I've just got back from SMX London (when I say "just" I'm obviously referring to the Hangover, as I've been back multiple days), and It's probably the best event I've been to for all around value and enjoyment. Having to been to several conferences (Including 3 SES events) over the years though, I've come to the conclusion that, unless you are networking for clients, these events are not easy to justify the expenditure they incur. The problem most people in the intermediate-advanced tier face is hearing only what we know already; I spend a lot of these sessions sucking eggs now.

First up, the costs....

The main problem with conferences is that the main ones are so expensive to attend. SES/SMX are usually priced around the £1k mark, which would rule out many people. Add in a hotel, travel and a socialising fund and you've probably reached £1500. If International travel is involved, these costs will be far higher, making the decision even more tricky. While these costs may not seem as big an issue when your employer is paying, you still need to justify these to your boss.

When I went to my first SES a few years back, I paid for the entire thing out of my own pocket, but I've been fortunate enough to have good employers since this time who've paid for me attend several events. Although it's not my own money, I'm usually even more motivated to get good value from the conference.

We all have our own ways of making these events working for us, but here are mine :

1. Choosing sessions the Google way

When I first went to conferences I would choose my sessions based purely on relevance - how interested am I in the subject? How strong is my knowledge in the area? How much time do I spend on that function? While these are clearly important factors, I feel this led to me going to many sessions I gained little from because I wasn't engaged by the speakers.

I now judge which sessions I attend based almost entirely on speakers. Despite the fact this doesn't influence content, I value humour and charisma extremely highly in these events - 6+ hours a day of concentrated listening can be very draining and I simply won't absorb much information if the speaker isn't engaging me. Remember that most speakers will publish their content online after the event; if you can download the content anyway, only the presentation of the content is relevant to your decision to attend.

As well as the speakers' charisma, there are a few other things I look out for - a presentation from a tool provider would typically be a warning sign that the session is a product demo, while I might well find the talk of a Fortune 500 CEO might be too generic for my liking. I generally find that the talks from people involved in day to day SEO/PPC provide the best value for me - affiliates, digital agency execs and similar. 

As a final point, it's very true that some speakers are known to 'give away' a lot more than others. At SMX London, Patrick's speech on link building was probably worth the conference fee alone for the excellent tangible tips he gave away. It isn't always apparent which speakers which give away the most, but a bit of research  goes a long way. If a doubt, a northern UK blogger will never disappoint ;)

2. Doing it the 2.0 way

Another great way to gain more from the conference is to make full use of Twitter. I'd estimate there were several thousand tweets on SMX during the 2 days. The important points usually get tweeted by a good handful of people, which is usually a great measure of their relative importance. You can even use Twitter to ask a question in another room, as happened in SMX London. 

Some excellent coverage from Rishil, Search Cowboys and others also helped me catch up on the  sessions I wasn't able to get to -- big thumbs up for that, guys.

3. Don't skip the networking

By far my favourite part of SMX London and just about every other conference I've been to is the networking. Even if you have nothing to sell, you'll meet some fantastic people, and probably learn a lot in the process. It's even debatable whether you can learn more outside the rooms than in them. My quick tips for maximising your network time are as follows:

• Make sure your hotel is a long way from your conference; that way you won't be tempted (or forced!) to go back to your room to work/sleep/chill, etc
• Leave your laptop at work - you are paying £500+ a day to be there, so what is the sense in losing this time to day-to-day work?
• Get about, don't stay in a distant corner of the bar
• Suffer the free lunch, as bad as they can be :) No doubt you'll 'wash it down' later anyway (and some of them are actually rather good!)

All in all, I think these events can be a great investment in your future if you make the most of them. They are also a great experience and an event in the calendar to look forward to. I hope to see you all at an SES/SMX event soon!