Attend any trade show, and you’ll come home with hundreds of business cards. And if you’re like me, you’ll eventually lose them.

We’d like to think that wireless technology, Microsoft Outlook, and the Internet are making much of the old-school paper pushing obsolete. Yet when we meet a new business acquaintance, the first thing we do is exchange business cards.

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Once you use one, you’ll wonder how you lived this long without it! They’re running a special on refurbished units this month, so why wait? Get one now!!

Have you attended a show this year? I’ve attended the Consumer Electronics Show (CES), Search Engine Strategies, and ad:Tech this year. (I was too busy to attend SMX, but maybe next year)

Next month, I hope to make it out to Chicago for the Internet Retailers Conference & Exhibition conference (IRCE). And in the fall, I’m heading out to Vegas for Blog World Expo.

These are all great shows - I learn a lot from the sessions, network with some GREAT people, and meet vendors and exhibitors that can help me take my businesses to the next level. And let’s not forget the crazy parties, great locations (I’ll never get tired of Vegas!), and eye candy galore!

The problem? MONEY! There’s the cost of the shows themselves, but there’s also the cost to get there, your hotel accomodations, meals, etc. But don’t let that stop you from attending! There are ways to attend these shows on a budget, and get the most bang for your buck!

Getting There

Airfare is getting more and more expensive, thanks to the ever-rising fuel costs. Here are two ways to fly for free (or close to it).

1) Sign up for a Southwest Airlines credit card. They’re currently doing a promo where you get a free roundtrip airline ticket after your first use! Only catch? You have to pay a $59 annual fee. Big deal - Where else can you fly roundtrip for $59?!

2) Sign up for the American Express Business Gold Card, as I’ve mentioned in previous posts. This requires a bit more work, as you need to charge at least $1000 on the card before you get the full 25K Membership Rewards points, but on the flip side, it doesn’t cost you ANYTHING for the first year!

Accomodations

Hotels aren’t cheap.. Attend a conference in NYC, and you’ll spend between $300-400 a night! 4-day conference, and you’re on the hook for $1200+. Because of this, I use my Starwood Preferred Guest® Credit Card from American Express. This card ROCKS!

Here’s how it works - You sign up for the card, and they’ll give you 10,000 Starpoints after your first purchase. That’s enough for up to 3 free nights at a Cat 1 or Cat 2 hotel! (In addition, they waive the $45 annual fee for the first year) Then you’ll earn 1 point for every $1 spent. They’ve also got bonus points awarded to you when you reach certain spending thresholds.

Here’s why I like it. If I spent $25K on a regular frequent-flyer credit card, I get enough miles for a free airline ticket. Approximate value - $300-$400. If I spend $25K on the Starwood, I get at least 25K Starpoints (more if I qualify for any bonus promos they’re running). 25K Starpoints = 7 nights at a hotel! 7 nights at a Starwood property would cost you more than $1400!

What’s also nice is that after you acquire 30K points, you get upgraded to Gold Preferred. All of a sudden, you’re getting free upgrades to MUCH nicer rooms, complementary wine, chocolates and candies, extra late checkout, and a bunch of other perks!

Meals

I rarely pay for anything when I’m at a conference. Lunch is usually provided, and an affiliate manager or other big-wig will usually pick up the tab for dinner.

Admission

So all you’re left with now is the cost of attending the show. There are usually discounts for early registration, group affiliations, etc. Some bloggers contests even give away free passes that were given to them in order to drum up attention to the event!

Another angle to consider - Are you with the press? CES considered bloggers part of the press (though after the stunt Gizmodo pulled this year, who knows where bloggers stand in their eyes), and many people scored press passes! Qualifications for press credentials vary from show to show, but if you’ve got a legitimate reason to request access, you may just luck out.

Good luck, and I hope this helps!

Unfortunately, I had to come home yesterday night, so I won’t be attending the rest of SES NY. Why, you might ask?

I’M GETTING MARRIED! Tomorrow! In Vegas! Yikes!?

I’ve been with my fiancee for a LOOOOOONG time, so I figured it was time to make it official. Or as my buddy said, “So I guess you don’t like sex, eh?”

I’ll be back Sunday, with lots of pics! Later!

Day 2 started off with the opening keynote by Nick Carr. As keynotes go, it wasn’t too bad.. I’m looking forward to reading “The Big Switch” in it’s entirety.

The Expo Hall opened up at 10am, and it was absolute chaos. I’m not sure why they waited until Day 2 to open up the hall, but I had lots of down time yesterday when I could have been walking the hall. Just like with AdTech NY last fall, they had to split up the exhibitors over 3 floors. Again, I don’t understand why these conference organizers don’t find a bigger venue to hold it in. It’s a mess trying to get around. Thankfully, later in the day there were less people wandering the Expo Hall, and it was a bit more managable.

