For years, the Targeted Traffic conference was known as the most expensive domain tradeshow by far, charging close to $2,000 for a ticket to the three day shows. The conference organizers said this was to make sure only serious domain investors attended, as basically nobody else could absorb the cost. Many people assumed they could get a better ROI by buying a $5,000 domain name rather than spending that much for travel and tickets, and others simply attended less expensive conferences.
This morning, Rick Latona announced a major price decrease, and the cost of the Vancouver Traffic conference is now $395 per ticket. Not only that, but Latona will refund all conference attendees who paid the regular price prior to today’s announcement.
I believe this is a smart step, and it couldn’t come soon enough. Oversee.net has been charging much less for their DomainFest conference with many more attendees, and people have made it a priority to go to DomainFest when they previously said that about Traffic. With Traffic and DomainFest conferences competing in back to back weeks in January, it simply made sense to go to the less expensive, more widely attended DomainFest conference, and the attendance gap was obvious this past January. Oversee.net has also started one day conferences at a cost of $175, so the new Traffic price is even more affordable over 3 days.
Traffic Vancouver is expected to be a huge show, with the Vancouver area teeming with domain investors and companies that work within the space. If this price change is carried through to future shows, it could make the Traffic conference much more competitive as it’s now more affordable for people who don’t necessarily make a full time living in the domain space, and those are the people who are usually on the fence about attending. Professional domain investors can frequently get major discounts or free passes depending on the amount of business they do with the organizer, so they are generally less price sensitive when it comes to the actual ticket prices.
Due to other travel, I won’t be able to make the Vancouver conference, but I hope the price is the same for the Hong Kong conference in November. If you’ve been on the fence about attending a Traffic conference, does this price decrease make it more likely that you’ll attend?
I noticed a new menu bar sitting above the load bar when I visited 