Here we go again, you’re heading down to sunny (hopefully, it seems to rain every time I’m there!) San Diego to seek your fame and fortune at IPC Apex 2018. Without a doubt you are investing a great deal of time and money (hotel rooms are about the price of a Fiat!) and you want to get as much from your investment as possible. Whether you are an exhibitor, or just walking the show you want to get as much bang for that proverbial buck as possible, right?

I’ve done many columns focused on exhibitors getting the most from their (very large) investment so I thought it would be fun and valuable to list some tips for those of you who are just walking the show.

So here are 10 tips and how to get the most out of your time at IPC Apex 2018.

1. Plan, plan, and plan some more. Even before you get to San Diego, make a list of the things you want to accomplish during your time there. This should include the people you want to meet and why you want to meet with them. This should include customers, prospective customers, vendors, potential partners, and of course vendors.
2. Speaking of vendors, make a list of the vendors you want to visit, why you want to visit them, what you want to learn, and accomplish from those meetings. This show is a great time to touch base with all of your vendors, settle any issues you have with them, and negotiate new contracts for the coming year besides just renewing your relationship with those vendors.
3. If you are in the market for a new piece of equipment, then do your research first. And I mean deep research, an eight hundred thousand-dollar LDI should not be an impulse buy. Buying equipment off the show floor is a great way to get a marked-down price, especially on the last day of the show when the vendor would much rather ship to equipment to your company than back to his headquarters. But, do your homework. Decide on the equipment you want to buy, the price you want to pay, and how much you want to pay for it, before you even get on that plane to San Diego.
4. This is a great time to be looking for new people. That show floor is going to be loaded with potential hires for your company. That new Quality manager you are looking to hire is probably standing next to you at the Orbotech booth. Or that might be the sales manager you want to hire coming down the aisle.  And of course, if you are already talking to some candidates, this is a perfect time to sit down and have a talk about the possibilities of working together.
5. If you’re looking for sales reps, Apex is a great place to do that a well.
6. Make sure you check out what is not going on, on the show floor. Yes there are many interesting and informative seminars, panel discussions and talks going on in all those conferences rooms you walk by on the way to the show. Check them out.
7. In fact, this is a good time to check out your show guide, get a copy from IPC before the show, this will help you plan as well as enhance your show experience. All courses are listed including a description of what they are about, who the speaker is, and when and where they are taking place. The show guide also lists the press conferences that are taking place throughout the week. IPC Apex is the best place all year to find out what is going on in our industry.
8. You can also use the show guide to locate the companies who are exhibiting at the show, making it easier to find them. This is another good thing to do while planning your time at the show. This way you will get the pay of the show floor and know exactly where you need to go to meet up with the people you want to meet.
9. One of the best things IPC has done in the past few years is provide a show App for your smart phone. Just hook into the App when you hit the exhibition floor and it will be the only guide you will need throughout the show.
10. And finally, make sure you get yourself some publicity for you and for your company. Stop into the Iconnect007 booth and meet the team there, they are a great bunch of people, very friendly and very happy to welcome you in and talk about how they can help with your business’s marketing and sales.

And one more in the spirit of under promising and over delivering, see if you can get the 007 folks to turn the camera on you and film an interview where you get to talk about your company. This will go a long way to helping you get your company’s story out to the marketplace.

But, whatever you do, take full advantage of your time at IPC Apex expo 2018 this week. Grab as much information as you can; meet as many key people as you can; find out everything you can about what’s new in our industry and yes, most important of all, have a great time. It’s only common sense.