I was @money2020. This is my review - if you want the deck with a 40 slides analysis, ask for it in the comments

Funny to see how every industry is posting on LinkedIn: Anthropic is hiring a head of * for $400K -> So [industry] is still important and relevant Anthropic is hiring for every role at $400k And makes 6.6M per employee

No more 'events are stressful', 'true all-in-one', 'out of the box integrations', 'technology that works for you' campaigns. Event planners are taking matters into their own hands. How distant are we from a world where we can custom-build our solutions? Not so distant, apparently.

Claude: 'Can I add some custom style to make it look better' Me:

No more 'events are stressful', 'true all-in-one', 'out of the box integrations', 'technology that works for you' campaigns. Event planners are taking matters into their own hands. How distant are we from a world where we can custom-build our solutions? Not so distant, apparently.

My friends Tomorrow I am dropping a 9 min video and 40 slide teardown of Money20/20 6 people working on it Two days of shooting In depth analysis $15k of work FREE in my newsletter. You know where to find it

Companies mess up their presence at events constantly. Generic messages, little strategy, staff at their laptop.

Gen X, Millennials and Gen Z now sit in the same business events, and your program has to work for all three. Gen Z and Millennials want short sessions, roundtables and actionable advice, and 88% of Gen Z say attending business events matters to them.

This should be what CEOs do at their user confrences instead of reading boring scripts Change that keynote now - people disconnect after a second

Only 3.4% of planners see no value in non-traditional venues, yet 21% use traditional venues exclusively. The top barriers are cost, infrastructure and logistics. Providers that find workarounds for those tap into the unmet demand.

Content, coffee break, more content: an agenda like that gives people no window to connect. Leave some slots empty on purpose, and give the attendees who would feel lost with a blank hour some guided white space.

Something I am observing at events. A speaker has 2 minutes to capture attention. If they fail, people will be on their phones instantly. A panel offers more moments to recapture attention. Even there, a boring question or speaker will shut down attention until the next question or speaker. This is why keynote slots are becoming increasingly harder to manage and consume. Different for deep dives and workshops where attention is opted in.

An attendee map and a booth floor plan serve different people. The floor plan is a sales tool for exhibitors. Give attendees a map built for wayfinding that shows where things are and what is going on.

Adding speakers is how many events try to grow, and that model does not scale. Attendee-driven sessions scale with the audience. Keep note-prone content such as keynotes and panels to 20% of the agenda and run roundtables for the rest.

High budget for an event is usually a great excuse to mask badly planned events. A lavish venue, superstar keynote, amazing food. Great. But it doesn’t help with boredom, inability to connect with attendees, pitches. The very reasons why events don’t land

It would be unfair not to say that the euphoria some event tech companies are feeling is just event planners not adopting AI yet. We will witness the real impact 24 months from now.

Panels are not dead. Above 10,000 attendees they drive more satisfaction than any other format. Under 5,000, roundtables win and panels come third. Match the format to the size of your event.

What your event is about matters for how you show up: - A tech event needs a top event stack. Especially AI chat bot - A media event needs exceptional on stage content - A food industry event needs excellent food - An event industry event needs to be perfectly planned

Good morning

When a company decides whether to send employees to an event, it weighs their time against the business it will get. Seeing the top companies in the industry exhibiting is the trait all successful events share. Show the exhibitor list and the attendee companies already signed up on the registration page early.