Entrepreneur Show this weekend

Pines

I saw this event is on in the RDS on Friday 23rd /Saturday 24th. Looked like it might be useful to startup businesses.

bon ami

Should be worth a visit quite a few presentations and exhibitors who will be worth talking to.

MidlandsM

Tickets from €20 - whose the entrepreneurs behind this?

kitesurfingbum

Went this morning, there were a lot of empty stands !!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Those which were occupied had limited products to offer,

• mainly show caseing for the products which the dragons have invested in (surf seeds etc...) and one just showing a video of Sean Gallagher (Sad!!!!!!!)
• firms offering franchises
• networking groups (BNI, ISME , Dublin Chamber and a few I have never heard of)
• Motivational self help groups, you know the ones who advertise late night on tv, "Buy my book and make a million $",

went to two talks and left early.

(no security on door when I got there, so I didn't have to pay at least I save €20!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!)

Joseph

I'm heading in in the morning, hopefully it will be more busy - perhaps it was just due to it being a weekday morning kite?

MidlandsM

I think real entrepeneurs know what this show really is about.

sweetdreamsire

I went to this yesterday and as a complete start up i found a lot of it very benefical. Meet with quiet a few people that were able to steer me in a new direction to what i was heading and it made complete sense. Google are there doing seminars which gave me personally quiet a few tips. I would agree that the stands in the main arena on the whole were not great but i did pick up a couple of things. Would i recommend ? well for €20 i would. If you only pick up one or two things there its one or two things worthwhile.

Cianos

I'm going to have a look today, will post back later.

waxon-waxoff

This was not advertised very well, i only heard an ad for it earlier this week. The logo for Boards.ie appears on the home page of their website actually.

I think €20 is too much, especially when you dont know whats going to be there. Many of these entrepreneur shows are free to attend and sponsored by a state body of some sort. That gives them more credibility than a PR company who are in it for the money.

The website does not give times for the speechs and events so i didnt like the idea of hanging around waiting for something to happen, so that and the fee put me off.

Rogue-Trooper

waxon-waxoff wrote: »

I think €20 is too much, especially when you dont know whats going to be there. Many of these entrepreneur shows are free to attend and sponsored by a state body of some sort. That gives them more credibility than a PR company who are in it for the money.

The website does not give times for the speechs and events so i didnt like the idea of hanging around waiting for something to happen, so that and the fee put me off.

You obviously didn't look at the website very closely. The seminar schedule is here and the list of exhibitors is here.

I really can't see any of our state agencies funding something of this scale in the current climate - the best efforts I've seen from state bodies is a couple of tables in a crappy hotel conference room.

sweetdreamsire wrote: »

I went to this yesterday and as a complete start up i found a lot of it very benefical. Meet with quiet a few people that were able to steer me in a new direction to what i was heading and it made complete sense. Google are there doing seminars which gave me personally quiet a few tips. I would agree that the stands in the main arena on the whole were not great but i did pick up a couple of things. Would i recommend ? well for €20 i would. If you only pick up one or two things there its one or two things worthwhile.

I agree with everything you've said. I thought the €20 entrance fee was worth it and although most of the exhibits and some of the lectures were of no interest to me, the few contacts and bits of information I took away made it money and time well spent.

Highlight of the day for me was the 'inspirational talk' by Sean Gallagher. I can't abide bullsh1t and that guy really speaks plain English and makes loads of sense.

I don't consider myself an 'entrepreneur' but I do run my own business and am glad I went today. I believe it is the first time anything like this has been run and was a good effort however there is massive room for improvement. Was it worth €20? Yes. Would I go again? Yes.

Low point of the day? Not winning the iPad that Blueface were giving away on their stand!!:p

Southsider1

waxon-waxoff wrote: »

This was not advertised very well, i only heard an ad for it earlier this week. The logo for Boards.ie appears on the home page of their website actually.

I think €20 is too much, especially when you dont know whats going to be there. Many of these entrepreneur shows are free to attend and sponsored by a state body of some sort. That gives them more credibility than a PR company who are in it for the money.

The website does not give times for the speechs and events so i didnt like the idea of hanging around waiting for something to happen, so that and the fee put me off.

I don't agree. I've seen and heard ads for it over the past few weeks. The website has all the times, speakers and topics on it failry clearly. I'd say it looked pretty worthwhile and would have liked to have gone.

waxon-waxoff

In reply to Rogue trooper, state agencies often have free events like this, on a smaller scale maybe, but not a money maker for a PR and events company. By state agencies i mean anybody who gets funding from the public purse, including colleges. DCEB, DIT and NCIRL have all had events for entrepreneurs which i have attended. There were some good guest speakers, people like Denis O'Brien and Ben Dunne.

Im getting a little tired of the Dragons now, im suspicious of people who self publicise so much.

bucks

I popped into this on Friday after catching a last minute flight home from London and i have to say i was impressed by the scale of the whole setup. I was expecting little rooms with only a few chairs and tables for the speakers etc.. but instead they put on a massive production with stages, lighting etc...

The only areas of real interest to me were the google & tech talks as that is my core business but the invest test turned out to be very entertaining. I really dont have much time for exhibitor stalls but again the google one was very informative.

Was it worth the entrance fee? Yes, i even aquired a few leads for future work however i was dissapointed by the not seeing the likes of enterprise Ireland and the other associated government departments, upon further investigation i learned that they were not in attendance due to lack of budget!! Disgracefull considering they keep harping on about how we should be all doing our bit to try and revive the economy.

Shows like this will always be tough to pull off 100% on the first year but considering the economic climate we are in they get 100% for effort!

