, and in terms of follow-up, try to be a little bit more creative than just “Great meeting you at IMEX.” Oh, that’s totally useless. Instead, say, “Okay, you mentioned that you were struggling with this, and I kept thinking about our conversation. Here is the resource. Here’s the person. Here’s the idea I mentioned, and let’s continue the conversation next week.” That’s a completely different follow-up.
And you can separate your contacts in different buckets. You can have a bucket of opportunity. You can have a bucket of relationship, a bucket of intelligence. Every contact that you’re making should not become elite. This industry is vast. People are moving, but building and continue to build your network, and never stop building your network, is extremely important.
So the last thing I would suggest when you are leaving Vegas is to take a blank piece of paper and to write, if IMEX is a great investment for me this year, what will have happened by the time I come home? And think about that. Write three answers. No 15. Again, small number actions, not ideas in the future that maybe is going to be tackled. No. Do something very concrete. The objective is not to come home with 200 business card. It’s to come home with three things that can change what happens in your business over the next 12 months.
So, prepare, prepare, prepare. Leave room for serendipity, but also intentionally leave blocks of time open because as we know sometimes the best connection and opportunities happen when you just wander the floor and trust serendipity.
And last but certainly not least, don’t go to IMEX to be busy. Go with intention. Meet fewer people. Have better conversations. Ask better questions. Listen to what the market is telling you. And when you come home, execute. Be accountable. We all know what we need to be doing, but if we’re not accountable, we’re not executing, things are not happening. That’s in the execution. That’s how you turn a trade show into an investment. And that’s when IMEX is becoming extremely important for what you’re doing.
And the last thing I want to share with you is about, you know, everybody’s talking about AI technology. Great. Wonderful. Nothing replace the magic of in-person connection. So, be genuinely interested in others, and I look forward to seeing you at IMEX.
Thank you for tuning in to The Business of Meetings podcast. I hope you found today’s episode valuable. If you enjoyed the show, the most important thing you can do is leave a review and share it with your colleagues. It really helps spread the word. I truly appreciate your support, and if you’re ready to take your business to the next level, don’t forget to visit eventbusinessformula.com to learn more about how we are helping event business owners like you. Thanks again for listening, and I’ll see you next time.
