Last August we interviewed Colton Robtoy as he was planning the CD Printathlon. CD is the Capital District, which is the Albany, NY area. We were talking to him about the challenges of planning this Printathlon. He was trying to get the word out about it, and that is why he came on our podcast.

Very recently we noticed that he had written some recap blog posts in the Pulse on LinkedIn. They were awesome; they had such great tips. He was so honest about all the things that went wrong, and we loved his methodical approach and analysis to it so that he would make an even better event next time. We thought we should have him back on WTFFF?! to talk about that.

Listen to the podcast here:

Planning A Killer 3D Print Event

He is a student, and he put on a 3D printing event. He had no event planning experience; this is not his background. He is an engineering student.

Was it train wreck? Or did it work?

3D Print Event Lessons Learned

We were really impressed with what Colton was able to achieve. He is incredibly resourceful, eager to learn and to do whatever it takes to make things better next time. Successful failure. In this case, he had minor failures along the way, but he made them successful quickly. Fortunately, he had enough time to course-correct as things happened, and we are sure his event next year will be bigger and even better from this experience.

His experience should be a lesson for anybody, including us. We have been participating in some events, like showing at the SoCal MicroCon and getting a lot of interviews done in one day, getting a lot of content for our users. It is not the exact same type of event, but I think there are a lot of lessons to learn for us and for other people who are considering planning a 3D print event.

It is true that Colton is a college student, rather young, and maybe was a little naïve about what was involved in trying to take this on. But I think that even if you are blissfully ignorant of some of the challenges and then decide to do it not knowing that, the lesson is that there are ways for really anyone, whether you are a small business, a local event planner, a part of a 3D print club, or a part of a school, to learn how you can start and structure such an event.

We love the 24-hour Printathlon competition as a hook to get people into it. They had different prizes for different kinds of achievement, provided machines, materials, guidelines, testing equipment, and more. They did a great job.

3D Print Event Tips

About a week or so after we interviewed Colton back in August, 2014, we went to a conference and saw a presentation from a woman named June Davidson, she is a sponsorship specialist, especially for nonprofit groups. She gave us this fabulous notebook/workbook, and because both of us attended, we had two of them. So we packaged one up and sent it to Colton.

It contained guidelines and suggestions for many ways to obtain sponsorships for an event or organization. Colton learned from it and started asking different companies, “Hey, you can give us some materials. You can contribute this….” He started acting on those alternative ways to get sponsorships, and was able to get many to contribute, including Polymaker who provided 20 spools of filament to use in the Printathalon. Now that he has had success with this first event, it will be a lot easier to ask them again next year, and they may want to give more.

There really are so many ways to get companies involved. Let’s face it, exposure is value to any company who is in the 3D printing business. Exposure = value. It doesn’t always cost anything in terms of laying out cash to get that exposure.

One of the most important lessons Colton shared was his a tip about meeting sponsors in person. You cannot phone this one in. If you want to reach people for your event and you don’t know them, sending out some mass email list is not going to work for you. Emails get buried in inboxes.

Recently we were at a business conference, and one of the people we met there who does not communicate on email very well says that every 90 days to six months, he commits email bankruptcy because his inbox fills up with all of this noise. Things get lost there. If you want to reach him, he says you have to text him.

The point is you just don’t know how people are going to communicate. You can’t expect to blindly email somebody and get results.

Whenever we meet up with someone and they give you their business card, we always ask them what their preferred method of communication is. Some will say text, and some will say email. What we do is make a mark on the business card by that method because we want to make sure that we communicate with them in the most quick and convenient method possible.

To Colton’s point, you need to find a way to connect with potential sponsors for your event, or guests who you want to speak at your event. Maybe it’s not a sponsor, but you are looking for content so more people will come to your event. You need to find a way really to connect with them. It is a great point; look on Meetup and find local events in your area. Last year, at CES, we met several people who we interviewed on our podcast this year. We met Polar 3D, 3D Printlife, and other companies. We made personal contacts there, so when we followed up later, they actually knew who we were and responded.

WTF 164 | Planning A Killer 3D Printing Event

Kids fascinated with 3D printing!

Some people in business prefer LinkedIn messages. We actually pay attention to LinkedIn more than email, but our all-time favorite that is blowing my mind this year is how many people communicate via Skype chat. Isn’t that amazing? As a result we now leave our Skype on all the time, but it is not our preferred method because we don’t accept anyone into our Skype circle that we don’t already know. That’s the difference. It’s not a good way to randomly contact us; it is only with people we already know.

But LinkedIn is how Colton got in touch with us the first time and asked to be on our podcast. He asked us some questions via LinkedIn, and we said, “Why don’t you come on the podcast and we will talk about it in depth together?” He hit on the method that we respond to the most.

This podcast really points out more than just exciting things about a 3D printing event and how to structure one, but also some good business lessons that are useful in many ways. Here is another one: If you show up for something, you are already doing better than a lot of people.

Similarly, just ask. What have you got to lose? Look at Colton. He is a student. He reached out to Tracy on LinkedIn, wanting to be on our podcast for his event. He asked. We’re into helping local events and spreading the message and promoting education in 3D printing. It helps everybody involved, so why wouldn’t we do it?

Another important take away we want to point out is that you really need to be flexible enough to have a Plan A, a Plan B, and maybe even a Plan C. You have to leave yourself enough time in the planning process to be flexible enough to come up with alternative solutions on the fly. You cannot plan for every contingency; you just can’t do it. So you have to be flexible and creative enough in your thought process to be able to handle that.

Another really good lesson that Colton learned in this is that he is the person who is organizing this event. He is in control of it. In fact, if anything goes wrong, ultimately it is his responsibility.

Don’t just trust that people who say they are going to provide you certain things are solid. Don’t trust that anything is solid. If you book a space several months in advance, follow up with it 60 days before, 30 days before. Confirm. At the end of the day, if there is a curveball thrown your way, you could have prevented it if you had just checked up on it. If it doesn’t work, you have nobody to blame but yourself. Even though the circumstances may not be something you actually did, but you can’t make excuses at the end of the day if the event is a failure because all of a sudden everybody shows up and the space got double-booked. You have to double-check. Take responsibility, and put a plan in place to double- and triple-check things. Follow up, follow up, follow up. You don’t want to have egg on your face, especially when you are getting other companies involved to help participate in your event.

If you have an event and want to make sure that you are on our list, send us an email to info@3dstartpoint.com. Be sure to check out our list as soon as we have it posted at 3dstartpoint.com, which we will. We will get the directory of events up soon for 2016.

To get in touch with us, go to 3dstartpoint.com or wtfffpodcast.com or shoot us a message at info@wtfffpodcast.com or on our facebook or twitter!

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About Colton Robtoy, CD Printathalon

Colton Robtoy is a student at SUNY (State University of New York) in Albany. He created, planned, and managed the CD Printathalon event in September 2015.

Capital District Printathalon 2015 is an all-weekend 3D Printing Event and Showcase for the Capital Region – Albany, New York. The goal is to introduce people from all over the Northeast to 3D Printing by highlighting leaders in the industry as well as holding a 24-hour 3D Printing Challenge to promote STEM and inspire creation.

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