SaaStr Insider Webinar: SaaStr Europa is coming in June!

Webinars coming to you live on Thursdays. Welcome back. If you've never been to one of these or tuned in, we like to share some of the latest and greatest insider information for our partners and sponsors about our various, you know, initiatives and events and media and all things SaaStr. So we're going to be your host for today. We just did a pretty good SaaStr Miami event just before we dive into Europe. But any quick thoughts on that, Waylon?

Yeah, it was awesome. I know it was something that was kind of, you know, wasn't planned for long, but it came together really quickly and the level of attendees was fantastic. So many founders, C-level execs, you know, great DJ, a few amazing sessions. Jason had some great sessions. CEO from Vimeo, that was a great session. So I thought overall it was really good. A lot of connections were definitely made. Would definitely be fun to be back next year.

Yeah. No, lots of, lots of really fun times. That was kind of like our first, I don't know, either official or unofficial meetup of the year outside of our much, much larger events, which we wanted to dive into a little bit today. So let me share my screen here. So yeah, as many of you will know, we do, we did 3 major events last year. We're doing 2 major events this year, probably go back to 3 next year. But yeah, the first one upcoming is our SaaStr Europe event. So this exciting times because it's the 5th SaaStr Europa. You know, we did 2 of these in Paris, 1 in Barcelona, and now this is the 2nd time in London, therefore making it the 5th SaaStr Europa. So yeah, we're back in London this year. We had a really good windfall of attendees and delegates last year from moving to London. So yeah, we'll be back in London this year as well. Exciting times. So we wanted to just do like a quick update and then we will go into the practice and kind of walk through, walk folks through kind of what's left to sponsor still, maybe what's a little bit more turnkey, just given the timeline to SaaStr Europa, and share some of like, you know, the, the numbers kind of going into the ramp up here for SaaStr Europa. So, yeah, SaaStr Europa is like kind of the only biggest and best community event in all of Europe, right? It is something where, you know, we're vendor, we're vendor agnostic and neutral. It's all about bringing the community together. There's a lot of networking that happens at SaaStr Europa, maybe even London more so than the SaaStr annual event. And, and, and really a key differentiator I always remind folks of for SaaStr Europa is in the content, which I'll scroll down to here and then I'll kind of come back. So in the content and speakers, you'll notice these are a lot of like really big international and, and, and a lot of these speakers are coming from the States to go to London to speak at this event. So, you know, that is a big differentiator from us maybe versus other events in Europe that are more Europe heavy. We do have, you know, Europe-focused founders and speakers who are doing more of the workshop styles, but really core differentiator here that we have a lot of folks that are coming in from, from, from throughout the world internationally, but mainly from the States as well to come do SaaStr Europa. So super exciting times. This is not even the full lineup. I know we just confirmed a bunch more speakers that we're going to get up on the website. But yeah, that's, that's kind of a big differentiator there is kind of the content. Waylon, I know you've been to the annual event. This will be your first Europa. Kind of in your mind, like, how do you think about maybe some of the differentiators on the Europe event versus the annual event? Yeah.

So, and I've, despite not having been to Europa, I've obviously talked to SaaS employees, but also talked to a lot of companies that have been at both. And I think one of the things that I consistently hear is about the intimacy of the Europa event. So obviously Saastr Annual is huge, it's a large campus, uh, it's a little tighter. Like everything in Europe, space is at a premium, and that kind of forces a lot of interaction, and you're seeing the same people, you know, multiple times, which just leads to developing, you know, a lot more maybe long-term relationships. At the end of the day, it's not about how many people you meet, it's about how many people you build a relationship with that you actually you know, connect with again in the future. And from what I've heard from a lot of people, they felt that at Europa that really stood out in terms of the quality of the connections that they were making. And then the other thing is just the true international nature of the event as well. Like you said, there's a large contingent from North America, but of course the UK, mainland Europe, Middle East, Asia. So really a truly international event.

