Eric Karkovack (00:00)
Hi everyone and welcome to the WP Minute. I'm Eric Karkovack. Today's episode features a segment from Matt's conversation with LoopConf organizer Brian Richards. Brian stopped by to discuss the evolving economics of event sponsorship and why it led to restructuring LoopConf's funding model. Now you can catch the entire interview over on our WP Minute Plus channel. Visit the WPMinute.com for all the details.
Matt (00:26)
How are you reshaping I'll call it LoopConf US versus what you did in the UK, with all things considered that we just talked about with sponsorships, with you having to restructure because you did lose that sponsorship? How are you rethinking it? I know it's a call to action. It's two it's two ninety nine for early bird or two forty nine for early bird right now, and then three forty nine if you miss the early bird timeline and you have to go and purchase full price, which is still super affordable.
in terms of
Brian Richards (00:54)
Thank you.
Matt (00:55)
of events. what are you doing to reshape the event? learning what you learned from the from the UK and now with this monkey wrench thrown into things here having to to to pivot.
Brian Richards (01:06)
Yeah, so thanks for the question. As I said in my earlier pitch, I want to have like a fanatically obsessed attendee experience here. And so I am inviting all of the prospective attendees to buy their tickets way earlier than they would ever reasonably buy them, 10 months in advance for people who are getting in right now. And that is to provide that advanced working capital to signal, like, okay.
Enough people want this, I don't have to start having sponsor conversations. The the way that this shift forced it forced my hand gave me the timeline that I've always wanted. Like I've I have long wanted to attempt an attendee funded, attendee-focused experience. But historically it doesn't make any sense because the sponsor conversations have to happen before or by November. That's when they've set their budget for the next year. Anything
much earlier than that, like sorry, we're we're too focused on the final quarter of the year. Come talk to me later. And anything much later than November is now too late. They've already figured out where their spend is going. So you've got like this sweet window, just like the first couple of weeks of November, before Thanksgiving here in the US, after Halloween here in the US, where it's like, okay, we're ready to talk about next year. we're interested in talking to you. What what is the deal? And so I now have eight weeks before that to see are there enough attendees who want this thing.
Buy your ticket now, tell me that you want this. And enough people do. I don't have to have those conversations in November, and I don't have to invite sponsors to provide funding for the event. There is just enough margin in the ticket price alone to cover the outlay of running the event without sponsors. And that's exactly what I'm going for. I have always been attendee-minded in the way I approach events, and so I frequently am working to curate an entire schedule.
that is playing off of itself to give you the most interesting opportunity for the people who do want to sit in sessions and learn from these experts and be excited about who's on stage and what they're talking about. But I also relish the hallway track and all of the conversations that can only happen when you have the right group of people together. They don't happen online. They don't happen in larger forums. And so I have intentionally
aimed for a smaller audience at loopconf. so target is a hundred people, up to two hundred is where I want to draw the line. The venue could s hold up to close to three hundred, but I think once we pass two hundred, the the vibe that I'm going for gets lost. And then smaller than a hundred, it feels a little too small perceptually. It's still great.
And so I think the real sweet spot is right as you start to get to a hundred and fifty attendees. Because the group is small enough that you don't have too many different groups and too many different kinds of conversations happening that you can't be aware of and catch up on all of them as you're talking to people. And once you pass 300, like w none of us can ever know all of the different kinds of things that are happening at WordCamp US or WordCamp Europe or WordCamp Asia, 'cause there's just too many people, too many conversations, too many floating attentions. So
I'm
Aiming for something that's small on purpose. And in addition to curating what I think are going to be truly outstanding talks from some truly impressive people, I have also made personal invitations to equally impressive people to just be present at the event so that we can have incredible conversations. And and that's most of the pitch is is that you are going to have some transformative conversations. the
thing that I realized earlier this week as I was trying to condense this into a smaller package to express quickly and succinctly is that the the conversations that happen at LoopConfs and the talks that you can learn from are all designed to expand your capability and perhaps even help you I don't want to say like 10x your skill set because that's such a dumb
Matt (04:58)
Go with it, Brian. Feed into the marketing machine.
Brian Richards (04:56)
unrealistic thing. But like you will be more capable because you are here having
these conversations. Not just with like how you use WordPress, but also how you operate more broadly. I have always been friendly to inviting perspectives from outside of our WordPress community because we don't exist in a vacuum. The websites that we're building exist in a sea of websites. The clients that we're helping
Could go anywhere to get their problem solved. They didn't, usually, they're not coming to us because they want WordPress for the fact that it's WordPress. They come to us because they want their problems solved. So, how can we get better at solving those problems more thoroughly? Those are the conversations I'm interested in having. And we happen to be constantly, but also very precisely right now in an
Uncertain state with an uncertain future. You mentioned like where's the industry going courtesy of AI? That's playing out in every industry. But also, like, where is WordPress as a project going? Where's the WordPress community going? Are they leaving? Are they doing other things? Or what? I, like you, happen to think we will continue to have a a thriving WordPress community of the people who are out there
Doing business. Thriving might even be a bit strong. There will continue to be people who do incredible things with WordPress, potentially forever, and can do so profitably for a very long time. So WordPress won't be gone or even close to being gone in ten months. I prefer to in all of the things I build, not to look at the bleeding edge, but like the trusted solution. Like, like what was great two years ago? Is that what people are still doing now? Awesome.
Then it will still be good two years from now. But also, where are we heading? What is the trajectory? What do we need to like what needs to enter our awareness now? And so those are the conversations that I invite and encourage and I think are the most valuable. It's not just we're only ever going to use WordPress and nothing else. It's we use WordPress and also we use this thing and also we use this thing. Or we take WordPress and we put it here.
