A 90-minute tactical workshop for real estate professionals, sponsors, operators, and service providers who want to stop treating conferences as expensive networking happy hours and start running them like strategic business development campaigns.
Every year, real estate professionals and their companies spend thousands of dollars on conference registrations, travel, hotels, sponsorships, and booth space. Most of them show up without a plan, collect a stack of business cards, and return to the office with little to show for it.
Conference season doesn't have to work this way. With the right preparation, on-site execution, and post-event follow-up system, conferences become one of the highest-ROI business development channels available.
This workshop – taught by Thesis Driven partners Brad Hargreaves and Paul Stanton – gives you a complete, repeatable playbook for getting measurably more out of every conference you attend this year. We’ll also share some behind-the-scenes tips and tricks we’ve learned from decades attending shows.
Over the past decade he has co-founded General Assembly, a pioneer in education and career transformation specializing in today’s most on-demand skills, as well as Common, a multifamily operating company focused on innovative housing typologies like coliving.
Contact the host →You’ll learn how to
- Choose which conferences to attend based on your specific goals, audience, and budget
- Build a pre-conference outreach plan that fills your calendar before you arrive
- Use conference apps, attendee lists, and speaker lineups to identify and prioritize targets
- Turn conferences into content engines that fuel your LinkedIn and newsletter strategy
- Evaluate sponsorship and booth investments against your actual business development goals
- Maximize your time on-site with a structured approach to meetings, sessions, and events
- Run a post-conference follow-up system that converts conversations into real pipeline
What the workshop covers
Choosing the Right Conferences
Not every show deserves your time and budget:
- Mapping conferences to your business development goals
- Evaluating attendee quality, format, and networking structure
- Building an annual conference calendar with clear ROI criteria
- Knowing when to skip, when to walk the floor, and when to sponsor
Pre-Conference Preparation
The work that separates top performers from everyone else:
- Mining attendee lists, speaker rosters, and conference apps before the event
- Pre-scheduling meetings and building a target list
- Preparing collateral, talking points, and follow-up materials in advance
- Coordinating team roles if you're sending multiple people
Conferences as a Marketing Channel
Turning attendance into content and visibility:
- Live-posting frameworks for LinkedIn and social media
- Repurposing panels, conversations, and takeaways into thought leadership
- Building your brand on-site and online simultaneously
- Leveraging event hashtags, speaker tags, and attendee networks
Sponsorship & Booth Strategy
Making paid placements actually work:
- Weighing the benefits and drawbacks of sponsorship and booth purchases
- Hosting side events, dinners, and breakout meetings
- Measuring ROI beyond logo placement
On-Site Execution
Getting the most from every hour at the event:
- Structuring your day around high-value interactions
- Navigating receptions, dinners, and informal settings strategically
- Managing energy, logistics, and competing priorities
- Quick-capture systems for notes, contacts, and action items
Post-Conference Follow-Up
Where most of the value is actually created:
- Building a follow-up system that runs within 48 hours
- Segmenting contacts by priority and next steps
- Converting conference conversations into meetings, deals, and relationships
- Tracking long-term ROI across your conference portfolio
Hear from our alumni
"Brad and Paul opened my eyes to how real estate deals get put together, where incentives lie, and how we might create business cases for proptech and climate tech. Great stuff!"
"A perfect introduction to the most important real estate concepts, distilled down in the perfect way to absorb and retain. Paul and Brad clearly thought a lot about how to actually educate, not just data-dump the group."
"Excellent course that guides you through a fictional case study with detailed explanation of every single step for all personas at every stage of a real estate deal. I highly recommend enrolling."
"Huge thank you for an amazing five weeks. The 'Selling into Real Estate Owners' course content is a goldmine for anyone building or selling in PropTech, and the weekly cohort discussions are a rare chance to learn directly from peers."
"A collection of engaging and collaborative sessions on how to launch and structure a venture into real estate. Paul and Brad put on a great class with an even better collection of participants."
Format & access
Post-workshop access via Circle
All participants will receive an invitation to join our private Circle community after the workshop concludes.
Actionable templates
Pre-conference, on-site, and post-conference workflows.
A recording for everyone
Recordings are sent to all registered attendees, whether or not you attend live.
Slides & materials
Participants receive the workshop slides, case studies, and implementation tools.
Frequently asked questions
Who is this workshop for?
Real estate sponsors, operators, brokers, fund managers, service providers, and anyone whose business development depends on showing up at industry events.
Is this relevant if I only attend a few conferences a year?
Yes. The frameworks apply whether you attend two events or twenty. In fact, being selective is one of the first things we cover.
Will this cover both attending and sponsoring?
Yes. We address strategies for attendees walking the floor, sponsors and exhibitors, and speakers.
Will there be templates?
Yes. Participants will receive pre-conference planning templates, on-site tracking tools, and post-conference follow-up frameworks. These will be shared via Circle.
I can’t make this time, will a recording be available?
Yes. All registered participants receive access to the recordings and materials via Circle, even if they cannot attend live.
As featured in
Doing Conferences the Right Way: A Workshop
Live on Wednesday, August 26, 12-1:30pm Eastern Daylight Time. $99.
Register for this workshopRecordings are sent to all registered attendees, whether or not you attend live.