My experience exhibiting at Internet World...

Edwin · May 9, 2008

While from a business point of view, I'm still waiting on a number of leads that came out of Internet World, I thought it might at least be interesting to share some general impressions of my experience as an exhibitor there.
http://www.memorabledomains.co.uk/iw-2008.html

(There's even a few photos, though admittedly not very good ones)

rob · May 9, 2008

Excellent write up - sadly I could not attend. do you have a PDF of the handouts / catalouge / brouchure?

What ballpark costs were involved?

Hopefully not too nosey, but great work promoting .UK brand which will benefit all domainers and Nominet stakeholders ;-)

Jeewhizz · May 9, 2008

Very good - did you close any sales at the show?

mojoco · May 9, 2008

Nice write up Edwin. Thanks for sharing your experience with us.

Edwin · May 9, 2008

Good question - I've added links to PDF versions of all the handouts and domain lists that show attendees had access to at the foot of my writeup.

In terms of costs, it was relatively pricey in that the bare stand was over £6K and on top of that there were furniture hire costs, electricity and internet connection costs (not cheap - it's a monopoly situation once you get inside the exhibition hall), graphic design costs, brochure printing, polo shirt printing, business card printing and poster printing, plus flights and hotel, etc. (surveying the pile of invoices in front of me, I'm sure I've left stuff off the list...)

Can't really divulge much about the business side of things, except to say that overall it was worthwhile considering the various goals I'd set for the show (including meeting the UK domainer community), and I've reserved a stand for next year.

ScottJ · May 9, 2008

That's an interesting write up Edwin, thanks for sharing, I'd also be interested in the PDF if you don't mind sharing it.

Edwin · May 9, 2008

sji2671 said:
That's an interesting write up Edwin, thanks for sharing, I'd also be interested in the PDF if you don't mind sharing it.

Help yourself

They're linked at the foot of the article, just above the bottom navigation bar.

ScottJ · May 9, 2008

Gotcha, cheers.. I reckon I'll try and come down next year.

Edwin · May 9, 2008

sji2671 said:
Gotcha, cheers.. I reckon I'll try and come down next year.

It's VERY early days, but with a bit of luck we can tie another Acorn domainer get-together in with Internet World 2009! That would be really cool...

stevebrowne · May 9, 2008

very interesting write up; thanks for sharing.

DaveH · May 9, 2008

Excellent write up! Cheers, point 5 is certainly interesting. Glad you got through to them that most domainers are nice guys and are offering a service.

Admin · May 9, 2008

After visiting Edwin there in person, I have to say I was very impressed with the professionalism with which he put the stand together, both in terms of it's marketing materials and his domain portfolio reference book, so he could browse by genre etc. allowing him to react to the needs of the enquirer.

The brochures looked great (and even better for mentioning domainprices.co.uk)

I will definately look to combine this with an AD meeting next year, and maybe we could do a more formal event / domain auction.

I know the planning that has to go into doing these shows so well done Edwin, you put a lot of other companies there to shame, (apart from the one with the hula hula girls), well done!

mat · May 9, 2008

Sounds like a worthwhile experience! Looks like you got everything spot on

Domainosaur · May 10, 2008

Thanks Edwin

Appreciate the look inside for those of us who could not attend. Are you going to the Paris Auction in June?

Edwin · May 10, 2008

Domainosaur said:
Appreciate the look inside for those of us who could not attend. Are you going to the Paris Auction in June?

Unfortunately not, as that would be another 12+ hour flight which is just a bit too much to do so often

Jeewhizz · May 10, 2008

Top stuff - did you know there was a typo on the front page of your leaflet?

Edwin · May 10, 2008

Jeewhizz said:
Top stuff - did you know there was a typo on the front page of your leaflet?

Yep, though as a measure of how hectic things were at the time, it took until the 2nd day of the show to notice it! In any case I'll be revising the brochure for next year; that just gives me one more excuse to do so...