Event Marketer's Toolbox
Each episode, host Chris Dunn teams up with a leading event professional to explore the tools, tactics, and trends that drive real results.
Event Marketer’s Toolbox is the definitive playbook for corporate event professionals and trade show marketers.
From first-time marketers to seasoned planners, this show delivers practical solutions to make your events memorable and impactful.
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Event Marketer's Toolbox
EMT #19 with Marisa Nebosky - Good, Better, Best: Building Smarter Budgets in Event Planning
In this episode of Event Marketer’s Toolbox, hosts Chris Dunn and Brendon Hamlin sit down with seasoned event strategist Marisa Nebosky to break down the realities of budgeting in today’s evolving event landscape. With 2,000+ events under her belt, Marisa brings the kind of real-world, field-tested insights every event professional needs.
From her signature “Good, Better, Best” framework to the need for confident stakeholder conversations, she explores how to plan smarter, reduce stress, and create brand moments that actually convert.
Whether you're trying to stretch a budget or convince leadership to invest more, this episode offers tangible strategies, clear mindset shifts, and valuable resources to elevate how you build and measure event success.
🔹 Good, Better, Best Isn’t Just About Price—It’s About Framing
Marisa shares how presenting multiple design tiers helps stakeholders understand what each dollar buys. By giving visual and experiential clarity to price points, marketers can make the value of each investment feel tangible.
🔹 You’re the Expert—Speak with Confidence
As Marisa puts it, "We do this every day." Knowing your stuff and being able to clearly and confidently communicate trade-offs, timelines, and ROI is what earns stakeholder trust—and bigger budgets.
🔹 Budgets Should Reflect Goals—Not Just Line Items
Are you building brand awareness or pipeline? Marisa stresses the importance of defining success early. Not all ROI is revenue; impressions, engagement, and share of voice are often just as valuable.
🔹 Sustainability is Strategic, Not Just Ethical
From re-using modular booth components to capturing content that has shelf life beyond one show, sustainability means smarter long-term planning and more value for your spend.
🔹 Trusted Partners Are Everything
Working closely with agencies, designers, and fabricators early in the process helps reduce surprises and increase creative solutions.
As Marisa says, “It’s all about open, honest conversations.”
Want to finally feel confident in your event budget conversations? Don’t miss Marisa’s practical tips and candid truths on how to bring clarity, confidence, and strategy to your event planning process.
👉🏼 Join us for more insightful discussions like this by tuning into 'Event Marketer's Toolbox,' where industry leaders share the tools, tactics, and trends driving success in the event world.
This Show is sponsored by Blue Hive
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Chris Dunn: [00:00:00] Hello everybody and welcome to the Event Marketers Toolbox. I am Chris Dunn. I'm with BlueHive Exhibits, and I'm very happy to welcome a couple of, uh, very special guests here today. I've got a guest host. His name is Brendan Hamlin. He's with Hamlin Creative. He's, uh, an Asheville, North Carolina guy. We're gonna get into the whole Boston thing a little bit later.
Chris Dunn: Um, but hey, Brendan, thanks so much for joining us. You're our, you're our guest host. Uh, tell us a little bit about yourself.
Brendon Hamlin: Uh, yeah, absolutely. Thanks Chris. I'm, uh, happy to be your, uh, ed McMahon today, so thanks for having me. It's my Johnny. So, yeah. I'm Brendan Hamlin. I run Hamlin Creative. We're a, uh, film and video and photo production company based out of Asheville, North Carolina.
Brendon Hamlin: And we focus primarily in the event space, so creating content in, whether that's trade shows or conferences or experiential activations, that kind of stuff. So there's really a special moment. In those live events where [00:01:00] creating content is really unique and we, we just love, uh, those opportunities to really, uh, elevate a brand in a, in a unique way.
Chris Dunn: Fantastic. Well, hey, we're creating some cool live content right now here on the, on the toolbox. We're, um, you know, our, our mission here is to, to build a community, uh, event, folks from all kind of walks of life, whether you're on the trade show side, the event side festivals, uh, production, wherever it is, right.
Chris Dunn: We're out there. We're, we're looking to have great conversations with. With, uh, with folks, um, and share that. And this is a live show, so you can feel free to drop anything into the chat that you wanna, might wanna hit on. Um, I've got a friend, a local Bostonian friend here, her name is Marissa. She is joining us today.
Chris Dunn: We're, I admittedly we're kind of in shock and awe here, uh, as Celtics fans, uh, two, you know, 20 point. You know, leads that have evaporated. Uh, so before we go any further, I'm gonna channel a little of the, uh, of the goat goats and, uh, and just, uh, we, we need, we need, we [00:02:00] need some winning ways to, to come and save our, our Boston butts here as we, uh, head down to New York Knickerbockers.
Chris Dunn: So, Marissa, that's really not what you're doing, but tell us a little bit about yourself.
Marisa Nebosky: Yes, but we're all here this morning channeling some greatness for the Celtics. So, um, thanks guys. Thanks for having me today. I'm, I'm super excited to be talking about budgets and event design. Um, a little bit about me, oh my gosh, close to, uh, two decades.
Marisa Nebosky: I. In the industry now. Um, I have worked on the agency side in a startup capacity. I've been in the brand side, um, getting to do large scale brand activations, exhibit designs, small round tables, VIP and executive programs. Um, so I kind of come to the table as an event strategist and marketer with. Over 2000 events under my belt.
Marisa Nebosky: So here to drop some knowledge, help you all deal with that very, very scary word of budgets and see if we can make those conversations a little bit easier today.
Chris Dunn: Fantastic. Well, it's gonna be a [00:03:00] fantastic conversation. Uh, I do know that budgets can be scary to talk about. Um, for whatever reason, actually, our friend, uh, Juana, who's behind the scenes today from Fist Bump, she's gonna drop a question in there and, uh, we look forward to seeing who's out there in the audience and, uh, fielding some questions.
Chris Dunn: So, um, before we jump into that first set of questions, uh, I wanna talk a little bit about our sponsors. So I work for BlueHive Exhibits. We are a. Creative 20-year-old group. We're based here in the Boston area. We also have a Las Vegas location. Um, we are kind of that mid-size. We're bigger than a boutique.
