By Chris Bucholtz

I’ve been a technology and business journalist for 17 years, and during that time I’ve gone to hundreds of conferences. Press people have the luxury of being able to get time with specific people away from the official show activities, but I have sat in on my share of sessions as well, hoping to glean some inside knowledge and to understand where the average attendee is coming from.

By Chris Bucholtz

The nice thing about a show like SugarCon is that it brings together people from all parts of the CRM ecosystem – IT people, business strategists, developers, partners, pundits and the vendors themselves. This year, we’ve made a specific effort to help more users – and potential users – gain an understanding of the full power of CRM by creating a “CRM 101” track in the show sessions.

By Chris Bucholtz

Themes for trade shows are often over-the-top bombastic, or they’re so generic and milquetoast that they barely register with the attendees. I’ve been to many, and I must say that I remember exactly zero themes for major shows (although I think the theme of Oracle Open World 2010 was “Larry Likes Boats”).