[00:00:57] John: Good morning Mateo, how are you?

[00:00:59] Mateo: Brother, I am fantastic. How are you?

[00:01:02] John: I’m good. I’m really good. It’s another week, episode 123 just you and me today, that’s exciting, I’m

[00:01:09] Mateo: I like these days.

[00:01:10] John: Yeah, it’s been a little bit, we’re and there’s a lot going on,

[00:01:13] Mateo: Yeah. Yeah.

[00:01:14] John: I want to talk a little bit about the VRMA Spring Forum. And so that’s a couple of things I want to talk about here in the show and whatever else, obviously you want to talk about, but episode 123 how you been?

[00:01:26] Mateo: Dude, good.

[00:01:28] John: It’s been a weekend. I

[00:01:29] Mateo: No, but it’s, no, life’s good, man. I have no, I have no complaints. Lots of good things brewing, super exciting.

[00:01:36] John: Can you back up? Can you back up just a little bit for those that are watching us on video? So we can go ahead and just take a look at that shirt you’re wearing. Just, oh, you can’t bait, you gotta get it, aww alright, that’s, alright fire.

[00:01:49] Mateo: Oh, that is so crazy. Yeah, anyways,

[00:01:52] John: for those of you that are just listening you missed out.

[00:01:56] Mateo: Yeah.

[00:01:57] John: Yeah, we got, we have a new No BS t shirt that we’re

[00:02:00] Mateo: Designed by John.

[00:02:02] John: that’s not

[00:02:02] Mateo: Matches my hat.

[00:02:04] John: yeah, that’s good. Yeah

[00:02:05] Mateo: Come on, so seriously alright, we’re not just, so people don’t feel beat up. We’re not just talking about one conference. While we will talk about conferences that are going on, but we’re talking about the broader scope of

[00:02:16] John: the state of

[00:02:17] Mateo: ROI, the state of conferences. Are there too many? Are they enough? Are they reaching the right people?

[00:02:22] Mateo: That’s a little off the deep end, but high very high level. I think it’s valid. It’s a valid question, right? Because again, it goes back to what I’m always saying, dude it’s awesome. You can put together the nicest conference with the best speakers, but if nobody shows up and you’re not hitting your target audience, how long does that last?

[00:02:42] John: Everything changed, right? I think. After COVID there was a huge uptick in attendance because people were cooped up for such a long time and for the first few, that first year of, was like You gangbusters. Everyone was showing up to the conferences. It was, for us on the vendor side of things, it was like, oh, we could talk to all these people in person.

[00:03:06] John: It’s amazing. A lot of things changed though since then. The cost of everything skyrocketed. The cost to attend and the cost to actually go and be a vendor, to attend for both sides as both a property manager and a vendor, doubled, tripled in just a couple of years. So when you are a, you’re in my shoes and you are a vendor that’s making decisions based on return of investment, based on ROI, and I’m like, all right, I could go, I could spend X amount of dollars, I could be in person, I could see these people, but, for this to be a success, I need to have X amount of conversations, and get a verbal close, if not an actual close on, two or three property managers that are, want to come over.

[00:03:58] John: Or one if it’s a, if it’s a smaller show and the cost is down. But now that the cost is so high and the margins are shrinking, you have to close more. You have to talk to more people. And for that to happen, you actually have to see people. And if property managers have made the decision that This is too expensive, or

[00:04:24] John: they’ve seen all this content before, or, , I can list like a hundred different reasons why a property manager may choose to not attend a destination conference.

[00:04:35] John: And so when I say a destination conference, I’m talking about VRMA Spring Forum. It’s in New Orleans, right? So why do you go? You go because there’s going to be some good content and you’re going to learn some stuff and it’s New Orleans, right? So you’re going to go let loose a little bit. You’re going to have some fun and you’re going to, you’re going to meet your friends and colleagues your family, your work family.

[00:04:58] John: And I don’t, I hate using that, but you know what I’m saying? These are the reasons why people go we made a decision at Direct and at NoBS to not attend this VRMA Spring Forum this year based on previous results or lack thereof . For, Direct specifically we haven’t seen a return on investment at Spring Forum in three years.

[00:05:20] John: Okay

[00:05:21] Mateo: How do you measure that though? So like for your, so my question to you, like in that, for the sake of conversation, right? And for anyone who’s listening to this that puts on conferences or is in that board what is that metric to you? And how do you measure that for

[00:05:36] John: great question. I think that, how we measure, how I measure is, I want to, if not break I can come less than break even if I had some good conversations that are going to go ahead. But obviously, you want to come out in the black, not in the red for a show, right? And I give it a, a six months runway after a show to make sure that I recoup it.