Chris Dunn: We're smaller than the big guys. We're the right size for, uh, companies, uh, who are looking to build any kind of three dimensional, um, activation trade, show, exhibit, permanent installation, all all the things right there. Um, and we're also sponsored by our friends at Fist Bump. Fist Bump is an agency group that is helping us not only kind of, uh, put on this.
Chris Dunn: Particular, [00:04:00] uh, podcast and live show, but they also capture all of the content and they help us kind of use that as a marketing thing. So we're creating here at BlueHive and for everybody involved, we're creating, uh, revenue through reputation. So thanks very much to the Fisk Bump team. Thanks Juana for having our backs behind the scenes.
Chris Dunn: And, uh, I'm gonna kick it over to, uh, Brendan who's gonna start us off with, uh, with the first question.
Brendon Hamlin: Yeah, thanks and it's great to meet you Marissa, and thanks for being here today. It's, um, I know this is, this can be a scary subject for folks, but it doesn't have to be, and I think that that's, um, uh, all in how you approach it.
Brendon Hamlin: And so we titled this, you know, good, better, best, um, building Smarter Budgets in event Planning, but. We do the same thing in our world. So whether that's, uh, crew size or creative approach or deliverables, you know, that good, better, best can certainly provide a tiered way of looking at it. But talk a little bit about how you approach it and how, how you utilize that strategy to build your budgets for [00:05:00] clients.
Marisa Nebosky: Right. Great question. Um, and just to reiterate, we wanna hear from you, so drop in the chat. Uh, what scares you about budgets? So we can address it and make things a little bit easier for you. Um, yeah, so I have this technique that a partner, an agency partner shared with me many, many years ago, and I have since kept and adapted and it is called the Good, better, best approach.
Marisa Nebosky: I. So a lot of times when you go into the designing stage or the strategy stage for an event, your stakeholders say, I want this. Right? We don't really care what it costs, or you need to give us, as we say, a champagne experience on a beer budget. And so using this framework, um, you can design three different experiences, attach three different price tags to them, and when you go in to have these conversations.
Marisa Nebosky: X amount of money is gonna give you this. It's a really good experience. This is what you can get a little bit more. We can elevate that and make it something better. And then for the highest price tag, really what you [00:06:00] want, this kind of framework, the best it can be, you're gonna need to fork out this kind of budget.
Marisa Nebosky: And so. It's tying some sort of visual to the financial expectations because I think a lot of times, um, your stakeholders don't realize those small extra costs like having to pay for a half day of labor if it's just a TV monitor, right? And that's like a 20 minute job, but you have to pay for four hours.
Marisa Nebosky: So it's helping to frame that and. Taking those designs one step further by adding in very simple 2D renders, so you're physically showing them on paper rather than giving them an audio overview of saying, we want someone to walk through this graphic header and then go to this demo experience. We're putting on paper what's happening and we're putting a specific price tag to it.
Brendon Hamlin: I think it's such a, um, an important approach because I think that it, it early on sets that expertise that you're providing. It's not like you create this [00:07:00] consulting sort of relationship. Like, I have a vision for you. This is, this is my expertise. It's your job really Right. To come and bring that, that level of feedback to the client to make sure that you're delivering the very best for them.
Brendon Hamlin: Right.
Marisa Nebosky: Correct. And I think by getting ahead of these conversations, right, if this is the type of experience you want, but you can only put this much money to it, we have to have that conversation ahead of time before you get into the production piece of it, right? Because that's when you have the scope creeps.
Marisa Nebosky: That's when deadlines become a little bit more urgent, where you suddenly can't pivot and start fabrication all over because you're six weeks out from your brand activations. So it's really trying to have those. Smarter, clearer conversations earlier in the strategy process. So when you go into production, everything is just task list checklist moving along.
Chris Dunn: Right. Marissa, just, uh, if I could jump in and kind of dive a little deeper on that. So when you're having those initial conversations, [00:08:00] um. Ideally, you're getting some sort of budget feedback from the client, right? So, and oftentimes those things are not matching, right? It's like, I want this, I want all of it.
Chris Dunn: I want all the things. I want the world, right? And I got this much money down here. So by coming in with your good, better, best strategy, you're able to say, well, here's, here's what you've actually said. You want. Here's what you've said you've budgeted for, and we can see the delta in between. So how do we kind of get there?
Chris Dunn: So in, in my world, the trade show world, when we do this from a design standpoint, a lot of times we try to, you know, I don't, I don't want my designers doing three completely different concepts and running all over the place, because then comparing apples to apples gets really difficult, right? But what if I could.
Chris Dunn: Present them with a design and say, okay, so here's our good, better best that lives within this design parameter and picture this, uh, these graphics currently on the good version are, um, are, are merely just, uh, uh, non litt or, you know, overhead lit, uh, graphic static [00:09:00] graphics that live on a, on a metal frame.
Chris Dunn: Uh, the, the better version of that is gonna look the same in a rendering. But now we're gonna say this is a light box, right? So we have an internally lit version of that graphic, which is gonna pop more. And then for the best version, yes, in the rendering, it's gonna look pretty much the same. But now envision this as a video wall, right?
Chris Dunn: We've kind of taken those steps to help them scale and from a, a, a lift standpoint on, uh, on the production side, uh, you know, which, which I'm on. Um, I'm not asking our design team to, you know, rack up. All these design hours kind of envisioning things in different directions and, and, and at least at that point then they start to understand, to your point earlier, you know, the things like it's a four hour mini, you know, to, uh, to come in and set up a, a popup and hey, in Boston it's an eight hour mini.
Chris Dunn: I'm sorry, Boston's the most expensive city pains me to say so. Yeah. Um, or one of the most anyways, but, so. Just, you know, nice to see that you're bringing this to the table to have these conversations with your clients. 'cause we feel this pain all the [00:10:00] time on the, on the production side.
Marisa Nebosky: Yeah, and I think, I think that's a great point.
Marisa Nebosky: As you know, being a marketer on the brand side, you really need to be that go between, between your agency partner and your stakeholders. And a lot of times your stakeholders internally have these great expectations. And we have to remember the agency team are humans. There are people with limited bandwidths, right?
Marisa Nebosky: And so a lot of that strategy work, that design work, that does still tap into your, your budget, right? So I talk a lot about wanting to have visuals, but as you mentioned Chris, it could be one version and you talk over how maybe you have some overhead lighting here that's in the best version or maybe in the, the better.