Yep. Yeah, yeah, it's exciting times. I think, you know, this This last year we had, you know, I think just, just at 3,000. I think we'll be, you know, closer to the 3,500 range for this year in terms of final attendance. It is 2 days, right? So a lot of folks kind of come both days because of how we engineer it. I know we have a lot of sessions this year for AI on day 1 and a lot of heavy hitters doing workshops on day 2 to do deep dives. So that'll be really exciting as, again, that's kind of a differentiator on just the overall kind of audience and play and how we think about its position in Europe. Yeah, we do have a lot of, you know, just kind of core disaster. We do have a lot of investors in attendance, founders, revenue leaders, etc. I think the other big thing to note is, you know, everything is geared towards scaling AI, networking, revenue, right? These are all very tactical things that you'll be able to learn and walk away with by attending the— and then also partnering at the SASter Europa event. It's really convenient in its location in London. You know, it's indoor-outdoor. So we bring a little bit of our festival style that we have engineered in the States for the annual event over to the Europa event as well, which I think is kind of fun to the core audience. So just to get into it a bit more and share a bit more details here. So we went over it at a glance. Just a little bit on our audience here as well. I know this is something that folks ask to see quite frequently, especially when they're considering, you know, becoming more of a formal partner with Saastr at the London event. You know, this is very much in line with our core demographics of being CEO and founder heavy. But you can see here as well, specifically for Europe, we have a high audience profile of, you know, sales, marketing, and investors as well, as well as, you know, different kind of company stages. So a lot of folks coming now as teams as well, which is something that's not maybe seen in the data here. But a lot of folks, you know, now bringing their decision makers with them to try and maximize their presence at the event. And so, yeah, I think SaaS as a whole is kind of unique in the sense that if you do decide to partner, it is something where, you know, we, we encourage executives to be present for your presence, right? This is something where, Really, if you do it as a team, it does pay off a bit better, not only from a sponsorship perspective, but also a team building perspective to have that face time with your leadership team and kind of, you know, really road test and pen test what's out there in the market. Waylon, anything to add here on the Europa audience specifically?

Yeah, one thing that I'll kind of double down on is that executive team and bringing your executive team out. You know, if you look at it, almost half of the audience is going to be C-level executives. If you add like VPs into the mix, you're well over 50%.

Right.

Getting deals done now is harder than it's ever been, at least in a very long time. And executive sponsorship and connecting your executives with the executives at the companies that you're selling into or buying from is just more important than ever. And SaaStr is a place where you can absolutely do that. You know, Goddard from G2 is a great example, you know, doing booth duty, meeting tons of his customers on site. I think that the quickest way to accelerate deals now is to be directly connected with the executives with signing authority. And we're seeing huge increase in like CFOs, which we've had a big push on. Candidly, we're trying to get those personas out. So if you've got execs that can come, absolutely, it'll be worthwhile. You'll be able to meet execs at companies you either want to sell to or want to buy from.

Yep. No, absolutely. I think that's a good call out there as well. And yeah, and I think especially too, one thing that's always surprising is, and one thing we'll add to this as we get closer here to Europe is seeing the breakdown of countries that come to our Europe event specifically. You know, obviously the annual event is a big international delegation, but most folks are from North America, right? I think that's kind of natural with it being in the Bay Area. I think for London, it sometimes trips people up for our Europe event that like actually the third most popular like country of delegates is still North America and the United States. Like, I'm always like telling— I'm like, it's usually the host country, which in this case, you know, is, is the UK. And then I think second right now is like Paris or something. And then like third is the US. So it's not that you're also only going to get folks that, you know, are coming from the UK or the EU. I still count those as one, but I know they're separate. So you're not the UK or the EU. They are very heavy in the audience, but they're, you know, third is North America and that, you know, it's US, Canada. It's still strong. And you've gotta keep in mind, you know, because of the community SaaStr has, a lot of these folks have, you know, London or UK offices or EU offices that they're gonna go and visit while they're doing, you know, a SaaStr event as well. You'd be surprised how many folks I get in my inbox where I like, you know, they've historically come to annual, but this year they're going to Europe because they need to go visit the team out there or they've expanded out there. So yeah, that's one thing to bear in mind too. I know it's not necessarily again in the data here, but in our tea leaves, right? It is a very international audience, which is great, right? If you sell across to both EU, UK, and the, you know, North America, there is a big North America presence even at the London event. So do bear that in mind, right? It's not just strictly Europe only. So I think that's something that always surprises people too when they're like, I couldn't like, oh, I met some people from the States. I'm like, Yeah, a lot of them come to this. Like, they go to both. Like, we, we do have a fair amount of people who go to like all SaaS, or I know people who went to all three last year. Um, yeah, we have people who literally go to all of our events. Um, and yeah, we have a lot of people who go to both. Yeah, there is a strong, uh, North American presence there that I just wanted to call out because it's not just all Europe.

Yeah, and I'll say something just to that point that's really important is, you know, I talk to founders and go-to-market teams basically all day. That's, that's kind of what the, what the role is here. And it almost doesn't matter where you're from, your VCs want you to be growing in the United States, right? Whether you're from India or you're from Paris, wherever it is, there's this belief that you really need to crack the US market. And so it's a really great opportunity, you know, if you're a European-based company or a company based in the Middle East, whatever it is, to be able to meet and make contacts in the US that will be valuable as part of that journey.

