Oprano Adult Industry Forums - View Single Post - Should There Be A Spring/summer Cybernet?

Carrie · 01-13-2003

(This is gonna be loooong...)
I'm kinda the "token newbie" around you guys, so I'm not looking at it with the same eyes that you are. Sometimes it helps, sometimes it doesn't.

I was in a booth the entire time in Montreal and I got a LOT of business done. I was in a booth (nearly) the entire time in Miami and got NO business done.
The difference?
In Montreal we had room for people to be in front of our table, we actually had *tables* (rather than look-a-like countertops) that we could lay things out on, write on, put drinks and food on, etc. We were right by the bar, and there were a couple of tables that held 8 people right in front of our "booth". We were fortunate enough to be out IN the hospitality suite part of things. The parties were a bit more low-key, less emphasis on seeing pussy and more emphasis on networking. We could smoke right *at* the booth, and so could our visitors. Even when were weren't in the "hall", we were still surrounded by business folks, because everyone was in the hotel and we all ended up at the restaurant downstairs (or for some, the one all the way upstairs).

In Miami the booth was tiny, the aisles were too narrow and cramped, there was nowhere for anyone to sit or put down their things. Everything was at near-chest-height so to write something you had to lift up your bags to that height and dig your stuff out, or squat down and dig through them on the floor. The smoking *really* got in the way - in order to smoke a cig, we had to be gone from the booth for at least 15 minutes (fighting our way to and from the Smoker's Broil, and smoking the cig). I got more done walking the floor to and from the Smoker's Broil and standing out there broiling than I did sitting at that booth. Even the companies that had couches in Miami - their booths weren't heavily populated. Why? Because everyone was hanging out in the hospitality area where they could easily get a drink without trudging half a mile for it, and could go have a smoke without being gone for 15 minutes.

Sharpie, your "kiosk" idea reminds me of old "Around The World" parties in college. One floor in the dorm would pick a night to have a party. Each room would serve a different drink. The goal was to see how many times you could go "around the world" (hit every room on the floor) before you passed out.

The frats would have big-ass parties also, with a ton of people all smushed in together listening to the same music and the only option was to go outside and watch the drunks drinking beer bongs off of the roof.
It honestly reminds me of small conventions vs. large conventions.

You can't squeeze everyone into *one* massive place and treat them all the same. Some people come to network, some come to hang out and watch, some come to get drunk and party. Tossing the business people in with the "I wanna live the porn life" partiers *and treating them the same* won't work. Even the sponsors don't work that way... Lightspeed is known for it's crazy events and parties, while MaxCash is known for having a comfortable place to sit and good food to eat.
The Around The World parties always drew more people and turned out better than the frat parties. You met more folks, you didn't get puked on as much, there was always at least one room where you felt "comfortable" and could just relax and talk (network) while the drunks slammed boiler-makers somewhere further down the hall while screaming at full volume.

Point blank, you can't please everyone. So pick a target audience and build the show for them. Internext draws a lot of the party folks, it seemed like Cybernet drew mainly veterans and folks interested in doing business. I *think* that AVN is trying to get their hands into the benefits of the smaller show like you have by having the one in Miami, but the one thing they're sorely missing is that they're making all the same mistakes - just on a smaller scale. They're keeping the networking area painfully separate from the "booth" area. They're still focusing too damn much on the entire idea of "booths" as being THE model to promote your business. They're still picking places that are incredibly expensive to stay, with no lower-end rooms for people who want to be where everyone else is but don't have $800 alone to spend just on the room. And the ticket prices... gads. I have to look at the ticket price from the consumer end because I have no experience on the "running the show" end. If they want more people to attend, they should drop the ticket price, not charge extra for the seminars (gee, why do you think people don't attend seminars in Vegas? It costs extra!), and focus on the ATTENDEE, not the exhibitor.