Marisa Nebosky: It's some floor spotlights that might be a little bit cheaper. Um, but I do think you have to have some sort of ver visual to show them. But you can get creative in how you. Represent those designs at the various stages, so the good, better, best. So it becomes very clear to them what the price tag is and, and what they can achieve.
Marisa Nebosky: Um, and as that marketer, kind of between the [00:11:00] agency and your stakeholders, it's really up to you to manage those relationships. So making sure that you're listening to your agency about what's realistic, working with them on actual numbers or close to it in terms of estimates, right? The closer you get to your event, deadline, prices are gonna go up, availability is gonna be limited.
Marisa Nebosky: Making sure that you relay those to your internal stakeholders, so it's not just about. Here's what the experience can look like, but as we take longer to decide, we're going to accrue more costs, either from a rush standpoint in terms of shipping, fabrication, um, I'm always running into last minute issues with graphics, right?
Marisa Nebosky: So I am constantly saying, this is the drop dead date. It needs to go into production. Um, because anything beyond this is gonna be like a 30% surcharge. So. Having those conversations and then being very clear about what happens if you don't make decisions by certain drop dead dates.
Brendon Hamlin: Yeah. I'm wondering, do you, is there [00:12:00] a, um, like a sales component to this as well?
Brendon Hamlin: Like when you're, when you're early on in the process trying to connect with a, with a new client, let's say, and providing this tiered um, presentation, does that help, uh, sell more or lock in more projects? Have you found that there's a difference in this approach?
Marisa Nebosky: I think with the sales team, a lot of times it's more about how many customers can we get in and what is it that that's, that's in it for them?
Marisa Nebosky: What are they getting out of this event? So in terms of the sales, it's usually me having those one-off conversations with them about what does success look like, what type of aspects need to be added to the experience. So they're hitting their sales quotas or they're meeting some of the concerns coming from their customers in the field.
Marisa Nebosky: That gets built into the design piece in and of itself. Um, but maybe the extent to which that gets built out could be part of the budget discussion, right? So if sales is finding they need more demonstrations, but we only have budget to maybe do [00:13:00] two in the booth, it becomes a conversation with them. We can do too.
Marisa Nebosky: What are the most important products that need to be highlighted? Where are you having the biggest issues? Um, maybe what are the more popular ones that we wanna keep pushing? So, to your point, yes, I think it becomes part of that conversation. But going back to like setting clear expectations around what is achievable within your budget parameters.
Chris Dunn: Yeah. Yeah. It just, if, if I could add to that, 'cause I, I heard the question in a, in a different way than Marissa would answer that. But one more thing that I would, that I would say, while we're kind of camping on, on budgets and that how to set expectations and, and managing client expectations and so forth.
Chris Dunn: A lot of times what we're finding on the trade show end is this, these costs have escalated at a fairly rapid rate, and I, I don't think that that's dissimilar to what's happening in the corporate events side. Right. Marissa Un and. Brendan are, are seeing this, uh, in, in all things that you do as well. So it's not unique to us.
Chris Dunn: However, oftentimes people are showing up with budgets that might have [00:14:00] been fine five years ago, but, but they're just, they're not enough for now. So we have to educate them on why those things have gone up. Um, a a and at the same time. Sometimes from a budgetary standpoint, we also have some luck helping folks find additional budget dollars in other areas that maybe they're not looking.
Chris Dunn: And, and, uh, Brendan, this, this will be music to your ears. Uh, is there a social media budget? Is there, is there a digital budget? Is there an ad budget or something? That we can now kind of come in and create a really cool interactive video component or, um, you know, something designed that's gonna live on as a, as a, a evergreen piece that's, that lives on after the event, but we're building it for the event, but we're able to reach outside of that bucket and we're able to grab dollars elsewhere in the company.
Chris Dunn: So it helps the event manager. Uh, do a better job, put something really cool together, and then, then those assets have more life and they're repurposed in in many ways. [00:15:00]
Brendon Hamlin: Yeah, I love that. I've also found that when we, like this is maybe just a trick that, that we've used, which is to maybe instead of good, better, best, but um, option one, and then option two is everything in option one, plus that incremental cost for option two.
Brendon Hamlin: There's some like maybe a mind trick there that a lot that you, you, you're only spending. Like, you know, the, the money for option two that upgrade charge is right, is usually not a bigger number than, you know, the first part. And that, that can be a way that, you know, can help kind of maybe, you know, eat the elephant one bite at a time kind of thing, and, and get through to a, an agreement and a and a.
Brendon Hamlin: You know, a position where you're on the same page with the client. Yeah,
Marisa Nebosky: and I think to add to that, it's also working really closely with your agency partners. So I've had issue, or not issues, but I've had experiences in the past where, let's say we wanna do a custom graphic of [00:16:00] some sort, but we either couldn't do it because it was at a budget or it was at a timeline.
Marisa Nebosky: Working with our agency to figure out what's a creative solution to that. Can we do something with lighting, right? Where it can give a similar effect, but at a lower price. Point. So I think this goes back to having those really good relationships with your vendors, being completely open and honest about what your budget parameter is, what the expectations are internally from the brand and from your stakeholders.
Marisa Nebosky: And is there another creative solution that's a little bit more cost effective? Um, like I said, I love working with lighting. I think sometimes it's a great way when you can't bring in some of these, um, various pieces like I've done overhead. Uh, SEG boxes that were light boxes with a fabric imprint that had the same look as doing an LED screen.
Marisa Nebosky: Um, but it was a much more effective cost point for us, but had a similar look and feel to what we were going for. And that comes from. Working with your vendor, explaining what it is that you're trying to achieve, and do they have some insights and what they're seeing across the industry [00:17:00] that might work creatively that maybe you're not knowledgeable about yet?
Marisa Nebosky: Um, I personally do my best to go to as many internal trade shows as I can. I like to walk the floor and see what the new tech is, see what some of the new fabrics are. New stands, things like that. But I also think it's equally important to visit trade shows outside of your industry and get inspiration from the way other brands are exhibiting, whether it be on the trade show floor and industry, you know, brand activation or some sort of maybe gala or something, and and looking at the way that they're exhibiting and can you maybe take inspiration from that, but modify it to meet your own brand or your own industry.
