With more pressure than ever to prove the value of your event sponsorship, event marketers know that a strong return on your investment requires more than just showing up with a booth. The AI Summit stands as a premier gathering where industry leaders showcase innovations, forge meaningful connections, and position themselves at the forefront of technological transformation, but standing out in the Expo Hall demands strategic preparation and authentic engagement.

That's why we gathered invaluable insights from our seasoned sponsors at The AI Summit, who have mastered the art of turning event participation into tangible business results. Whether you're considering your first sponsorship or optimizing your existing approach, these expert tips will help you transform your event presence from a brand exposure opportunity into a powerful driver of qualified leads, strengthened thought leadership, and business growth.

1. Plan Strategically Before the Event

"You have to come up with a very clear plan. What do you want to achieve? Because it's only a two day event, you really need to understand what do you want to achieve, how do you want to achieve it and have a really clear game plan. If you don't, you might miss opportunities that present themselves here. So good advanced planning is must."

"Plan in advance! It's my best advice for anyone coming. It's a big event, so you want to make sure that your messaging is relevant and exact."

2. Leverage the Event App for Networking

"I think the key is in the detail and the preparation in particular. So in advance of the event, we were looking through the event app at who we were could potentially meet with. The app gives us a great opportunity to do that, being able to see the other delegates, arrange those meetings and also see availability in real time through the scheduling function. So I think that was a great feature to have that helped us really get maximum value out of the event."

"The advice I would give to newer sponsors and exhibitors is not to forget about the app and not to forget about all the networking opportunities, because that's been very valuable for us. We've come here and managed to find a lot of people and companies we are interested in talking to, and we managed to build meaningful connections with them during the event."

 

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3. Drive Impact with Outcome-Focused Messaging

"Show people the outcomes you're driving. Don't just focus on the technology, but show the kind of use cases, because that's what people find value in."

"My advice to someone looking to be an exhibitor would be to lead with your most interesting outcomes, the things that you're driving with your the technology, not necessarily things that you're building or selling. People are here to be inspired and if you put that forward, they'll engage with you."

4. Bring Sufficient Team Support

"In terms of advice for new exhibitors or sponsors, I would say make sure that there's more than just one of you, because the conversations are more frequent, more productive and more intense than we expected them to be, deeper than we expected them to be, and so it can be helpful to have multiple people on the stand to really take advantage of that."

5. Align Your Content with Industry Trends

"I would say really trying to align the content of your speaking opportunity with the latest themes and topics that are related to the AI industry. For instance, for us it was all around AI agents, something that we've had a number of conversations with customers at the booth around. And so that for us was key as well, really ensuring our messaging was aligned to the key topics and trends in the industry and of the event itself."

 

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6. Don't be Afraid to Start Small

"I think I would advise a new sponsor or exhibitor to try it out. I think even with a small booth it's worth it, and then you can walk around, get to know the people, find people with similar interests."

7. Showcase What Makes You Proud

"I think just have fun with it, come with the things that you're proud of, come with the things that you're going to enjoy, and come with the technical side as well. I think just having a really good range of things you're doing matters, and it doesn't always have to link to AI. AI is everywhere so you can really get away with just showing your latest and greatest at your company."

 

Want to put this into practice yourself? Download our brochure to find out more. 

 

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