Yep, absolutely. 100%. And then just to get into it, so we'll kind of go through what's left because not all of this is still, I know, available just given the timelines we have to event. So we do still have a few gold. So this one I like, it's very turnkey. We actually refresh the designs a bit for '24 to be a bit more streamlined. But this is a good example of how we do our gold booths. Super turnkey. You know, you just design the back wall. You can just throw your logo on the front-facing counter here. You know, this is really a great entry-level option if you have 2 or 3 people who wanna staff the booth, right? That's kind of the max you can fit there, but also still have room for conversations. Extremely turnkey, right? Like plenty of time to do a gold still. These are in, and the, the whole expo, I should say, is engineered to be in extremely high traffic areas. There is no bad booths across SaaStr events. So no matter what you do, you are getting constant foot traffic, which is also a big difference, right? It's not just during happy hours. It's not just in the early mornings. It is literally, sometimes folks tell us it's too much traffic, but I think that's a good problem to have, right? To try and maximize how many people you meet. But yeah, Gold Booth is kind of our entry level here. It's the most turnkey thing you could probably still do for Europa, right, Waylon?

Yeah, absolutely. I think like just in general, like our booths are all pretty turnkey. It's basically submit some graphics and show up, which everybody loves, especially at startups where maybe you're a bit understaffed.

Sure.

So I think people love that, especially like it's just we've sold booths with 6 weeks out to annual and teams are able to come and execute, which they don't think they're gonna be able to, but we're able to help people make it happen.

Yeah, and that's a great call out too, right? We had folks buying up until like the last week of May for Europa last year and it's the same timeframe, it's the first week of June. So it is really something that can come together quite quickly, right? If you've got this, if you've got a few people on staff who can attend, Again, even better if you have an executive— sorry about my hiccups— even better if you have an executive, but really turnkey to do and, you know, have a presence there at Europa for 2 days. And again, it's 2 days versus, you know, the annual is 3+ days. So a little bit of an easier time commitment as well. So the Super Gold is still turnkey to Waylon's point. It's a bigger back wall. It has space for an activation, which you don't— you do or do not have to do, right? So that is one where you can make it more turnkey by, by going for the bigger booth. And it does have a speaking session. So I think there's maybe one or two of these left, just given, um, the timelines for speaking. But Waylon, I know you talked to so many folks who value the speaking. What do they value the most out of it?

So I think for a lot of people, like, getting on stage at SaaStr is just like a career landmark moment. But the thing—

it's a career bucket list moment, right? Like, you want to— you're trying to get it on the bingo card.

Exactly. And but the other things are, one, if you do a great session, you're going to drive a lot of additional booth traffic.

100%.

You see pretty consistently on the day that you have a speaking session, you're gonna see a significant bump in traffic. So I think that's a big part of it. And the other thing is, you know, not everybody's solutions are entirely differentiated, or at least they're not perceived as being differentiated in the market. And one of the few ways to differentiate right now really is thought leadership. You know, if you've got 3 or 4, you know, AI type companies in your space, for example, that are all kind of doing similar things, being the one on stage that's talking, that's demonstrating that thought leadership is the best way to sort of separate yourselves from the herd. So I think it's also just a big branding play to be, to have that speaking session as well. It also gets collateralized, right? So full production value speaking sessions, you get write-ups, you know, promoted through SaaS channels as well. You've also got, you know, an asset that you can use after the event. So I think it goes beyond just like the impact on site as well.

Yep. Great callouts there. The Platinum, I would say, is, you know, still can be done at this point, but we're getting close on this one just because it is a bit more bespoke, a bit more custom on the Platinum sponsorship. Again, not outside the realm of possibilities, just requires a little motivation to, you know, meet all the guidelines. Again, the booth is still turnkey, but it's a much bigger asset, right? So it's, it's about 12 12 feet, if you will, because everything in Europe we do is a meter, so it's roughly 12 feet. But yeah, so, you know, big back wall, you could think of it as a billboard. This is really where, you know, you've got a big billboard on site for your brand. You can, as you can see in this photo, right, you can fit more folks from the booth as well as, you know, more space to have conversations with prospects. It does have a slightly longer speaking slot. So all those great things that Waylon just mentioned, but, you know, more time and duration on stage. We see folks kind of at that duration either, you know, bring a customer with them or do some sort of a deep dive because they have, you know, the more of the time to do that on the content. A lot of folks at a platinum level do an activation, right? Because they have the space for it. By activation too, we mean things like, you know, either swag, custom swag, food, you know, things to activate the audience and set yourselves apart. So yeah, not also have the rest of realm of possibilities, just a little bit more custom when it comes to the platinum. And then, yeah, a lot of these are spoken for. So I know the pub is spoken for as well as the lanyards. I think the water bottles are still available at the moment, but getting close on that one as well. Some of these have also been taken, but let me flip to— I think there's like at least one happy hour sponsorship left. And maybe the Brain Dates in Europe, I think.