Brendon Hamlin: Always be
Chris Dunn: learning,
Marisa Nebosky: right?
Chris Dunn: Absolutely. Hey, we got a great question here from, uh, from Vincent. Um, reemphasize that the client project is part of the larger program goal, and that's, that's a a, a great point and I think. You know, sometimes, and again, we we're primarily trade shows, [00:18:00] probably 90%. And then the events are, but that's, so that's kind of my focus.
Chris Dunn: And oftentimes when we're working with that client, um, it's, yeah, a trade show is not a standalone event that, that relates to Nothing else in, in the, you know, it's, it's a. It's a piece of the marketing puzzle. Um, and you can build off of that in a tremendous way. But if you've got a, you've got a thematic thing happening, you got a client, you got a product launch, you got something large, um, that you're doing as a, an ad campaign across the board for, you know, you know, running it for six months or whatever the case, you know, tying in that event and, and using that as a, as a, as a.
Chris Dunn: Key piece in that program or in that, uh, that effort, uh, is super smart to do, and then, and then you, you're just building more stability for that overall, you know, theme and or campaign.
Marisa Nebosky: Right, and I'll chime in here As the marketer, I think an event should never be a one-off activation. In some ways it should be integrated to something else.
Marisa Nebosky: It should always [00:19:00] tie up to your bigger business goals and objectives. Um, so what is the integrative campaign that this is building around, right? Is there some sort of digital component? Are you adding in a virtual element? Um, what's the campaign look like? You know, I've, I've done a lot of product launches.
Marisa Nebosky: The, the event in and of itself has never been. The hero moment, it's been one of a greater piece. We've done an exhibit, we've done a demonstration room, we've done dealer events. Um, you need to think about the full picture. And so a lot of times when I build out my budgets for these events, like I said, working with Chris, we have the, the section that is just the booth or the brand activation.
Marisa Nebosky: I'll work with a team like Brendan. What's the marketing or the content capture, right? Because. You put a lot of money into these, these experiences and you want them to have a decent shelf life. Like starting to look at the long-term return here. So we have done experiences where we have gone in after hours with a film crew.
Marisa Nebosky: We have captured content, whether it be a booth tour or we've captured content around, uh, some [00:20:00] of the demos we have to either create. You know, sizzle reels, highlight reels. We've used it in some of our learning management systems. We're taking content that you are already, you know, strategizing and building out and giving it a longer shelf life.
Marisa Nebosky: So you're thinking more sustainability. So your budget ends up having a little bit more of a bump, but you're getting a bigger return from it in terms of engagement, positive brand sentiment, um, brand impression. So. To Vincent's point, yes. We need to be looking at this from a full picture and thinking about the full sales cycle.
Marisa Nebosky: So it's not just top of funnel, but it's using the various moments across your experience to hit across awareness, decisions, acceptance, all of that.
Chris Dunn: Yeah. Great, great points. Um, you know, we, we started with a conversation that's really morphed into a, a whole bunch of things, which is tremendous. I, I love when that happens.
Chris Dunn: Um, I want to just kind of add, uh, an additional question here before we kind of move to the, [00:21:00] a little bit of a, a change in, um. Into kind of topic, but pre-qualifying what success looks like for your client, I think is important. It's sometimes easy to kind of skip over that because maybe it's an uncomfortable question, maybe you just forgot.
Chris Dunn: Um, but tell us a little bit about how you kind of handle that and what does that look like, that, what does that sound like, um, when you're kind of working with that stakeholder?
Marisa Nebosky: Right. So I think it's a great question and success is going to be defined differently by every single stakeholder. I go back to saying, when you work with stakeholders, it's already, it's always about what's in it for them.
Marisa Nebosky: Um, so my key things is asking each stakeholder, what does success look like? What do you want your attendees to take away from this experience, right? Is there a CTA? How do you want them to feel? What's the next step? So working with the team to define that and then going back and working with your partners to figure out how do you build that experience out.
Marisa Nebosky: So is the takeaway from this to book a follow-up sales meeting? Is it to attend a [00:22:00] demo? Is it, uh, a webinar where they can learn more about some of the products? What, what does that look like? Um, yeah. And so that's how I kind of frame those structures and then go back and make sure that the brand story and the experience we're creating aligns with what we need them to take away from this.
Chris Dunn: Gotcha. Awesome. Uh, I love that. Um, oh, and
Marisa Nebosky: one more thing, Chris. Yeah. I'll say that success doesn't always have to be financial, right? So we talk a lot about these events needing to be like a three x return. Um, one of the things I really love to do with my stakeholders is going into it defining, is this more of a sales event or is this more of a brand marketing event?
Marisa Nebosky: Meaning our success if it's more of a sales initiative, might be tied more directly to specific return. Pipeline build closed pos, open pos. If it's something that is being designed more for brand awareness, um, we're looking at impressions, we're looking at engagement. How long did they [00:23:00] come over to the experience?
Marisa Nebosky: Where did they stay the longest? I go back to work, talking about work with Brandon, um, you know, creating content from the show floor that goes on your social channels. What kind of share of voice did you have? Re-shares, impressions, likes, things like that. So. Going kind of back when we talk about good, better, best in that success stage.
Marisa Nebosky: Also defining what type of experience you're making so that your goals and objectives align and everything ties in. And you have that red thread going through that we talk about.
Chris Dunn: Right? That's, that's great. You know, uh, in the early days when I was just a, a little baby ae in the, in the trade show world, one of my mentors said, you know.
Chris Dunn: Picture asking, you're, you're, after the show has happened, you're on the plane, you're flying home with your client, and turn to them and say, that trade show was fantastic. And just understanding why when they turn to you and look at it and go, yes, it totally was because blah. Right? So if that's an unknown, then hitting that target is near impossible, right?
Chris Dunn: So just having that simple [00:24:00] conversation ahead of time is, uh, is so important because. Like you said, that now we know where we're kind of aiming for. And yes, if there's multiple stakeholders, everybody's got a little different take on it and, and they want to know what's in it for them. So we have potentially several targets to hit, but easier to do so when we know what we're aiming for.
Marisa Nebosky: And when you think about those success metrics too, and we go back to talking about budgets, right? If we have to have that conversation where we need more spend in order to hit these, these objectives, then that's an honest conversation we need to have in part of the strategy. Or even when we get into the operations piece where maybe we suddenly need to pivot.