Hi everyone and welcome to the WP Minute. I'm Eric Karkovack. Today's episode features a segment from Matt's conversation with LoopConf organizer Brian Richards. Brian stopped by to discuss the evolving economics of event sponsorship and why it led to restructuring LoopConf's funding model. Now you can catch the entire interview over on our WP Minute Plus channel. Visit the WPMinute.com for all the details.
Matt (00:26)
How are you reshaping I'll call it LoopConf US versus what you did in the UK, with all things considered that we just talked about with sponsorships, with you having to restructure because you did lose that sponsorship? How are you rethinking it? I know it's a call to action. It's two it's two ninety nine for early bird or two forty nine for early bird right now, and then three forty nine if you miss the early bird timeline and you have to go and purchase full price, which is still super affordable.
in terms of
Brian Richards (00:54)
Thank you.
Matt (00:55)
of events. what are you doing to reshape the event? learning what you learned from the from the UK and now with this monkey wrench thrown into things here having to to to pivot.
Brian Richards (01:06)
Yeah, so thanks for the question. As I said in my earlier pitch, I want to have like a fanatically obsessed attendee experience here. And so I am inviting all of the prospective attendees to buy their tickets way earlier than they would ever reasonably buy them, 10 months in advance for people who are getting in right now. And that is to provide that advanced working capital to signal, like, okay.
Enough people want this, I don't have to start having sponsor conversations. The the way that this shift forced it forced my hand gave me the timeline that I've always wanted. Like I've I have long wanted to attempt an attendee funded, attendee-focused experience. But historically it doesn't make any sense because the sponsor conversations have to happen before or by November. That's when they've set their budget for the next year. Anything
much earlier than that, like sorry, we're we're too focused on the final quarter of the year. Come talk to me later. And anything much later than November is now too late. They've already figured out where their spend is going. So you've got like this sweet window, just like the first couple of weeks of November, before Thanksgiving here in the US, after Halloween here in the US, where it's like, okay, we're ready to talk about next year. we're interested in talking to you. What what is the deal? And so I now have eight weeks before that to see are there enough attendees who want this thing.
Buy your ticket now, tell me that you want this. And enough people do. I don't have to have those conversations in November, and I don't have to invite sponsors to provide funding for the event. There is just enough margin in the ticket price alone to cover the outlay of running the event without sponsors. And that's exactly what I'm going for. I have always been attendee-minded in the way I approach events, and so I frequently am working to curate an entire schedule.
that is playing off of itself to give you the most interesting opportunity for the people who do want to sit in sessions and learn from these experts and be excited about who's on stage and what they're talking about. But I also relish the hallway track and all of the conversations that can only happen when you have the right group of people together. They don't happen online. They don't happen in larger forums. And so I have intentionally
aimed for a smaller audience at loopconf. so target is a hundred people, up to two hundred is where I want to draw the line. The venue could s hold up to close to three hundred, but I think once we pass two hundred, the the vibe that I'm going for gets lost. And then smaller than a hundred, it feels a little too small perceptually. It's still great.
And so I think the real sweet spot is right as you start to get to a hundred and fifty attendees. Because the group is small enough that you don't have too many different groups and too many different kinds of conversations happening that you can't be aware of and catch up on all of them as you're talking to people. And once you pass 300, like w none of us can ever know all of the different kinds of things that are happening at WordCamp US or WordCamp Europe or WordCamp Asia, 'cause there's just too many people, too many conversations, too many floating attentions. So
I'm
Aiming for something that's small on purpose. And in addition to curating what I think are going to be truly outstanding talks from some truly impressive people, I have also made personal invitations to equally impressive people to just be present at the event so that we can have incredible conversations. And and that's most of the pitch is is that you are going to have some transformative conversations. the
thing that I realized earlier this week as I was trying to condense this into a smaller package to express quickly and succinctly is that the the conversations that happen at LoopConfs and the talks that you can learn from are all designed to expand your capability and perhaps even help you I don't want to say like 10x your skill set because that's such a dumb
Matt (04:58)
Go with it, Brian. Feed into the marketing machine.
Brian Richards (04:56)
unrealistic thing. But like you will be more capable because you are here having
these conversations. Not just with like how you use WordPress, but also how you operate more broadly. I have always been friendly to inviting perspectives from outside of our WordPress community because we don't exist in a vacuum. The websites that we're building exist in a sea of websites. The clients that we're helping
Could go anywhere to get their problem solved. They didn't, usually, they're not coming to us because they want WordPress for the fact that it's WordPress. They come to us because they want their problems solved. So, how can we get better at solving those problems more thoroughly? Those are the conversations I'm interested in having. And we happen to be constantly, but also very precisely right now in an
Uncertain state with an uncertain future. You mentioned like where's the industry going courtesy of AI? That's playing out in every industry. But also, like, where is WordPress as a project going? Where's the WordPress community going? Are they leaving? Are they doing other things? Or what? I, like you, happen to think we will continue to have a a thriving WordPress community of the people who are out there
Doing business. Thriving might even be a bit strong. There will continue to be people who do incredible things with WordPress, potentially forever, and can do so profitably for a very long time. So WordPress won't be gone or even close to being gone in ten months. I prefer to in all of the things I build, not to look at the bleeding edge, but like the trusted solution. Like, like what was great two years ago? Is that what people are still doing now? Awesome.
Then it will still be good two years from now. But also, where are we heading? What is the trajectory? What do we need to like what needs to enter our awareness now? And so those are the conversations that I invite and encourage and I think are the most valuable. It's not just we're only ever going to use WordPress and nothing else. It's we use WordPress and also we use this thing and also we use this thing. Or we take WordPress and we put it here.