[00:05:59] John: That’s how I look at it. And other companies will look at it a different way, but, I understand I might have a conversation with somebody that is, slightly interested, but it’s the wrong season. That’s the wrong time. They’re in a contract. After the show, can conversations continue to happen?

[00:06:15] John: And can I go ahead and get a close within six months? And that close, I look at, we work in subscription. So they’re, theoretically, a larger company is going to generate a decent annual subscription. If you can go ahead and close one or two company, truly you close one or two property managers at a show.

[00:06:34] John: You’re going to hit ROI, if you don’t, or if it’s the same property managers, because they’re all, VRMA is a family. You got the same people that will show up over and over and they’re steadfast in their ways. And every, And it’s fine. Nothing against VRMA. And I definitely, this is not a bash of VRMA.

[00:06:53] John: And I want Drew, Drew Brown, current president. I’m going to reach out to him to come on and talk to us about this. Because I’m rooting for VRMA. I’m, we are attending international because I think international is still It’s it you can win at International. It’s still the show to go to, but I think , this spring show , and I think they’re trying.

[00:07:17] John: But there’s a lot of pieces to the puzzle and I’m, that I, that are on top of my mind here too, as well,

[00:07:21] Mateo: I agree. I’d love to get Drew on. I think Drew’s a great guy. I think, and I’ve always said this the reason I participate with VRMA and the things that I’ve done, scale back a little bit, I’m still involved and still believe in the organization is, it has, it’s more like the potential, right?

[00:07:39] Mateo: It’s the potential of what it can become, right? And less of what it’s been traditionally. And I think that’s, the part that is going to, determine its value moving forward, right? Are enough people know about it and the people who do know about it and research it, do they feel welcome to it?

[00:07:55] Mateo: Are they, do they see it as something that they can learn from, something that’s a worthwhile investment from their side? You’re talking about the vendor side. What about the manager side, right? Like

[00:08:04] John: a hundred percent,

[00:08:05] Mateo: why does a manager want to invest in going to VRMA, right? And you could give talking points about the education, the resources and all that other stuff, but if that doesn’t land.

[00:08:14] Mateo: How do you get that to translate? Because, the majority of the operators that I see in very local levels and that are decent they’ll hear a whiff of it, they’ll think that they don’t belong, or they don’t even know about it at all. How do you change that narrative? And especially from a growth mindset, right?

[00:08:30] Mateo: Like when, I don’t know, when I think about being exclusionary, and saying, Oh we want only this and we’re using this language. How do you court somebody who may not be there yet, right? Who’s new to the business and wants to know how to grow their business and, being able to reach out to them and pull them through with succession planning.

[00:08:48] Mateo: Any business does that, right? Thinking about their consumers or their customers of tomorrow and how to make sure that they stay relevant enough to attract them and bring them into the fold. And

[00:09:01] John: but these property managers and these hosts Mateo are getting what they need from all these outliers, smaller conferences that have popped up in the past three, four years. If we were to look back, five years ago, there were, 10, 12 shows a year. Now there’s 30 or 40 just here in the United States of like little, podcast shows.

[00:09:26] John: And they know that, thanks for visiting and this show and like STR Wealth and all these different shows that are As a property manager or as a host, you’re not going to every one. So you’re picking and choosing and a lot of these are regional and they’re more intimate and you feel a part of it.

[00:09:44] John: So how does a larger organization like VRMA, pivot in a way that allows them to go ahead and I don’t want to say, competes the wrong word but get a decent amount of, make it worthwhile for everybody.

[00:09:58] Mateo: Get, they gotta go small to get big.

[00:10:01] John: I 100 percent and this, everything needs to and it’s

[00:10:03] Mateo: go small to get

[00:10:04] John: I wanted to say, this is the point I wanted to make earlier. Think about Kansas City, the Kansas city. That was funny. The Kansas city show. was the last spring forum I went to, and it was crickets. There wasn’t many people there. And from my understanding, it was a venue that was chosen for international that, they had booked previous to COVID.

[00:10:32] John: COVID happened, they had to keep the venue, and they put it at spring and what does that mean for VRMA now? New Orleans is already booked. Is next spring forum already booked? I don’t know. Do they already know where next have they already, a year if I was VRMA, I would go, I’d pump the brakes, hard.