Marisa Nebosky: We need to have a moment that says, if you really wanna achieve this, we're not at a point where we're gonna see success. We either need to pivot the design, we need to bring in more resources. Or we need to elevate the experience and to do that, we need, we need to come up with some more funds,
Chris Dunn: right? Yeah, that's an honest conversation.
Chris Dunn: And, and I mean, if you're talking about a reasonable sized event, you know they're already sinking in, right? Hundreds of thousands, millions, whatever they're, [00:25:00] they're gonna spend, right? And you may go to them and say, you know, for 80 grand more we could really move the needle by doing this, this, this, and this.
Chris Dunn: Um, right at that point, did they look at the big picture and say, okay, so it's, it's a few points. It's not, it's more than I want it to spend, but are we gonna get a, a higher ROI for, for making that? That extra effort, right? And
Marisa Nebosky: and that's where we have to come in as the event professionals with confidence and speak and say, this is what we recommend doing.
Marisa Nebosky: Because if you're not willing to go up by this much, we're not gonna hit success. We're gonna end up putting all this money in and we're gonna do nothing to move the needle. So I think a lot of this is also having the confidence going in and speaking as an expert. You know your stuff. I know a lot of times we get nervous when we're in a, in a room with executive leadership or the C-suite, but it's remembering that we do this every day and we are the experts and we just need to come with confidence, concise language.
Marisa Nebosky: Um, I'm big about decks. I think when you talk to your stakeholders, it's always about the bottom line. So it's showing kind of like hide buckets of what those numbers are. So like we're [00:26:00] putting X amount to the actual experience and build out, we're putting X amount to content. If we can up content by 10%, we're projecting maybe this much more engagement on social media.
Marisa Nebosky: So it's being the expert coming with what you see those metrics and just again, having that open conversation, but coming with the data too.
Chris Dunn: Hmm. Show up with receipts.
Marisa Nebosky: Yes, exactly. Every penny counts. I say that all the time. We manage multimillion dollar budgets. We are usually the team that gets the most scrutiny.
Marisa Nebosky: So make sure your budgets are extremely detailed down to the penny. But when you go into those stakeholder meetings, they only really need to see top, top line,
Brendon Hamlin: right? And then, um, you know, really projecting that. That value, like you're saying, because the opportunities in, whether it's a trade show or an activation to carry that story forward.
Brendon Hamlin: Like we, we talked Marissa about a road show. You know how you can use a road show from one event to the next to promote to get more people. So if you had a. [00:27:00] 10 city tour, let's say, you know, every stop along that way, you could be doing a, some sort of promotion that ties to the next event. That kind of, that kind of strategy can really help.
Brendon Hamlin: And that's a, that, but that needs to be factored in early and make sure that it's a part of the, the plan. Another thing that, um, we touched on a little bit was sustainability, but really as it relates to also that value. Position. So talk a little bit about how you're seeing sustainability become a, a. A value add, not just this add-on that you have to make sure stuff doesn't end up in the landfill.
Brendon Hamlin: That's a, that's important, but there's another part of it. Right,
Marisa Nebosky: right. And I think that's a great point. When we think sustainability and going green, we always think about using items that can be repurposed or recycled. Um, one of my favorite thing or the name badges that you can plant and then you have some nice flowers that come up as a nice memento from your event.
Marisa Nebosky: Um, but I also think. One of my pet peeves is when we don't think [00:28:00] about how we can repurpose some of these custom pieces we're doing, um, or even the content. You know, I, I understand in some circumstances you might need to do a burn and build experience, but we wanna really limit the amount of stuff going into the landfills, right?
Marisa Nebosky: So. Another kind of big trend we're seeing is more companies doing road shows or more of these smaller, intimate gatherings where, like you said, they're going from one city to the next and thinking about how do you advertise that as part of your bigger marketing campaign? Um, one of the things I love to do for modular shows, you know, smaller trade shows like 10 by tens, 20 by twenties, or even just smaller brand activations, whether it be some sort of build out in a restaurant or.
Marisa Nebosky: You know, another, maybe like a hotel ballroom or something is invest the money in building a nice kit or toolbox. Since we're on the event Marketers Toolbox. And these are a number, a number of pieces that sit in your toolbox, right? That will frame out to be a 20 by 20 space. [00:29:00] And so when you show up to some of these smaller activations, um, you can go into your toolbox and you can pull out the various pieces that work within this footprint.
Marisa Nebosky: So every event can have a different look and feel, but it's still aligned with the brand. And you're basically going from, let's say, a 20 by 20 where you would've normally started from scratch and maybe spending upwards of a hundred K, where you've already invested in kind of these custom pieces that sit in your warehouse, that now you're dropping your budget down to maybe 50 or 60 K per event.
Marisa Nebosky: So a longer term. Investment there. But if you're looking to do more of these smaller events in the long run, it pays off. And it's kind of the same piece when we talk about content too, right? So we're thinking about are you doing demos or workshops and where does this content live afterwards? You know, a lot of times you're, you're making stuff from scratch, like a new brand video, um, or you're doing new product videos or marketing assets, right?
Marisa Nebosky: Thinking about the multiple uses for this content beyond this one term experience. And so. [00:30:00] Bringing another layer of sustainability that way.
Brendon Hamlin: And I, I mean, personally I feel the, you know, the, the better the qual or the higher the quality of the content, the longer the shelf life. You can, you can have a, a, a selfie video in the middle of the trade show, may not have the same length of, you know, shelf life as something that is more, you know, produced at a higher quality or maybe has a, a, a strategy behind it.
Brendon Hamlin: And is meant to, to live for a longer term. Are you seeing that as well?
Marisa Nebosky: Yeah, we're seeing more of it. I think it, like I said, it goes back to the budgets and having those open, honest conversations early on, because I do think, you know, a lot of times I talk about a cost savings reduction, whether it be from sales, having all of their meetings on site versus going one off and having to add in the travel piece to it.
Marisa Nebosky: I think it's really important with content too, right? So if you can look at your project roadmap or your marketing roadmap and look six months down the line, and you are gonna need content that relates to this product, well, you've got a big brand [00:31:00] activation going. Let's think about pulling some of those deliverables into this.
