A month ago, I had the opportunity to attend The Financial Bloggers Conference, affectionately know as FinCon.   As a single person getting her finances in order, I can wholeheartedly say that I am NOT doing this alone.  I’ve got an army of great financial bloggers and podcasters that I subscribe to and they been a huge help to me in my journey to get debt-free.  I met the majority of this “army” at FinCon, the Financial Bloggers Conference organized by Phillip Taylor (find out more about Phillip and his blog, PTMoney, here).

This trip was EXTRA special because the conference was being held in New Orleans, one of the cities I grew up in.  I hadn’t been back in 18 years!  My father made quite an impact while we lived there with his ministry to the homeless and drug-addicted of the inner city and so this trip allowed me to revisit the fruits of his labor and my childhood 🙂

It was an eye-opening experience to say the least. From the first day to the last, I had a BLAST and I can’t wait to go back!

Of course, forever on a mission to NEVER PAY FULL PRICE for anything, I sought out ways to make sure attending FinCon14  would still keep my budget happy and enable me to get the full benefit of the trip.  With that in mind, here are some tips on attending your next conference without paying full price:

Registration Ticket

Always get the Early Bird special.  Tickets for this event went on sale in January or February, so I saved several hundred dollars on registration by purchasing as soon as they went on sale.  How do you make sure you have the money set aside when tickets go on sale?

• Plan what conferences you plan on attending for next calendar year ahead of time.  For example, I have a list of events to attend for 2015 already written up.  I will be attending FinCon15 (of course!) next year, the annual convention for WFG (the investment division of Saidia Financial) as well as various tax-related conferences to meet my continuing education requirements for the EA certification.  Of course, this is all “If the LORD says the same”.
• Have a line item for personal development already set up in your budget, and contribute to that regularly.  It beats trying to come up with the money all at one time.  If you have a business or side hustle, many of the expenses related to attendance are tax-deductible.  Those that know me know that I’m a huge advocate for personal development in several ways, so I have a “book” line item and a “conference/workshop” line item.  Don’t forget to include webinars and virtual conferences that may come up!
• Set a savings buffer in your business savings account for unexpected business expenses.  Sometimes opportunities arise that will take our business to the next level but we have to turn them down because we are unprepared financially to take advantage of them.

Hotel

Instead of staying at the Marriott where the conference would be held, I chose instead to stay in the heart of the city (it’s MY city after all) and at the same time save some serious cash.  I took this opportunity to try out AirBnB after hearing about it for years.  I definitely enjoyed the hospitality AND the cost savings!  My hostess was very nice, even leaving me a bottle of wine in the fridge for my stay and calling/texting me once a day to make sure I was having a good time in the city.   The private studio apartment was sufficient for pretty much the only two things I needed it for, sleep and shower.  I spent most of my time running around the city for the first two days and networking with fellow finance geeks the rest of the week, so not much else was needed as far as lodging anyway.  $95/night for 5 nights instead of $139/night…not bad!

I can definitely say that I will be using AirBnB again for some upcoming business trips I have planned.  An added perk is the good feeling knowing you are contributing to someone else’s side hustle by renting their room or house out.

Food

It definitely helped that breakfast and lunch were sponsored by several different banks at the conference, and dinner by various vendors.  Not having to spend a tourist’s amount of money on food in New Orleans?  Priceless.  Make sure you have money set aside for off-site fellowshipping (is that a word?).  Also make sure  I got the opportunity to have beignets and coffee with Chris Ducker, a leader in the virtual assistance industry and another of my go-to resources.  Check out his mission to help entrepreneurs rescue their time and productivity here.

And since I’m on this green smoothie adventure, I actually brought my Nutribullet  on the trip and went grocery shopping for fruits and veggies as well.  Total cost of eating out and groceries for 6 days (including pit stops): around $60

 Transportation

I worked out different scenarios on transportation the month before attending, ranging from taking the Megabus (approximately $30 each way) and renting a vehicle once I got there (turned out to be way too much) or taking a cab everywhere.  My situation was a little different then most attendees in that I was spending two extra days in New Orleans before the conference and planned on doing a lot of driving to specific areas I needed to visit for the family.  So it turned out that renting a car in Houston and driving to New Orleans was my most cost-efficient course of action.  Total cost for 6 days = $200.08 plus 2 tanks of gas at about $80…about $48/day.

So the moral of the story?  Plan, plan, plan ahead.  Set money aside regularly for those things that are important to you.  Invest in your business by expanding your professional network and attend events that will connect you with influential people that can mentor you.  I came away with so much homework, it’s unreal.  But so very worth it.

What are some events you attend regularly to grow your business and how do you save money to attend?