This is the fair question hosting companies ask. 

Field marketing is an interesting entry on the budget sheets. Events serve as a great place to build relationships, earn trust, and reinforce brand awareness. However, simply purchasing a booth at an international WordCamp or sponsoring a major industry event or flagship conference can run over $100,000 when you include booth space and build, travel, staff, swag, and side events. 

Brand awareness is typically the first reason given for spending the money, but that does not satisfy the finance and leadership teams for long. The challenge is turning events into something measurable, repeatable, and defensible for the years to come. 

As the 2026 conference season approaches as seen in our 2026 event list, it’s time to focus on what drives success. From proven strategies to keep your booth buzzing, to keeping teams aligned and data sharp.

The event landscape for hosting companies. 

Investing in events is not the same across the board, so burning budget by treating all events the same is one of the quickest ways to waste precious marketing money.

Many festival-type events like CloudFest are effective, but having an expo booth is hardly worth it for hosts. The main issue is the attendees are not your direct customers. Hackathons, partnerships, and business development are where events like CloudFest excel for hosts. Deal discussions, new integrations, and relationship building. If your business development objective is to fill the pipeline at the enterprise or partner level, these events justify the investment.  

On the other hand, WordCamps and community events serve a very different purpose. These are not sales floors; they are trust-building environments. Your customers are there. Your future customers are there as well. There is community goodwill, and at these events, product education and customer retention are the real headlines. These events, when done right, strengthen loyalty, reduce churn, and create warm, inbound demand.  

Smaller, focused events like Domain Days or PressConf are another great place for deal discussions, new integrations, and partner relationships. These events are usually best suited for C-level executives and decision-makers.  These events have become key in networking as they are more personal and geared toward longer conversations.

Starting with a dedicated event landing page.

Before a single badge is scanned, your attendance at the event should already be generating a signal.

Build an event landing page that answers three questions. Who from your team will be attending? Why should someone meet with you? And how can they book a time to meet?

Include calendar links for your meetings, demos, and casual coffee chats. If you are offering discount at the event also include a coupon code you are using for the event. This does two important things: pre-orders can be made before the event even starts, and you get a clean attribution mechanism for post-event analysis.

Next, share that landing page information with your existing customers and affiliates in a newsletter with a simple message, “Meet us at the event.” Now the booth transforms from a cold traffic magnet into a meeting space, reframing the event’s purpose from lead gathering to customer engagement.

Designing the booth like a sales funnel. 

Most booths fail because they are built like billboards instead of funnels. 

A good booth has a flow. Something brings people in, something makes them stick longer to have a conversation, and something makes the next step obvious. 

One of the most effective ways to achieve this is through gamification, and the best booths feature games, simple challenges, and other interactive experiences that slow people down. This time can be used to qualify, educate, and connect. A booth that people enjoy is one that people remember, and memory is the foundation of brand ROI.  

The best flow starts with a greeter who asks them a few questions, then moves them to the activation point, where the gamification comes in, and each visitor is qualified to either play a game, have a deeper conversation, or live demo.  

Surveys that measure ROI

Surveys are often said not to work for lead collection. This is only true if you are asking the wrong questions.

One survey question can transform the worth of your data and is very simple: Are you a current customer?

This answer singlehandedly segments your event traffic into existing customers and net-new prospects. Plus, you get a metric that matters: customer engagement vs. acquisition. No guesswork.  Use this every year to show your Y-O-Y growth in a segmented customer base.  In the past, I have watched that number go up 30% in just one year.

Surveys can also be tied to a give-back. Examples are planting a tree through One Tree Planted for every survey completed; this creates goodwill, meets sustainability goals, and provides people a reason to fill it out beyond swag.

Don’t leave leads for the end of the event. The event is a time for engagement and to close deals.

Every time a new entry is made, it should automatically be recorded in a Google Sheet accessible to your team. Set a goal for the event. For instance, signing up for new agencies. Grade the sheet based on this criterion in real time.

When you notice agencies piling up, respond to these before you leave the event. You can always offer dinner, coffee, or a private demo. Also, make it a reactivation point at the booth by keeping some special swag (20 branded power banks) for the next day, and email those agencies in the morning and tell them to swing by to “recharge” and see a demo. This will create urgency for them to visit your booth and for you to keep the booth busy.

A busy booth is a sign of success.

Surveys in the AI age

The ongoing advancements in technology offer the opportunity to completely transform how surveys are conducted on the show floor.