@ waxon-waxoff: Believe it or not the show wasnt run by a large PR events company, instead a self made entrepreneur from somewhere in the midlands organsised it and appartently it was his first time running such an event, that takes balls considering the scale of it and the economy!! A true entrepreneur!

Cianos

I thought it was ok. I was hoping for more educational resources on the main floor rather than just companies setting up booths to promote themselves. I talked with a couple of nice people and hopefully made some good connections but I definitely think the show was more suited to those already established in business rather than budding entrepreneurs. As someone already said, having the likes of enterprise Ireland there giving one on one advice and guidance would have made it more worth attending.

I thought €20 was a bit steep for what really was a showcase of exhibiting businesses, most of which most people wouldn't have any interest in interacting with.

Hopefully they will make some improvements and put on a better show next year.

Axwell

Cianos wrote: »

As someone already said, having the likes of enterprise Ireland there giving one on one advice and guidance would have made it more worth attending.

The CEB has a desk setup the minute you walked in giving one to one advice and had lots of brochures and booklets.

Have to agree a lot of the other stands werent much use to people starting out and some of them were just exposure for those that had been on Dragons Den. Same with some of the guest speakers that were there and when they talked about their business it wasnt how they got into it, the pitfalls they faced, advice etc it was more an explanation of their business and what they do and if you had already seem them on Dragons Den you knew all this. I still found it enjoyable though and it was good to see in times like this how many people are setting up businesses.

Joseph

Overall it was very good and it has changed my opinions of some of the dragons.

Gavin Duffy spent the whole time promoting the things hes invested in and dancing in the isles for some reason? Had intended on chatting to him afterwards - definetly put me off.

Sean Gallagher was absolutely excellent, best speaker there - couldn't fault him.

The mediator group with Niall O'Farrell was very good, the Blueface rep there was excellent.

Seemed like only 60-70% of the Stands were in use and were all nearly promoting a product, good nonetheless

abakan

I found it good. good speaches - i missed Sean's speach(which is a pity)

I found it strange that arriving at the event - there was no flyer etc when I bought my ticket about who was exhibiting the speaches were on.

Some of the exhititors were very good and I enjoyed the speaches that I listened to while there.

Kendlebell Naas

We had a stand there and although the numbers through were not anything like promised the quality of most visitors was good. We picked up some good leads for our Virtual Receptionist Services. I thought that the charge of €20 + €6 for parking was a bit steep given the current climate however , it did ensure that the people attending were genuine. I thought some of the seminars were good and google did a couple of excellent presentations

aidan.connolly

Hi ,

I went on Saturday morning having won the ticket on Boards.ie ( thanks ) .

I found the speakers good, especially Sean Gallagher.
I felt that the time allowed for Q & a was short, but overall the experience was good.

Let's hope this is an Annual event.

Regards

Aidan

chillywilly

I won tickets on facebook, but there was no sign of them getting sent out. So i contacted the guy on facebook....he told me to email the show itself and they would sort out tickets for me, but no one got back to me. Very disappointing

Axwell

chillywilly wrote: »

I won tickets on facebook, but there was no sign of them getting sent out. So i contacted the guy on facebook....he told me to email the show itself and they would sort out tickets for me, but no one got back to me. Very disappointing

I also won tickets and mailed them and was sent the email to download and print the tickets myself. The person was very polite and responded to any quieries so I had a completely different experience than you. Is it possible the emails went into your spam or junk mail? There was a phone number to contact also on the website so I'm sure if you pursued them enough you could have got the tickets to be fair.

chillywilly

Axwell wrote: »

I also won tickets and mailed them and was sent the email to download and print the tickets myself. The person was very polite and responded to any quieries so I had a completely different experience than you. Is it possible the emails went into your spam or junk mail? There was a phone number to contact also on the website so I'm sure if you pursued them enough you could have got the tickets to be fair.

The person who i was dealing with on facebook was also very polite. He apologised and said if i sent an email to a certain email address it would be sorted. They didnt get back to me so i left it. Im not trying to degrade them or slate them, i was just disappointed i didn't get my tickets as i was looking forward to going. It is possible that i could have got got my tickets if I rang but after being told they were going to be sent out to me, and emailing twice I just left it.

It sounded like a couple of the talks would have been beneficial but then again theres always next year

Coyote

did anyone get the google adword voucher they were meant to send out yet?

fishy21

Coyote wrote: »

did anyone get the google adword voucher they were meant to send out yet?

I was wondering the same thing. Who in google should we email?

Coyote

I did not think we needed to email anyone. my understanding was we would get a email from them with a code to use?

fishy21

Coyote wrote: »

I did not think we needed to email anyone. my understanding was we would get a email from them with a code to use?

Yes but after full week no sign of an email, so i thought we should email someone over there.

Coyote

fishy21 wrote: »

Yes but after full week no sign of an email, so i thought we should email someone over there.

well I send them a email but as it's Friday after 7pm on a bank holiday weekend probably be a few days before we hear anything.

fishy21

Coyote wrote: »

well I send them a email but as it's Friday after 7pm on a bank holiday weekend probably be a few days before we hear anything.

Let me know how you get on.

Coyote

fishy21 wrote: »

Let me know how you get on.

just a small update, got a email back from them. they said they will be "passing the info to Google on Tuesday and you should be hearing from them shortly afterwards." so with luck we should hear some thing from google in a week or two. guess we will have to just wait and see.

The Entrepreneur Show

Hi Guys,

Apologies for the delay in the Google Adwords Vouchers, we had a delay in processing this on our end but this has now being sorted and will be passed to Google immediately after the weekend and you should receive information from them on how to avail of your vouchers shortly afterwards.