[00:10:54] John: I’d be like, let’s stop booking. Springs right now until we figure this out, realizing that it’s going to take a year or two to go ahead and get it back going again, if that makes sense. But you can’t just keep buying ahead and buying ahead, but I understand that’s how you reserve venues.

[00:11:11] Mateo: So there’s a question in that, right? We’ve both been in the business long enough to see them change the format. Remember when they used to do East vs. West? You’d have West Coast Forum, you’d have East Coast Forum. Do you think they need to change the format?

[00:11:23] John: 100%. I think the format needs to change. They keep an international in the, they keep these connects that they have because these are regional, but

[00:11:32] Mateo: are they well attended? I’ve only been

[00:11:33] John: I, some of them have, but again, part of it is, I think part of it is it’s a money game. And if I look at it playing, VRMA needs to make money.

[00:11:45] John: It’s an organization that is funded and needs to, that needs to make money. Now, all, the cost to attend all of these has skyrocketed. And so the players that are, the players, the vendors that are going to, are, that can, that have gotten a lot of, they’re on, F Rays, E Raise, whatever, there are 100 million here, 110 million here, 170 million here.

[00:12:08] John: These companies can afford to be at every single one of these. And they don’t bat an eye at spending whatever they need to spend at it. Right now, VRMA Connect is bigger than it should be. I think it needs to be more intimate. I like the old road shows that feel of going to a community with three or four or five vendors and, everyone comes together and, you’re there at a community level.

[00:12:37] John: It’s not a destination show. It’s a community show. It’s a regional show. People aren’t traveling to the show unless they’re like, Oh, I really want to meet with somebody. We had that, that show that we put together in Atlanta that was well attended. We had a hundred attendees to that show with five vendors, a hundred attendees.

[00:12:58] John: Some of them traveled a few hours to get there.

[00:13:02] Mateo: it was no, but there was no organization behind that. So I think that’s, that should be the message, right? Like when you have the infrastructure and the ability to do that, do you change the format, right? Should it be off season and on season, like summer, do a summer season. So all of the winter markets can attend a summer season forum and do a summer market forum in the winter when the, when the summer season markets can actually do it in that time.

[00:13:24] Mateo: Is that more valuable? I just, I feel like there needs to be creativity within that space, because VRMA still leads the charge. They’re still the largest. They’re still the biggest. We believe in them. We need them. 100%. So it’s so it’s not knocking. It’s not speaking disparagingly.

[00:13:39] Mateo: It’s also, it’s speaking as

[00:13:41] John: I’m rooting VRMA

[00:13:43] Mateo: game that want to see these changes happen for the betterment of our industry, right? And for the betterment of everyone here, so vendors can get their value, so we can bring more managers and potential managers and people who are dipping their toe into this business, can get the best resources because, right?

[00:14:01] Mateo: We’re all in this pool together. So what they do, we’re all affected by, right? And that should be why the largest body should be leading the way. And being as inclusive as, sorry, for other people don’t like the words, but like being as inclusive as possible. Cause it’s a numbers, you said it, it’s a numbers game.

[00:14:20] Mateo: If you’re here to make money, like in, in open it up. That’s what you’re going to do. Getting more people into the fold.

[00:14:28] John: if I was in charge, I would have way more smaller. And the last thing I want to say, but before I get into that, I want to put a disclaimer out that I’m not saying this is easy or it will be easy.

[00:14:43] Mateo: If it was easy, we wouldn’t be having these conversations. If it

[00:14:45] John: This is like a very delicate, process and it’s going to take a few years to figure this out, but I think it can be figured out.

[00:14:54] John: And that’s why we’re talking about it, and it’s almost like, All right,, we have a spring and we have three or four connects, right? What if you had, VRMA, there’s a couple ways you can look at it. VRMA just does international, could be one.

[00:15:07] John: And they just make it the biggest, baddest show ever. They put all their resources and all their time into one show a year and that’s their focus. And I ultimately, I think that’s the way to go. Truly, if I think about it, because I think that these other, there’s all these other organizations that are also doing this that could do it I wouldn’t say better, just different.

[00:15:30] John: And it’s nice to go ahead and have a little bit of different feel. Northwest VRP is coming out, they’re, I guess they’re no longer Northwest VRP. And they’re gonna have a national conference, so I don’t know what that means, too. And I don’t know what I feel about that. I want to get Brian Olson and that crew on to talk about what that is once that’s officially announced.