Now consider the possibilities of an AI-backed chatbot. It could take on the likeness of a historical figure, an industry pioneer, or even a celebrity, enabling customers to engage verbally with the chatbot at your booth. Instead of filling out surveys on a tablet, attendees engage their chatbots, respond naturally, and finish surveys via speech.

To attendees, this will be an experience beyond simple data collection. Marketers will appreciate the excitement that attracts a crowd, stops passersby, and sets your booth apart from others.

The potential ROI is readily apparent: interactions last longer, completion rates increase, and the experience is social media worthy. It’s the kind of experience people will film and then share with their friends, bringing them back to engage with the bot. And to top it all off, the underlying mechanics you are used to remain untouched: responses are sent to your lead sheet, customer status is recorded, and segmentation is done automatically.

Surveys can be processed using this technique as a live attraction. It strengthens the innovation funnel, shifts the brand perception to progressive, and gives participants a reason to remember you long after the event.

As tools become more sophisticated, the novelty of experiences like this will become the standard. Companies that experiment early will collect better data and redefine engaging booths.

Worthy swag

Everyone expects to get a T-shirt, and that expectation is part of the problem. Shirts rarely fit everyone, sizing is always a gamble, and many end up folded into a suitcase only to be forgotten when the attendee gets home. They are expensive, bulky, and often deliver far less long-term brand exposure than marketers assume.

When it comes to merch that actually works, shirts are consistently outshone by beanies, hats, and socks. One-size-fits-all is not just convenient; it removes friction entirely. These items travel well, get worn more often, and show up in everyday life long after the event ends. 

Plastic disposable swag has been losing popularity for many years. Many attendees are not interested in trashing items that they will not use. Nonetheless, some giveaways are still sure to attract interest. Power banks are still among the best giveaways because they solve the problem of a dying phone battery. Even more importantly, charge them beforehand to keep attendees engaged at your booth, since they will most likely have to wait for their devices to charge. This gives your booth staff time to have discussions, show demos, and build connections.

Worthy swag is not about the quantity of items being given away, but rather the utility and appropriateness of the items. The best swag earns a long-term place in an attendee’s bag because it has immediate value and continues to promote your company long after the event ends.

Driving repeat traffic

The objective is not about getting people to your booth once; it is about getting them to come back.

Photo booths, live demos, and daily mini-activations give people a reason to come back. Each return visit deepens familiarity and increases the likelihood of conversion.

When they observe hustle, they assume it is valuable. Momentum breeds more momentum, and active booths create their own gravity.

Raffles serve multiple purposes, from generating excitement to collecting data to attracting people to your event. Along with effective attribution and following up, they positively impact event ROI, avoiding mere vanity metrics.

Consider running a raffle for a prize at the end of the show. Instead of numbered tickets or business cards, accept custom-branded entries you give out, and gamify by working them into a collection process. 

Side events, small venues, genuine interactions

Most of the return on investment from large events comes from small ‘side events’. As events grow, attendees deliberately seek smaller settings where they can have meaningful discussions free of excess noise, large crowds, or packed schedules. This has created quality-focused side events that prioritize interaction over volume.

There are two distinct, yet effective approaches. Targeted, smaller events, like exclusive dinners or VIP meetups, are great for close partners, agencies, and key prospects from whom you want to build trust, have technical deep dives, or strategic discussions that are far less likely to happen on a busy expo floor. At the other extreme, fully open side events are great for informal meetings and encourage community building and exploration. These can be low-effort, low-cost, and low-frills. An informal ‘let’s meet and talk about e-commerce at the coffee shop’ can be more valuable than a fancy networking party when your goal is to connect.

The key is being intentional. Keep the budget realistic, select venues that encourage conversation, and structure the event to facilitate dialogue rather than focus on theatricality. While the world becomes filled with larger and larger conferences, smaller side events often deliver the strongest return because they provide what people actually want: time, attention, and authentic human connection.

This is why we at webhosting.today do our Late Beers at CloudFest at a smaller hotel outside the park. While the main hotel bars are packed, and other parties are lined up five deep at the bar.  The leaders of the Hosting Industry enjoy great conversations over beers in a secret location.

Making events a source of repeatable ROI

Field marketing for hosting companies is not about chasing badge scans. It is about designing events as systems, with inputs, actions, and measurable outcomes.

When you consider segmentation, live lead handling, purposeful booth design, and pre-event marketing, ROI becomes a tangible concept. Something you can define, defend, refine, and improve year after year.

Events will always be about people first, but they can also be about performance.