2023 W37 - Events!
Every week I post about one thing that happened at Rows. We're building in public!
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🎤🎸 Should I stay or should I go? - the Clash
Recently we said no to a bunch of events we want to go. Two declines happened this week. Some were organized by companies that are strategic to us and with whom have partnerships, and one was by a good investor of ours. So, not some random obscure thing.
Events are great to meet and convert new users, same for investors. Events are the SEO of physical life, from the perspective that they work slowly, one by one, and eventually become a great source for conversion. Saying no to them feels like a missed opportunity - it's free distribution after all.
But attending events consumes energy and focus.
In 2023 alone me and my cofounder have participated in more than 20 events, a few of which had hundreds of people in them - events from SaaStr, Lucid, Armilar, UpTec, Founder Tales, Inside.com, Airfocus.com, Solutions (Hamburg), Antler.co, Nova MBA and more. There's more still lined up for the next quarter.
When you look at the numbers, it's clear that events are not as impactful as other things, especially product improvements and smart changes:
exposing your product in a more clear way, like when we shipped Instant Rows⚡️which doubled our conversion rate;
launching exciting features, like the Rows Analyst✨, which got us hundreds of thousands of new users;
gathering feedback and working with users so that they succeed.
crafting good stories that get users attention and media exposure.
So, yes, focus on that first.
Events are magical though, especially if it's you who's doing the talking. This allow you to you craft a story around a community. And that's our first filter: if it's us presenting, then we are much more likely to participate. Then we privilege those juicy audiences:
key users and customers;
medium/large audiences; (100+);
investors who're engaged in our industry;
Pretty obvious.
So, well, we stayed at home this week.
See you next week
- Humberto