As an attendee, a relative "newbie", and someone who wants to get the benefits from the show but doesn't make 7 figures per year, here's what I want/don't want out of a show:
I don't want to walk 1 or 2 miles to get to the convention from the hotel.
I don't want my choices to be a1) pay $800 just for my room or 2) stay a mile away from the action and end up paying another $200 in cab fares. I want a hotel that can cater to the high-end AND the low end, or there is a less expensive hotel *right next door* or across the street where I'm 2 minutes from the action without paying $20 in cab fare.
I want it on a weekend, so it's easier for people who work (part-timers, spouses, etc) to be able to attend, and easier to get babysitters for those that have children.
I want to be able to choose my means of accomodations and airfare - the "package" deals of show/hotel/airfare starting at $2000 are ridiculous, especially since you can't attend if you don't purchase a package. (However, the people throwing the NYC show are probably purposely *not* catering to the smaller webmaster, and this may have been done purposely to keep them out, which is an excellent way to do so if that's what they're going for.)
I *personally* want the emphasis to be on networking. Not everyone is me, though; and some want the emphasis to be on partying. Again, you have to pick your target audience.

Things I would *like* to see?
More "comfort" stuff at the booths (if there are booths) and less goodies. You can hand me a $7 shirt that I might wear once out of the privacy of my own home, a 50cent clothespin with your company's name printed on it that I will NEVER use and most likely will throw away, and a $1 flyer with all of your sites listed on it that I will also throw away (all your cost); or you can hand me a good sandwich and a soda. Trust me, I'll appreciate the sandwich and soda more.
Goodies cost: $8.50
Food/soda cost: $4.00-$5.00 max (more if you have mixed drinks)

In the same vein, I can use a small content CD a hell of a lot more than I can use a foam boob. I can use an 8MB memory card more than I can use another fancy embroidered expensive baseball cap.
The sponsors need to realize that mainstream "branding" of products for folks to take home with them is wasted money in this business. You think I'm going to take that coffee cup saying "fuck I love porn and I love XYZ company" and put it out where the family and kids can see it? I'd do that with a Yahoo cup, but with LesbiansRidingFuckMachines I won't. You're NOT going to pick up extra business off of the branded products you give me.
You WILL, however, pick up extra business by thinking about what I can use (either at the show or away from it), and giving me that - I'll tell someone all about how well I was treated and how you're such a great company.
Why are there software companies at these shows giving away t-shirts? Tell me about your product, and I'll forget it. Give me a t-shirt, I'll stick it in the closet. Give me a time-limited or feature-limited demo of your software on a CD, and I'll USE it. Where's the common sense gone?

My ideal show...
*Exhibitors with common sense who hand out things not because they're "cool", but because I as a webmaster can USE them. *Points to the lexan PSW Billing mousepad that takes a beating or a spilling and still fucking rocks.*
*A large area, perhaps a circle or groups of circles, of exhibitors around the outside with lots of tables and chairs in the center so we can network and do business *without* being separated from the "action".
*No booming fucking music that you have to scream over. We're not selling speakers, folks. What's the point of having loud music to attract people to your booth when they can't even hear you once they get over there?
*Seminars/Roundtables off to the side but still in view of the exhibits... so people wandering by can see/hear what's going on and decide to sit down and participate, but people attending won't feel like they're utterly cut-off from the action and missing out on things. If they see someone they want to network with walking around, they can get up and leave. You can't do that when you're closed in a room, can't see anyone, and have the pressure that if you get up and leave you're going to take attention away from the discussion. It's uncomfortable being stuck in a college-style lecture hall. We're not in high school anymore. (Well, most of us anyway. LOL). If you take away the 300-decibel speakers booming music, then the roundtable wouldn't have the problem of needing to be closed off so people could hear.
*All of the $$ issues I mentioned above concerning room costs or nearby room costs, ticket prices, etc.
*Picking a target audience and sticking with it. People who want to do business, or people who want to party. The *show* should be one or the other, not both. Parties can always be thrown after show hours.

I know this has been REALLY long and I apologize, but I hope that you've found at least one thing you can work with in my perspective. I *am* your average webmaster who's in the trenches banging it out to make a buck and get some traffic. I *am* in this for the long haul and working at it seriously - this isn't something I'll drop in one month or that I'm doing just to get laid. My concerns are the money it's going to cost me overall to attend (accommodations, ticket, airfare, food while I'm there) and what I'm going to get out of it *business-wise*. I'm not coming simply to party or simply to take a vacation. If I want to party I'll do it away from the show (after hours), if I want a vacation it sure as hell isn't going to be where work is infringing on me - it IS a vacation, after all.

