Why, as a SaaS Startup Owner, You Should Go to Conferences

This is part2 of my upcoming blog

My Saas Journey to 10K Users

So, why did we go to a conference like Websummit anyway? There’s a whole story behind it which you can read in 2 blog posts written by Vedran.

Leap of Faith describes how Treblle came to be, and million reasons you should go to Websummit is where Vedran tells you a story of how Websummit helps you succeed if you leverage all that it offers you as a startup.

This was their second visit to Websummit. The first one went so well that Vedran decided to pay them a visit once more and to write about it. We posted it a few weeks before the summit on Twitter and it got reposted quite a bit, and more importantly, it got reposted by Paddy Cosgrave, the CEO of Websummit.

Organic visitors skyrocketed for a few days after posting that. This showed me the power of Twitter when you post the right thing at the right time.

Still, I was pretty surprised by this. Coming from a world of marketing for a wide variety of things, news on why you should visit some conference really didn’t seem to be a big deal. It might even look like a promotional text paid by the conference itself. And it was not. It was all super organic. So, why is that?

As I learned, developers hate, like really despise marketing and this is like some unspoken truth that they all seem to understand. It’s almost like a dogma of developers.

The other thing I learned is, developers, like to trust their information, and they all use one hack to get that information in pure form. The hack is, that they almost exclusively listen to advice from other developers.

So, a developer wouldn’t write about going to a conference if they did not deem it worth writing. They most certainly found some value in it, and because other developers almost intuitively understand this, they will at least take a peek to see what this text is about.

So, if you have a developer as the CEO, make them write about things. Of course, it helps if they already have a following or at least, a lot of experience that gives them authority. I was lucky since Vedran is a genius developer with a decent following and awesome social and writing skills.

However, even if you have a problem with your CEO (maybe they’re not good writers), you can write it for them. You’ll need to have a meeting or two to get the information out of them and to brainstorm the topics you would like to write about, but it can be done.

RESULTS

Results from our second visit to Web Summit? They were not overwhelming to be honest.

I got the team to send me some pictures and videos from the pitching competition. It was a great opportunity to get some interesting content for our social media.

However, you need to be a bit patient to see actual results. Sure, conferences like this can help your product's visibility and growth immediately, however, it will not be sustainable. Similarly like ProductHunt, it will give you a boost and if you do things right you’ll see a spike in traffic and leads.

You need to be ready for this. It’s all for nothing if you get 50 new contacts and never follow up on them. So, have a plan of action when you come back home. Reach out, send some emails and make some calls.

I would recommend visiting at least 2 - 3 big conferences a year. Just make sure you have a plan on what to do once you get those leads.

Also, if you can, get a booth. People will come to you for a demo and ask questions. These are invaluable. Remember the or write them down. It’s a great learning experience and as soon as you have answers (if not already) you can develop those into great pieces of content.

I know, as a SaaS in the developer market you need to act quickly and Startups need to show results sooner, rather than later. Still, it’s OK to take a breather, come up with a strategy and try to achieve some goal within 2 or 3 months. Pick a lane and focus on it.

KEY TAKEAWAYS

- Visit at least 2 or 3 big ones a year

- If you can, get a booth

- Get your CEO to write or get them to 
give you information so you (or a writer) can write

- Have a strategy in place for leads

- Make content by getting insights and questions from attendees