Marisa Nebosky: And on the bonus is if this project has separate budget and you are now covering some of those deliverables. Maybe some of that budget gets moved over into your trade show budget. So, you know, those are kind of like having a bigger picture of what's going on. And I know we go back to saying like, we need to see the project roadmap or the marketing roadmap, which isn't always the case because a lot of times we might be like drinking from the fire hoses, we say.
Marisa Nebosky: But, um, we do the best we can and I think the more you can plan in advance is really gonna help with your, with your budget numbers.
Chris Dunn: Awesome. Uh, so we, I think we've got. Something going on with our, uh, our, our question, uh, visibility anyways, but, so I'm getting some private messages here from, from Juana, um, Tim Fling saying success could be, you know, a key target saying I've only got 10 minutes, but they stay for two hours.
Chris Dunn: Right? So we knew that we did something right. We really kind of, you know, moved the, moved the needle on that. [00:32:00] Um, I, before we kind of. Take off or step off of this particular topic. I'd love to kind of put my 2 cents in from the exhibit builder world because what you were saying certainly speaks to us. Um, and we are always having these conversations with our clients about, uh, you know, modular exhibitry.
Chris Dunn: Uh, you mentioned kind of the build and burn. Theory, you know, and that was kind of how everything was done in Europe for an awful long time. They wouldn't literally burn it. Although I do hear maybe in more in like China, they literally kind of light stuff on fire. Um, uh, but, uh, it's, it, it's more of a, a, you know, a, a rental strategy with a lot of things kind of, you know, being used once and, and then, you know, set, set aside or crushed up and put in, put into the landfill, which we wanna avoid.
Chris Dunn: Um. So to your point, Marissa, half, what we like to always do is say, let's take a pic, uh, a peak at your entire show schedule. Let's see the entire year. Because if you're only looking at one show at a time or one event at a [00:33:00] time, you can't get that large perspective of of the big picture, right? So if we could see the big picture and identify, you know, what, once a year you guys do this show, it's a 40 by 40, 1600 square feet.
Chris Dunn: If we outfit that. Area set up with enough, uh, architecture with enough, you know, uh, three dimensional brand elements, we can break those things up and use them across the board. So yes, this, this upfront spend might be a lot more, but when you, when you dollar cost average it out, uh, over all of those events, you end up, you know, certainly saving a fair amount of money.
Chris Dunn: Right. When we talk about. Talk to folks about, you know, rent versus buy. Usually we're looking at like, hey, between show three and four is gonna be your break even, right? So if you're doing only one show a year, um, you probably don't need to, you know, buy something unless you need to be super specific. You can rent, you can, it can be super customized.
Chris Dunn: It doesn't look like, you know, quote unquote, uh, just an, just a rental. Um, but you can, you know, leverage that spend out. However, if you're doing a dozen [00:34:00] shows a year and you're gonna reuse that property over and over and over again, then certainly, you know, it makes sense. So those are conversations that, um, that are, are very healthy to have, you know, whether you're a planner, whether you are, uh, an, an event manager for, for a brand, you know, when you're.
Chris Dunn: When you're kind of sitting down, either looking at a new, uh, at a new partner or at, uh, interviewing, you know, folks or sitting with an existing partner, like, make sure you're having those, those, those big picture conversations and being fairly transparent and opening up your, your, you know, your schedule and saying, we got a $500,000, you know, budget for the year and here's all the things we're trying to do for that.
Chris Dunn: I feel like. People get really, you know, nervous about, about protecting their budget 'cause they feel like vendors wanna just, oh, I just, I'll take everything. Thank you very much. But if you're working with somebody you know that's worth partnering with and, and is collaborative and transparent, then they're gonna help you maximize your, you know, your usage of that budget over, over, whether it's over multiple events or best use it for that one big event or whatever that might be.[00:35:00]
Marisa Nebosky: Yeah, and I think that that's a great insight, Chris. Thanks for jumping in there and adding. That layer. And I think from a brand side marketer perspective, right, it's trying to have those conversations with your key stakeholders ahead of time. So I really do try to have the show schedule for the next year, like firmed up by like October.
Marisa Nebosky: Um, it's not always realistic. Sometimes you're doing a mid-year check-in. But being able to realistically have an idea of what they wanna do. And a lot of times I go back to saying it's those conversations with your internal stakeholders where they think the buy-in for this show is $5,000, but it's, it's not really right, because you have shipping, you have staffing, you have the actual experience.
Marisa Nebosky: So it's working with them to figure out where they want to go and then putting real numbers to it and then. Kind of laying onto what Chris said, um, there's a reason NDAs exist, so working with a partner you trust, if you're worried about sharing your show schedule, get them under an NDA and you need to have those honest conversations with them because it's gonna help prepare you for when you go in [00:36:00] internally and present all this stuff to your stakeholders.
Marisa Nebosky: So. Saying, okay, we have 10 shows over the course of the next six months. Realistically, what do we think we need to spend? How can we repurpose things? Um, because one other thing to keep in mind is some of these shows might piggyback one another, and if you're sending certain assets to this show. You might not be able to send him the next show because by the time you move out of this one and you're loading in the next one, it's not feasible.
Marisa Nebosky: So having that partner you trust, having those conversations coming up with a plan that feels really secure. So when you go into those stakeholder meetings, you're walking in with confidence saying, I need X amount of dollars. This is how it's gonna be allocated across the board in order to achieve this.
Chris Dunn: Right. You know, Vince asked a good question, uh, or made a good point about, you know, the inflating or the escalating cost of shipping. You know, sometimes discourages the re of, of pieces. And I don't disagree with you, Vince. Um, I think one thing that, again, we, we try to do just not to make this a commercial [00:37:00] for Blue hu but we do have West Coast and East Coast very specifically, uh, because if we have an event happening, uh, really Denver, west Denver to California.
Chris Dunn: Obviously Vegas being kind of that, you know, mothership of all events, um, you know, we're gonna try to do things in that local markets to reduce that, that shipping, you know? Yeah. Piece. Um, sometimes we'll produce something, uh, uh, on the East coast and we're able to just take SEG fabrics that we're created for a certain framework and we can ship those.
Chris Dunn: Very light, very, you know, small and minimalistic and rebuild the same thing on the west coast, right? So being smart about how you're gonna allocate those dollars and kinda looking at the big picture and again, saying what makes the most sense? Are we opening ourselves up for risk and issues, you know, by doing some things and to, to save a few bucks?
