Are Online Events A Huge Waste Of Startup Company Time And Money?
Trade shows and events are all pay to play. The more money you have, the better placement and exposure you get. The great equalizer has been that at in-person events, you inevitably get foot traffic. This is especially true for CES, the world’s largest consumer technology event, where Fortune 500 companies send out scouts to look for cool new technologies.
What happens when more trade shows and events like these go online?
There is a real danger that this pay to play game will do very little for fledgling companies who need the exposure, and will only create an echo chamber of Fortune 500 and bigger companies willing to fork out to be front and center.
If You Build It (E-Booth) They Will Come
In one recent online event with e-exhibition spaces, companies got a branded logo banner on one web page alongside a slurry of other companies. Imagine having to scroll through 30 non-descript exhibitors, let alone CES’ 4,400.
Say you can squeeze your budget to afford an online booth for an e-event. You’ll get some traffic or value, right? Not necessarily. Consider you are competing against those you can buy into promoted spaces, sponsored spots, and marketing upsells (social ads, e-newsletters, etc.). That pushes you down the list. Not to mention event sponsors who shell out thousands to be the center of attention. Further down, you go.
With so many companies, it can be like finding a needle in a haystack.
The disparity becomes much wider if you don’t know a tech even exists, and it’s not advertised or right in front of your face, how would you know about it? Chicken and the egg.
Pay To Play Online Is Anti-Start-up
Events like CES already have an online portion, considered their media arm. It’s usually in the form of a web portal that uses the same pay to play model. The more you pay, the more your banner ad, video interview, or editorial gets seen. If you don’t pay, you don’t get to play.
For a smaller company, there’s no competing with a corporate budget. Similarly, you may not be able to compete with a series A or B company budget.
INC Magazine ran a great story on estimating a CES budget, which is about $150,000 back in 2012. For a startup company that has between $10,000 and $2,000,000 in seed round funding (CrunchBase), that’s a huge chunk of change.
That same year, Samsung spent more than $850,000 on a 25,000 square-foot booth. That’s not including their advertising, sales, and promotional budget.
There’s literally no competition. You’re basically on different planets.
Event Organizers Need To Focus On What’s Really Important
It is a given that events are a business and they too need to stay alive and be profitable. There are plenty of ways to do that without cannibalizing small to medium-sized companies.
One way is to create fair-play spaces for these companies to be seen online, where everyone is treated with the same exposure level. Similar to how CES created Eureka Park for startups, who were getting lost focus-wise at the back of super far away halls (aka to take advantage of the smallest and cheapest floor spaces).
Although this comes at the opportunity cost of more money to the organizer, what it does is something much more critical for them and the industry. It emphasizes the event as the place to go to see cool new innovative tech.
This is what makes events like CES buzz-worthy in the first place. Geeks who attend (me included) go to be first to see, test, and experience new tech. I love a good 8K TV, but I also love the ultra-futuristic AR glasses that happen to be made by a company working out a parent’s garage.
To Go Or Not Go? The Answer Is Maybe
As in-person events get fewer and fewer, their organizers are going to have to find new ways to monetize and stay fresh. Heading online will be a real challenge and, at the same time, an excellent opportunity to distill and organize their exhibitors and re-differentiate.
For startup companies, they need to think critically about what they’re getting in exchange for their hard-earned and limited money. If the benefit and output aren’t obvious, that’s not a good enough business reason. Lastly, consider asking for more and bargaining with event organizers. If you have genuinely cool tech and a great story, they should also be excited about it and see mutual promotion as a win-win.
Do you plan to head to Las Vegas in 2021 to experience CES in-person? What are some of the coolest online events you’ve seen so far?