So that's the perspective from your average webmaster. An "advanced newbie" or a "midbie", as some would put it. Most of the folks here at Oprano have been in the biz so long they've forgotten what it's like to be at my level. Well, nowadays you guys are the exhibitors, not the attendees. The attendees are people like me. If you want me to attend, make a show that is focused on MY needs, not the needs of someone who can throw down $1500 for a room and $300 for each dinner. Give me things I can USE, not flashy bullshit useless gadgets that I'll never use.
Make it worth my while to spend the money and come there, during a time when it won't further impact my bank account just to come (ie throwing it during the week), and most likely, I'll be there.

Here's some ideas for things the average webmaster *needs* more than foam boobies and plastic beer cups:
Software (image processing, photo retouching, mirroring programs, organizing programs, keyword tools, free scripts, etc etc etc)...
Content, coupons for your service, pens, mousepads, digital camera cards, gift certificates for dinner nearby or amazon.com, TIME with YOU and your representatives, flyers on how to get and sustain traffic, glossaries on what all of the different acronyms/terms mean (for the real newbies), business cards with real contact info, icq #s, and a description of what your business DOES (take a look at the business cards you gathered and tell me how many of them tell you what the company does - not many, eh?), food and drink (it is added cost to us and usually attending a show means many many hours of going without food), tylenol, anti-bacterial hand lotion, notepads, post-it notes... think of the things you USE while sitting at your desk working and things you NEED when you attend a show... those are the best things to give away if you're going to give something away at all.
Amateurs are a slightly different crowd and need slightly different things. Sexy clothing (not t-shirts), cam software (at least demos), sex toys, lube, tutorials on lighting, taking good pictures, condoms, discounts on site design/banners/buttons, microphones... in addition to the common-sense stuff above.

After all that, I need a drink!