(I found it odd that GetUpdated was one of the key sponsors of the show, yet their booth was tucked away far in a corner on the highest floor.. Maybe it’s just me)

Converting Visitors Into Buyers was my first session of the day. I was eager to attend this one, because the session notes said, “The latter part of the session takes volunteers from the audience and examines their websites live to provide general feedback about changing them to improve visitor conversion.” Unfortunately, the 4 speakers used up all of the time in the session, and this part never happened. Still, it was a very informative session, and I’ll surely use some of that newfound knowledge to further optimize my ecommerce site in the future.

Another Networking Lunch, and this time the food was a bit different. I opted for something “safe” (or so I thought), and took the smoked turkey. Little did I know that it would be in a pita with tofu on top. To snack on, organic vegetable chips. WTF?! Again, made a few good contacts, and came up with some new ideas to implement out of some conversations at the table.

After lunch was another Orion Panel, on Universal Search. I spent too much time wandering around the Expo Hall, and showed up about 20 minutes late. There were people sitting on the floor, it was that packed. It sounded like a good session, but I wasn’t going to stand for an hour or more, so I left and caught up on some e-mail instead.

3:15pm brought about the sponsored sessions. I was really conflicted here, as I wanted to go to the Hitwise session, but also wanted to go to the Microsoft session on Live Search. I ultimately made the wrong decision, and went to the Live Search session. My ecommerce site used to have page 1 listings on MSN for many of our major keywords. But when Live went live in October 2007, our rankings disappeared overnight! I asked one of the panelists (a Microsoft employee) about this, and she indicated that it would be addressed during the session. Instead, the session focused 90% of it’s attention on adCenter. The Live Search speaker had only been with MS for 1 MONTH, and couldn’t really answer any questions on Live. Her answer was to talk to the people in the booth (who weren’t much help either). I was pissed. And to add insult to injury, people that went to the Google session got free t-shirts!

Last up for the day was Landing Page Testing & Tuning, presented by Tim Ash. A great session, though it almost felt like a big infomercial for his company’s services.. I would have liked to walk out with some definitive suggestions, but instead it was more of an overview to make you look at your site and landing pages in a different light. I’m going to have to pick up his book, as I’m sure that will go further in depth.

Unlike all the live blogger geeks out there (and there were a lot!), I decided to focus on the workshops at hand, and worry about posting later. I watched countless people miss the entire session, as they fought to get connected to the flakey wifi network.. Such is life.

I was very interested in attending the Organic Listings Forum, so I made a point to get up early and catch the train into the city. Unfortunately, this “open forum” was VERY basic in nature, and the questions being asked by the audience weren’t thought-provoking in the least. I had high hopes for this session, as I’m a big fan of Jill Whalen, but she didn’t actually speak all that much. I left this session disappointed, and wished that I had gone to the “Redefining the Customer” session instead.

Next up was Analytics: Data Into Action. I picked this session because none of the rest appealed to me. I’m actually glad that I decided to attend. Matthew Bailey was a fantastic speaker, who interjected some fun into his presentation, while still getting his point across. The main theme of the session was to use segmentation when analyzing your visitor data. All-in-all, not a bad workshop..

Then it was lunchtime, and SES had a “Networking Lunch” planned for us. I actually made a few good contacts here, and the food wasn’t bad either. They needed to turn down the A/C, but other than that, no complaints.

2:00pm brought the next set of workshops, and I opted for the Web Analytics: Measuring Success session. Again, I wasn’t wowed by the other options, so that’s how I ended up here. Avinash Kaushik from Google was first up, and he really showed off the power of Google Analytics. He also stressed the need for multi-variable testing, which is made easy using Google’s Website Optimizer. A great speaker, and I’m going to be following him closely from now on.. The rest of the speakers weren’t bad either, touching on many of the same points..

Up next was the Orion Panel - Getting Vertical Search Right. An interesting panel, but not really relevant to my personal needs. I stuck around for almost an hour, before ducking out. I had intended to stay for the SEMPO mixer (never one to turn down an open bar!), but I was wiped out and just wanted to check into my hotel room and get some rest.

As I mentioned previously, I’m a HUGE fan of the American Express Starwood Rewards Card. Not wanting to drop $300+ for a hotel in the city, I logged into my SPG account and looked to see if there were any Starwood Hotels in the area. Low and behold, the Sheraton New York was only 1 block from the Hilton (and was actually a recommended hotel in the SES NY literature!). I booked a room for 12,000 points. For most rewards cards, that would equal $120. You can’t even stay in a hostel for $120 in NYC! The room was great, and as an added bonus, the SPG manager left me a complimentary bottle of wine, and a box of candies. Sweet!

Till tomorrow..

I finally got a free moment to jump on the computer, so I figured I’d throw up a quick post! Of course, a quick scan of Google Blog Search showed me that every other blogger in the universe has already written about ASW.. That’s what I get for spending 12 hours at the craps table! But I walked away up almost $22K, so I’m not complaining!

The parties are RIDICULOUS! And the conference itself isn’t so bad either.. It’s pretty cool meeting people like Zac Johnson, John Chow, and others in person, after reading their blogs forever. Lastly, a huge shout-out to Shawn and Misty for putting together such a great event! Can’t wait for Affiliate Summit East in Boston this summer..

I’m off to dinner at Nine @ The Palms.. Till tomorrow!