Chris Dunn: Or does it make sense? Is it smart?
Marisa Nebosky: Right, and, and I think again, that's working with your partner. A lot of, a lot of trade show companies now, exhibit house companies will have the east and the West Coast, you know, offices or storage facilities, just because we know Florida's a big, you know, hub for brand [00:38:00] activations.
Marisa Nebosky: We've got Chicago, Las Vegas, so. Is also a discussion of, hey, maybe there's a certain experience that happens at all of these because they're on the West coast and we just send those assets out and they all come out of that warehouse. And then we create a different experience maybe for all of the East Coast ones and all of these assets stay like in the Chicago warehouse and we ship those out So.
Marisa Nebosky: It's just about creative problem solving and, and going back to having those honest conversations with your trusted agency partner to come up with a plan that makes sense, that fits in within your, your, uh, stakeholders, budget restrictions or constraints, and then relaying that conversation open and clearly to your internal stakeholders.
Marisa Nebosky: Here's the plan. If we need to diverge from it, then we might need some more money, or we might need to get a little bit more creative. Um, and then I would just add on to that, you know, we're talking a lot about trade shows and designing assets for that, but if you do a large scale brand activation or an experiential activation, right, it's not just using those, those assets for the trade shows.
Marisa Nebosky: [00:39:00] Those are things you design in mind that could be used across various experiences, whether it be a popup that you might do in a city or some sort of experiential build out where maybe you take over a warehouse, you know, something you might see at CES. So. Things you design do not have one place where they can only be used.
Marisa Nebosky: We're thinking about how can you use these across multiple experiences, multiple places. Um, obviously when you talk a little bit more global, that strategy gets a little bit more complex because you have freight. Um, but so I think for this conversation, we'll just keep it to US based activations, but we're, we're happy to dive into more global issues if anyone has questions about that later on.
Chris Dunn: We're gonna dive into global issues,
Marisa Nebosky: trade show, shipping,
Chris Dunn: slippery slope.
Marisa Nebosky: That that's the only thing we're, we're okay to talk about. We're, we're
Chris Dunn: okay. We
Marisa Nebosky: can't really
Chris Dunn: talk about politics and religion. We don't talk about anything else. Uh, Zaia is jumping in and she's Remi, she's, she's spot on. Uh. Her company. Um, and [00:40:00] they're in the AV world. They have East coast, west Coast.
Chris Dunn: So when you deploy, you know, make sure and have a strategic plan to be, uh, you know, deploying in a local market. The one thing I wanna say before we kind of close up this part of the conversation, conversation, excuse me, is that, um, also helping working with your partner and helping your stakeholders understand what, uh, budget, budget ramifications may exist.
Chris Dunn: Uh. Without. Throughout the US we've got a number of different cities and these cities all come at very different price points that are out of the control of really anybody. Right? So doing something in New York. From a dollar per hour spent, uh, is very, very different than doing it in, uh, in, certainly in San Diego.
Chris Dunn: It's very different than doing it in Orlando. Very different than doing it in Chicago. Right. So understanding, um, you have a, you have got a show, you've got an event that happens in Orlando one year and then it moves to Chicago. Uh. Immediately my brain goes to like, you better budget 1.6 times what you had for Orlando for the very same thing because right, the [00:41:00] Chicago rates are just that much more, right?
Chris Dunn: So picking, uh, again, picking an experienced, you know, partner is important to help you kind of understand those intricacies. Um, you can't just take last year's budget at 10% for, you know, for, for creep. Um, and then, and then call it good, right? But you gotta look at those cities. You gotta look at your move in, your move out dates.
Chris Dunn: If, if I'm, if I'm in Atlanta and I'm doing everything on straight time and then I go to San Francisco and do everything on overtime, I'm gonna see a dramatic, you know, huge rise in cost. And I'm gonna, if I don't know to expect that and or budget for it, then you know, I'm gonna be caught with my, my, uh, proverbial budget pants down.
Marisa Nebosky: Yeah. And that goes back, like I said, having those honest conversations with your agency, finding someone you trust because if you like, California's always expensive. There's the extra sales tax there. We know Chicago's always expensive because it's usually union labor. I personally try not to work on Sundays on site because I know it's usually like triple, triple time what it is.
Marisa Nebosky: Um, but it's, so if you have a show that you do every year, but maybe rotate, [00:42:00] so one year it's in New Orleans and then it's in Colorado and then it's. In San Francisco, right? But you don't have a lot of events on your book that shows maybe what those numbers would be. That's where you can tap into someone like Chris and BlueHive and say, okay, what are you seeing for costs here?
Marisa Nebosky: The flip side, when you're talking, you know, working with Brandon and you're looking to think about content. Maybe there's such permitting that might need to be required for whatever reason, and it's an added cost you didn't think about, so. I go back to saying, having those really upfront conversations with your agency, so you become better pre prepared.
Marisa Nebosky: You can speak to what you need to when you have these conversations with the stakeholders, they can give you specs, info, help you make some really top level slides that you can present to your stakeholders so you're not feeling like you're going in in blind.
Chris Dunn: Yeah. Wow. That was a, a, a really great conversation.
Chris Dunn: And, uh, the toolbox here on the toolbox, we, we kind of aim for kind of that 40 minute range and we're a little over that right now. So I'm gonna, we're basically gonna [00:43:00] put a bow on this and wrap it up, but we like to end. Each a session or episode of the toolbox by asking our guest, you know, what are three kind of key takeaways?
Chris Dunn: Um, and, and they may be something we've already talked about, but leave us with three things that event pros can kind of take and put into action today if you could.
Marisa Nebosky: Yeah. So I think for me it's, it's being confident, remembering that we are the experts here. We know what we're doing when you walk into the room with your stakeholders to have these conversations.
Marisa Nebosky: Confidence. That's, that's the most important thing. Um, and then I would say outside of that is having those honest and open conversations with your agency partners so you can get to a place where you're better prepared to explain and to pitch with your stakeholders because. They're on the ground a little bit more than you are when you're internal and on the brand side, right?