01-13-2003	#20
Carrie Eternal Newbie Respin bullshit press Your Comments Are Welcomed Join Date: Oct 2002 Location: Inside your monitor Posts: 2,850	(This is gonna be loooong...) I'm kinda the "token newbie" around you guys, so I'm not looking at it with the same eyes that you are. Sometimes it helps, sometimes it doesn't. I was in a booth the entire time in Montreal and I got a LOT of business done. I was in a booth (nearly) the entire time in Miami and got NO business done. The difference? In Montreal we had room for people to be in front of our table, we actually had tables (rather than look-a-like countertops) that we could lay things out on, write on, put drinks and food on, etc. We were right by the bar, and there were a couple of tables that held 8 people right in front of our "booth". We were fortunate enough to be out IN the hospitality suite part of things. The parties were a bit more low-key, less emphasis on seeing pussy and more emphasis on networking. We could smoke right at the booth, and so could our visitors. Even when were weren't in the "hall", we were still surrounded by business folks, because everyone was in the hotel and we all ended up at the restaurant downstairs (or for some, the one all the way upstairs). In Miami the booth was tiny, the aisles were too narrow and cramped, there was nowhere for anyone to sit or put down their things. Everything was at near-chest-height so to write something you had to lift up your bags to that height and dig your stuff out, or squat down and dig through them on the floor. The smoking really got in the way - in order to smoke a cig, we had to be gone from the booth for at least 15 minutes (fighting our way to and from the Smoker's Broil, and smoking the cig). I got more done walking the floor to and from the Smoker's Broil and standing out there broiling than I did sitting at that booth. Even the companies that had couches in Miami - their booths weren't heavily populated. Why? Because everyone was hanging out in the hospitality area where they could easily get a drink without trudging half a mile for it, and could go have a smoke without being gone for 15 minutes. Sharpie, your "kiosk" idea reminds me of old "Around The World" parties in college. One floor in the dorm would pick a night to have a party. Each room would serve a different drink. The goal was to see how many times you could go "around the world" (hit every room on the floor) before you passed out. The frats would have big-ass parties also, with a ton of people all smushed in together listening to the same music and the only option was to go outside and watch the drunks drinking beer bongs off of the roof. It honestly reminds me of small conventions vs. large conventions. You can't squeeze everyone into one massive place and treat them all the same. Some people come to network, some come to hang out and watch, some come to get drunk and party. Tossing the business people in with the "I wanna live the porn life" partiers and treating them the same won't work. Even the sponsors don't work that way... Lightspeed is known for it's crazy events and parties, while MaxCash is known for having a comfortable place to sit and good food to eat. The Around The World parties always drew more people and turned out better than the frat parties. You met more folks, you didn't get puked on as much, there was always at least one room where you felt "comfortable" and could just relax and talk (network) while the drunks slammed boiler-makers somewhere further down the hall while screaming at full volume. Point blank, you can't please everyone. So pick a target audience and build the show for them. Internext draws a lot of the party folks, it seemed like Cybernet drew mainly veterans and folks interested in doing business. I think that AVN is trying to get their hands into the benefits of the smaller show like you have by having the one in Miami, but the one thing they're sorely missing is that they're making all the same mistakes - just on a smaller scale. They're keeping the networking area painfully separate from the "booth" area. They're still focusing too damn much on the entire idea of "booths" as being THE model to promote your business. They're still picking places that are incredibly expensive to stay, with no lower-end rooms for people who want to be where everyone else is but don't have $800 alone to spend just on the room. And the ticket prices... gads. I have to look at the ticket price from the consumer end because I have no experience on the "running the show" end. If they want more people to attend, they should drop the ticket price, not charge extra for the seminars (gee, why do you think people don't attend seminars in Vegas? It costs extra!), and focus on the ATTENDEE, not the exhibitor. As an attendee, a relative "newbie", and someone who wants to get the benefits from the show but doesn't make 7 figures per year, here's what I want/don't want out of a show: I don't want to walk 1 or 2 miles to get to the convention from the hotel. I don't want my choices to be a1) pay $800 just for my room or 2) stay a mile away from the action and end up paying another $200 in cab fares. I want a hotel that can cater to the high-end AND the low end, or there is a less expensive hotel right next door or across the street where I'm 2 minutes from the action without paying $20 in cab fare. I want it on a weekend, so it's easier for people who work (part-timers, spouses, etc) to be able to attend, and easier to get babysitters for those that have children. I want to be able to choose my means of accomodations and airfare - the "package" deals of show/hotel/airfare starting at $2000 are ridiculous, especially since you can't attend if you don't purchase a package. (However, the people throwing the NYC show are probably purposely not catering to the smaller webmaster, and this may have been done purposely to keep them out, which is an excellent way to do so if that's what they're going for.) I personally want the emphasis to be on networking. Not everyone is me, though; and some want the emphasis to be on partying. Again, you have to pick your target audience. Things I would like to see? More "comfort" stuff at the booths (if there are booths) and less goodies. You can hand me a $7 shirt that I might wear once out of the privacy of my own home, a 50cent clothespin with your