Sunday afternoon I will travel to the PMA show for the balance of this week. I decided to ask myself what I really want to get out of the show this year and share the resultant thoughts with my readers.

First and foremost, for a whole host of reasons, we have been going fast and furious without much of a break in the action for almost two years now. So, while I am not viewing this trip as a vacation per se, I do plan to find some downtime. When I first planned this trip I was going to try to pre-schedule all the meetings into 1 or 2 days and fly in and out just in the nick of time for the meetings. However, it became clear that it would be impossible to accomplish this 30 days out as I was trying to do. So, instead, I just scheduled myself in town for the entire conference and decided that when I didn’t have meetings I could take some time to engage in much needed creative thinking.

Next, the aforementioned pre-scheduled meetings with existing and potential strategic partners drove the whole need for the trip. Our private servers and OEM type relationships now represent well over half of our business. The ability to meet with 4 or 5 current and perspective clients of this type in one place over a day or two is very appealing, both from a cost and time management perspective. Of course most of those meetings have ended up on the 12 hour plus Tuesday – go figure.

Face-to-face Networking is always a valuable reason to be at a show like PMA. In addition to the clients and potential clients I have meetings scheduled with I am quite certain dozens of business acquaintances will be in attendance. The trick will be connecting with them (see next point).

I will write a blog entry for JimRaffel.com after the show, and will engage in social networking from the show. If you are interested in connecting during the show days please contact me via Twitter or other means you may have.

Last but not least, I will look at all the cool new stuff coming to the consumer photo market (I’m in the market for a new point and shoot digital camera). At the same time I will keep my eyes open for opportunities and ideas.

I am looking forward to a successful and fun #PMA09 (that is the Twitter tag for the show).

Related posts:

1. Thoughts on PMA Show
2. 65-2: New Media vs. Old Media at a Trade Show
3. Twitter Follow Friday – Meet ‘em for Coffee