When I joined RapDev, we were already showing up to industry events, staffing booths, representing the brand, and having real conversations with customers and prospects. The foundation was there. Since then, we’ve turned that presence into a repeatable program that drives pipeline, scales faster than our team, and keeps getting better with every event.
Starting With What We Had
As a technology partner, in-person events have always been a core part of how we go to market. We're in the room at the conferences where our customers and prospects already are. That gives us something valuable: a captive audience of people who already care about the space we work in.
In FY23, we attended 3 events and walked away with around 500 leads. We had a booth, we had a team, and we had good conversations. It worked. But we knew there was more we could do with the opportunity.
Growing the Footprint
The shift happened gradually. We started investing more in our booth presence, bigger setups, better materials, and more intentional staffing. Happy hours went from informal to actual hosted experiences with real headcounts and follow-up plans.
The biggest change was putting systems in place that scale, so our event footprint could grow faster than our team. A few of the things we built:
- A framework for choosing events. We score each event on audience fit, expected pipeline, and cost per lead before committing, so budget goes to the shows that actually move the business.
- A repeatable booth playbook. Standard booth kits, materials, and staffing plans mean we aren’t reinventing the setup for every show.
- Pre-event outreach. Templated outreach and meeting booking so we arrive with conversations already on the calendar.
- Hosted happy hours. These went from informal meetups to planned experiences with real headcounts and follow-up plans.
- Fast, structured follow-up. Leads routed into HubSpot within X days, with follow-up sequences by persona, so no conversation goes cold.
By FY24, we had grown to 14 events and 3,000 leads, a 6x increase in lead volume in a single year. That kind of jump doesn't happen by accident. It happens because each of those systems let us do more without starting from scratch every time.
At the same time, we built out something we didn't have before: a real webinar program. In-person events are great for building relationships, but webinars let us reach people who aren't at the conferences, create content that lives beyond a single day on a show floor, and go deeper on topics that a booth conversation can't cover. We went from 8 combined events and webinars in 2023 to 29 in 2024, a 260% increase.
What We Learned Along the Way
A few things that made the biggest difference:
Presence isn't the same as impact. Just being at an event isn't enough. We got a lot more out of every event once we started being intentional about our goals going in, who we wanted to meet, what we wanted people to walk away knowing about RapDev, and how we'd follow up afterward.
The happy hour matters as much as the booth. Some of our best conversations happen away from the show floor. At DASH 2026, our happy hour drew 519 attendees. It also gives us room to create a fun experience that’s entirely our own, instead of competing for attention on a crowded expo floor. That lower-pressure setting changes the quality of the relationships we build.
Events should shape the webinar calendar. The questions we hear at the booth tell us what our audience wants to learn about. We now pick webinar topics based on those conversations, [for example, X topic after DASH], so webinars pick up where the event conversation left off. Treating events and webinars as one program, not two separate efforts, made both of them better.
Follow-up is part of the event. The event doesn't end when the booth breaks down. How you follow up, how quickly, how personally, and how relevantly determines whether the investment actually pays off.
Where We Are Now
This past year, we ran 22 events and 22 webinars, generating 7,500 leads, up 44% year over year. Our biggest event, DASH 2026, alone generated 1,700+ leads. The team that pulls all of this off has grown too, which makes it possible to do more without the quality slipping.
The number I think about most isn't total headcount; it's the momentum behind the numbers. Events aren't just a brand play for us; they're a meaningful part of how we drive the business.
What's Next
We're still iterating. Every event teaches us something, and every webinar gives us data on what our audience actually wants to learn about. But the foundation is solid, and the momentum is real.
If you're building an events program at a company like ours, our advice: don't wait until you have a big budget to be intentional. Start with the events you're already attending, make them count, and build from there. Three events can become fourteen. Fourteen can become the kind of program you're genuinely proud of. Want to connect at an upcoming event? Check out our events and webinars page.