Marisa Nebosky: They're doing probably upwards of 30, maybe 50 events a month. So they're seeing things a little bit more in real time, trends coming through, problems that may be coming up. So rely on them as, as a good partner and support system to get what [00:44:00] you need so you feel very, uh, organized and prepared for your calls.
Marisa Nebosky: And then. I would just say it, it goes back to just being organized and thinking through what the experience is trying to get through everything you might need in the staging and strategy process that could affect your operations. So honest conversation, trusted partners, and, and have confidence. You know what you're doing.
Marisa Nebosky: You got this. There
Chris Dunn: you go. Boom. That's a fantastic way to kind of put a bow on that. This has been a tremendous conversation. I really appreciate everybody's, uh, time. Uh, my guest here in the studio, Marissa, I should say. Our guest, uh, Brendan, who has joined us, uh, sitting in for his, I. Uh, second show, actually the first one that you'll see.
Chris Dunn: Um, but, uh, but for the second time and we hope to have him back. So this all started with a relationship that developed on LinkedIn really for, for both of these folks and myself. Um, uh, we had Brendan on as a guest, uh, early, I think it was in back in February. Uh, we've built a continuing to build a relationship, have great [00:45:00] conversations, and, um, this is the way that kind of the, the social.
Chris Dunn: Marketing plays out right as you build, you build relationships with people. And, um, you discovered that there's a lot of great people out there with a lot of great knowledge and things to share. So this has been really fun. So, uh, Brendan, as my co-host, thank you very much for joining. Thank
Brendon Hamlin: you. I have a full page of notes, so I'm not just a co-host, I am a, I am also, we're also learning as well.
Brendon Hamlin: Lots of great information here. Thank you Marissa.
Marisa Nebosky: Thanks. Absolutely. It's.
Chris Dunn: Yeah, Marissa. So we're gonna, we're gonna end with, uh, with the goat and uh, gonna channel, we're gonna channel energy. Gigi. Yeah. Six time world cha actually seven time world champion. Six, six here though. Um, and send everybody away with all that, those good feelings and, uh, winning vibes.
Chris Dunn: So Marissa, thank you so much for coming on. Thank you. And this has been awesome. You have, uh, shed a lot of light and, and, uh, dropped a lot of gold nuggets that hopefully people will, uh, pick up and take with them, uh, for their week.
Marisa Nebosky: And I, and I would just add, I know budgets are very scary. It's, it's a big [00:46:00] conversation.
Marisa Nebosky: I mean, we, we've barely kind of scraped the surface here in the 40 minutes, so, you know, we're all available on LinkedIn. Feel free to connect with us or send us a message. Um, we're happy to support as Christmas me mentioned, we all met over LinkedIn. Um, so yeah, it's a, it's a great support system there.
Chris Dunn: Fantastic. And that's, and that's the best way to reach you is, is uh, through LinkedIn? Yeah,
Marisa Nebosky: you can, um, you can send me a LinkedIn message. I do offer mentoring to peer-to-peer mentoring because I think sometimes it's a little scary when you go into a new job and suddenly you're dealing with strategy or you're now managing other event professionals.
Marisa Nebosky: So I try to be a resource as best I can to help. Others navigate that? Um, kind of in my experience in my career, it was a lot of trial and error. I didn't always have that kind of guiding light. So I try to try to help where I can so others don't have to go in those same kind of footsteps that I navigated through.
Marisa Nebosky: So.
Chris Dunn: Nice. That's a great way to, to pay it forward and make sure that this next generation of event professionals, you know, have, um, have some great insights [00:47:00] and to, you know, to your point, go in and be confident, right? Until you have, until you've done it or talk to somebody who's done it and you right, and you, and you feel it in your bones.
Chris Dunn: It hard to be confident, right? So, um, for those folks out there who maybe have some, some questions, um, Marissa is a tremendous resource and obviously, uh, knows her shit.
Marisa Nebosky: Like I said, it's all, it's all travel and a trial and error, so it's, it's normal to feel completely nervous when you go into these, but after a while, you know, it gets a little easier and, and just remember you are the expert.
Marisa Nebosky: You don't, you do know what you're doing, so you, you got this.
Chris Dunn: You got this? Absolutely. Well, hey, this has been great. Thanks so much. If you've tuned in, um, if you're listening to the podcast, then you very well know that this is available on podcast. But this, uh, this live broadcast will be, uh, seen here at the same link, uh, on LinkedIn for, I don't know, it's forever or for a long time.
Chris Dunn: Um, we are also on YouTube and we're on all of your favorite podcast platforms as well. So, um, I like to listen, uh, [00:48:00] to podcasts when I walk my dog on the weekends. So, um, I don't know, maybe I'll even listen to this episode. I'll probably learn a lot from Marissa 'cause I was, you know, frantically just trying to make sure I was in the right place and not, not taking the notes that I should have, like Brandon was.
Marisa Nebosky: Well, um, again, I'm happy to chat more. You know, I, I'm, I call myself a bit of a marketing nerd. I, I love events, I love creating experiences and driving community and, and I think we have a very stressful job. And I think sometimes people forget that. And the only ones that really, truly understand what we do are the ones that are in the trenches with us.
Marisa Nebosky: And so, um, there. Just being there for one, for one another and, and being that support system, whether it's just to quickly vent or again, to ask for some advice, because I still get really random requests that I'm like, okay, how would I do this? Who's, who's done this before? Like, they want a petting zoo.
Marisa Nebosky: What? Okay. So, you know, like that's, that's where your community comes into play.
Chris Dunn: Perfect. Great. And you're actually getting a ringing endorsement here from your friend, uh, Tim Fling, who says your mentoring sessions are awesome.
Marisa Nebosky: Yes, Tim. Tim is great. [00:49:00] So if anyone's looking for a tech producer, shout out to Tim Fling.
Chris Dunn: Fantastic. Alright, we're wrapping up the toolbox here. Thanks for coming, guys. Tha uh, we'll see you guy. We'll see you all around, uh, the, the trade show, uh, forum or the event areas and, uh, and good luck. Have yourself a great week, great weekend, and uh, enjoy and go. Celtics. We're looking. Celtics, we
Marisa Nebosky: game three and four are ours.
Marisa Nebosky: Let's go. There
Chris Dunn: you go, we're off. Take care guys. Bye. Bye
Marisa Nebosky: everyone.
Chris Dunn: Bye everybody.