[00:15:48] Mateo: Think, the reality is the metrics are going to matter, right? So there’s limited shelf life, at the end of the day for. What people and where people are going to spend their money. And we see the patterns of people who are changing, we see the patterns of people’s attitudes shift and what they’re looking right.

[00:16:06] Mateo: In terms of bottom lines and effect for their business. And the value, which isn’t always, deal signed by the end of the conference, but it’s seeing what seeds were sold, which relationships were built. There’s, what are the value that’s coming out of this?

[00:16:19] Mateo: Where people are able to express their voice, they learn. Did they get something or were they enriched in a way from both sides, from the vendor side and from the manager side, how was that value, did you get a better understanding of the client? Did you get a better understanding of the industry?

[00:16:32] Mateo: Did you actually hear from people who are in these trenches every

[00:16:36] Mateo: day? Like when you’re not getting that,

[00:16:38] John: yeah it’s not just vendor to PMC and PMC to vendor, like it’s vendor to vendor and it’s PMC to PMC, right? That’s if I was a property management company, I think the most value I’d get out of a show is networking with Fellow property managers to go ahead and to bounce those ideas of hey this work this didn’t work Have you tried this?

[00:16:58] John: Oh check this out. That’s the value in these shows and I heard at spring, you know from three separate sources, and I’m not gonna name them. There’s like it’s a vendor fest unfortunately again It is you know, one person said I 75 PMC’s here As in people, not as in companies. So

[00:17:20] Mateo: again we’re not saying those are the numbers, but

[00:17:22] Mateo: even if

[00:17:22] John: again,

[00:17:22] Mateo: so

[00:17:23] Mateo: let’s be clear. So even if that’s, even if that’s the feeling, and that’s the exposure. They’re like,

[00:17:28] John: obviously, we’ve been talking change for a while. And I want to shout out to, I want to shout out, Tyann with Touch Stay, who’s got this shit figured out. And I want to shout out, Maddie from Mount , if you follow either of these women they are going in the right direction with things.

[00:17:44] John: They are doing this right. And I would gladly get behind with both no BS and Direct either one of those. I want to piggyback off of what they’re doing or do something comparable because I think , they’re going the right direction with this stuff.

[00:17:58] Mateo: mean, then that’s what happens. When things get. Or have the perception or feel stifled, new innovation is going to happen. New people are stepping up, new things are going to happen. And we’re seeing that, right? So I think it’s exciting.

[00:18:10] John: I did. It’s.

[00:18:12] Mateo: people on there, you gotta get, you gotta stay on your toes, man.

[00:18:15] John: Yeah, 100%. And I have some great ideas, I’d love to, I definitely want to go ahead and chat with Drew. Drew, if you listen,

[00:18:22] Mateo: Drew, we love

[00:18:22] John: brother, brother, we need to get you back on,

[00:18:25] John: nothing but love for VRMA.

[00:18:27] Mateo: Yeah. It’s, I think these are the conversations that, have been happening in the background for a long time. And we wanted to just touch on it and give our opinions around it. Now, these are purely our opinions. And our, from what we’ve, from what we see.

[00:18:42] Mateo: But again we’re a part of this industry. We want to see it succeed and are happy to, do our part to help. Within that space. And, we want to see our friends succeed. We don’t relish in anybody not being successful within this space. It

[00:18:53] John: And I’m stoked for international, like it’s going to be a great show, like it always is. I’m really excited for it.

[00:18:59] Mateo: And we’re all excited to see what kind of crazy shit you’re gonna come up with this year.

[00:19:03] John: And no

[00:19:04] Mateo: Not like MMA. Yeah, I was gonna say don’t do MMA. Can we do, like

[00:19:08] John: we’re just going to do like a tea party or something. Really, we’re going to tone it down this year. Nice. I see that.

[00:19:14] John: So until next time here’s to conferences. Here’s to getting together. Here’s to networking and here’s to all of us figuring this out the best way for property managers hosts and vendors alike moving

[00:19:30] John: forward

[00:19:31] John: And for those of you and we’re going to do more of these.

[00:19:33] John: We’re going to do more, just Mateo and I and try to pepper one in probably one out of every four we’re going to try to do. We like these. Let us know your thoughts. If you want to hear more, just me and Mateo. And if you don’t want to hear more, just me and Mateo, we don’t want to hear it. it to yourself and,

[00:19:49] Mateo: Be nice.

[00:19:50] John: Be nice. And lastly if you like what you hear. Or you like what you’re watching, make sure you subscribe, you hit you share give us a review on, Spotify and on all the your favorite podcast listening channels. Until next time.