company's name printed on it that I will NEVER use and most likely will throw away, and a $1 flyer with all of your sites listed on it that I will also throw away (all your cost); or you can hand me a good sandwich and a soda. Trust me, I'll appreciate the sandwich and soda more. Goodies cost: $8.50 Food/soda cost: $4.00-$5.00 max (more if you have mixed drinks) In the same vein, I can use a small content CD a hell of a lot more than I can use a foam boob. I can use an 8MB memory card more than I can use another fancy embroidered expensive baseball cap. The sponsors need to realize that mainstream "branding" of products for folks to take home with them is wasted money in this business. You think I'm going to take that coffee cup saying "fuck I love porn and I love XYZ company" and put it out where the family and kids can see it? I'd do that with a Yahoo cup, but with LesbiansRidingFuckMachines I won't. You're NOT going to pick up extra business off of the branded products you give me. You WILL, however, pick up extra business by thinking about what I can use (either at the show or away from it), and giving me that - I'll tell someone all about how well I was treated and how you're such a great company. Why are there software companies at these shows giving away t-shirts? Tell me about your product, and I'll forget it. Give me a t-shirt, I'll stick it in the closet. Give me a time-limited or feature-limited demo of your software on a CD, and I'll USE it. Where's the common sense gone? My ideal show... Exhibitors with common sense who hand out things not because they're "cool", but because I as a webmaster can USE them. Points to the lexan PSW Billing mousepad that takes a beating or a spilling and still fucking rocks.* A large area, perhaps a circle or groups of circles, of exhibitors around the outside with lots of tables and chairs in the center so we can network and do business without* being separated from the "action". No booming fucking music that you have to scream over. We're not selling speakers, folks. What's the point of having loud music to attract people to your booth when they can't even hear you once they get over there? Seminars/Roundtables off to the side but still in view of the exhibits... so people wandering by can see/hear what's going on and decide to sit down and participate, but people attending won't feel like they're utterly cut-off from the action and missing out on things. If they see someone they want to network with walking around, they can get up and leave. You can't do that when you're closed in a room, can't see anyone, and have the pressure that if you get up and leave you're going to take attention away from the discussion. It's uncomfortable being stuck in a college-style lecture hall. We're not in high school anymore. (Well, most of us anyway. LOL). If you take away the 300-decibel speakers booming music, then the roundtable wouldn't have the problem of needing to be closed off so people could hear. All of the $$ issues I mentioned above concerning room costs or nearby room costs, ticket prices, etc. Picking a target audience and sticking with it. People who want to do business, or people who want to party. The show should be one or the other, not both. Parties can always be thrown after show hours. I know this has been REALLY long and I apologize, but I hope that you've found at least one thing you can work with in my perspective. I am your average webmaster who's in the trenches banging it out to make a buck and get some traffic. I am in this for the long haul and working at it seriously - this isn't something I'll drop in one month or that I'm doing just to get laid. My concerns are the money it's going to cost me overall to attend (accommodations, ticket, airfare, food while I'm there) and what I'm going to get out of it business-wise. I'm not coming simply to party or simply to take a vacation. If I want to party I'll do it away from the show (after hours), if I want a vacation it sure as hell isn't going to be where work is infringing on me - it IS a vacation, after all. So that's the perspective from your average webmaster. An "advanced newbie" or a "midbie", as some would put it. Most of the folks here at Oprano have been in the biz so long they've forgotten what it's like to be at my level. Well, nowadays you guys are the exhibitors, not the attendees. The attendees are people like me. If you want me to attend, make a show that is focused on MY needs, not the needs of someone who can throw down $1500 for a room and $300 for each dinner. Give me things I can USE, not flashy bullshit useless gadgets that I'll never use. Make it worth my while to spend the money and come there, during a time when it won't further impact my bank account just to come (ie throwing it during the week), and most likely, I'll be there. Here's some ideas for things the average webmaster needs more than foam boobies and plastic beer cups: Software (image processing, photo retouching, mirroring programs, organizing programs, keyword tools, free scripts, etc etc etc)... Content, coupons for your service, pens, mousepads, digital camera cards, gift certificates for dinner nearby or amazon.com, TIME with YOU and your representatives, flyers on how to get and sustain traffic, glossaries on what all of the different acronyms/terms mean (for the real newbies), business cards with real contact info, icq #s, and a description of what your business DOES (take a look at the business cards you gathered and tell me how many of them tell you what the company does - not many, eh?), food and drink (it is added cost to us and usually attending a show means many many hours of going without food), tylenol, anti-bacterial hand lotion, notepads, post-it notes... think of the things you USE while sitting at your desk working and things you NEED when you attend a show... those are the best things to give away if you're going to give something away at all. Amateurs are a slightly different crowd and need slightly different things. Sexy clothing (not t-shirts), cam software (at least demos), sex toys, lube, tutorials on lighting, taking good pictures, condoms, discounts on site design/banners/buttons, microphones... in addition to the common-sense stuff above. After all that, I need a drink! __________________ Need a kick-ass design done quickly? I recommend Sex Creator - they absolutely ROCK.