So I'll say like, I think Brain Dates. Well, first off, one point on the Platinum. I think one of the nice things about the Platinum is that you have that ability to have some furniture.

Yeah.

So you could like do demos and stuff like that. You can also like take meetings at the booth. So I think it's something where, you know, if you've got a tool that's really cool, you wanna be able to show off, having that additional furniture space is really valuable. And I'll also just say, as far as the activations go, we see about a 50% lift in leads for sponsors with activations versus without. So it's literally like the lowest cost way. We just like pass through cost on activations.

Yeah.

You know, it's not a profit center for us. We know that it's a better event when there's cool stuff being distributed at booths for the attendees and our sponsors get way more traffic and leads. So definitely recommend if you are looking at sponsorship, it's a great way to increase your overall ROI. And then the Brain Dates Lounge. So just for this one, like, you know, talking to Jason M. Lemkin, our founder, you know, he says if he were at SaaStr, he would spend the majority of his time at Brain Dates. It's a structured networking program. You get the opportunity to like associate yourself with that thought leadership. You also get the opportunity to host some Brain Dates, some networking sessions that are related specifically to, you know, topics that you maybe help address. So that's a great opportunity to drive additional awareness, thought leadership within your space, and ideally, you know, some, some conversations that turn into leads for you. So you get branding both on site as well as within the Braindates app. So you're gonna be visible, and I think it's, you know, 50% or more of the attendees end up signing up for that. So it's something where from a branding perspective, you are gonna touch almost, you know, at least half of the audience, likely the majority.

Yep, exactly. Yeah, no, that's always a good one. Some of these are gone too. So yeah, again, some things have been gone because a lot of folks, you know, have come to us already on wanting some of these additional ancillary sponsor activities. But of the things that are left, again, our gold is like our tried and true Europa sponsorship. The Brain Date Lounge is a really good one if you want to do something that's a little bit more outside of the box. But all these are fairly turnkey. And I will say too, as like a last differentiator, I will say like, you know, our team stays with you throughout the process. So getting it all set up. If you work with Waylon or David or Brian, like, they will stay on with you to help get you all up to speed, work with our, you know, events team to get everything together. So that is something too where, like, you know, you're not just going to get dropped on somebody else who maybe doesn't have all the context. We do it quite streamlined in this way to help, you know, make sure you're not hitting any— you're not up against any deadlines and having to rush even at this time frame for Europa, right? It is only March, so there is still plenty of time to do things at the Europe event if if you wanted to activate. Um, cool. Um, any other last or final thoughts, Waylon, just on Europa specifically?

Yeah, well, just adding to what you said there, like, we'll be on site. So, you know, any, any sponsors I work with, I'm on site the entire time. You know, I'm not, I'm not going to speaking sessions. I'd love to, but basically my role there is to support and make sure that every one of my sponsors is having a great experience. You know, we want to build long-term relationships. So many of our sponsors are long-time sponsors. And part of that is obviously helping ensure that you're able to execute on site. So, you know, we do things like trainings in advance of the actual event to make sure that, you know, your team knows how to maximize at SaaStr. You're not just paying for a booth and hoping for the best. We want to make sure you're successful because we want to make sure that, you know, you want to come back next year and the year after that.

Yeah, 100%. The last thing I'll end on is like a final thought is like we are actually about to kick off those trainings and sessions for Europa. So it is a good time to, you know, still join and have something turnkey presence, right? You actually haven't missed a whole lot, right? We're about to start all those things now. We're going to kick off things like booth selection in the next couple of weeks. So yeah, it's actually a really good time to get in. You would get in right when, you know, everyone else is getting all their information, when folks are starting to think about, you know, who to send and how to activate. So really good time to get involved with your Europe event, which is why we wanted to talk about it today. Cool. Waylon, for folks, if they want to get in touch, how can they reach you?

Yes, you can reach me on LinkedIn, Waylon McGill, or email Waylon, that's W-A-Y-L-O-N, at sasterinc.com.

Awesome. I'm just ai@sasterinc.com. I know some people have been emailing it about AI Day. It is just my email, but that's my initials. But it's all good. Happy to help with, you know, your open AI day or whatever it might be. Cool. If you guys have any questions, let us know. Until next time, you know, we'll see you on the next Workshop Wednesday and then the Thursday Insider webinar. And we'll see you later. Thanks for watching.